北郭集

Běiguō jí 北郭集

The North-Suburb Collection by 徐賁 (撰)

About the work

Běiguō jí 北郭集 in six juǎn (catalog meta records 6 juǎn WYG; the SBCK source preface speaks of ten juǎn) is the literary collection of Xú Bēn 徐賁 (1335–1380), zì Yòuwén 幼文, hào Běiguō shēng 北郭生, native of Wúchéng 吳城 (Sūzhōu). One of the canonical Wúzhōng Sìjié 吳中四傑 with KR4e0029 Gāo Qǐ, KR4e0041 Yáng Jī, and KR4e0042 Zhāng Yǔ. Refused service under Zhāng Shìchéng 張士誠 in the late Yuán and retreated with Zhāng Yǔ to Wúxīng 吳興 — Zhāng to Qīngshān 菁山, Xú to Shǔshān 蜀山 (both retreats in modern Húzhōu). Summoned in Hóngwǔ 9 (1376) and appointed gěishìzhōng 給事中, then jiānchá yùshǐ 監察御史; sent out as àn Shānxī 按山西, promoted to Guǎngxī cānzhèng 廣西參政, then Hénán zuǒ bùzhèngshǐ 河南左布政使. Died in office c. 1380, traditionally regarded as worked to death in his post or imprisoned and starved (the latter per the standard biographies). The preface in the SBCK base — by an early-Míng townsman of Wúxīng — gives the textual history: the collection was not transmitted for over a century; Zhāng Qǐáo 張企翺 (the Guǎngdōng qiānxiàn who also re-cut Yáng Jī’s KR4e0041 Méiān jí) had it cut at his own expense; his fellow-townsman wrote the preface on his commission.

Prefaces

Anonymous preface (signature damaged in the SBCK source), titled Běiguō jí xù 北郭集序, addressed to Zhāng Qǐáo 張企翺. The preface gives Xú’s life: native of Wúchéng, residing outside the Wàngqí gate 望齊門外; precocious talent; verse renown; verse-exchange partner of Gāo Jìdí, Yáng Mèngzǎi, and Zhāng Láiyí of Xúnyáng — “Wúzhōng therefore compared Gāo, Yáng, Zhāng, Xú to the Táng Sìjié” (the canonical formulation of the Wúzhōng Sìjié designation, here explicitly tied to the Táng analogy). Under the false Wú [Zhāng Shìchéng] regime, when “the kǔn 閫 was opened and worthies sought” (i.e. the rebel court tried to recruit literati), Xú refused and retreated with Zhāng Yǔ to Wúxīng — Zhāng to Qīngshān, Xú to Shǔshān (both yōushèng retreats). In Hóngwǔ 9 (1376) on recommendation entered court as gěishìzhōng, then jiānchá yùshǐ; sent out as àn Shānxī, promoted Guǎngxī cānzhèng, Hénán zuǒ bùzhèngshǐ; “everywhere had merciful governance”; died in office. His verse collection bears the name Běiguō jí; contains yuèfǔ, five- and seven-character ancient and regulated, páilǜ, five- six- and seven-character juéjù, and liánjù — ten juǎn in all. Master has been gone for over a hundred years and the collection has had no transmission. The preface frames Xú’s career in Yì 易 terms: “his early holding-back was for the quánshēn yuǎnhài 全身遠害” (the Hexagram Tún 屯 liùsān 六三 reading); “later, on entering the splendid dynasty, traversing the inner and outer, he was able to put his Way into practice and to make his verse famous in the age” (the Hexagram Jiàn 漸 shàngjiǔ 上九 reading).

Abstract

Xú Bēn’s lifedates 1335–1380 are taken from the catalog meta (consistent with the standard biographical references; CBDB id 34387 records the name without dates). The narrative is the standard Wúzhōng Sìjié arc — refusal of service under Zhāng Shìchéng, retreat to a mountain retreat in Wúxīng (here Shǔshān, alongside Zhāng Yǔ at Qīngshān), summons to Hóngwǔ service from 1376, rapid rise through ànchá and cānzhèng posts, death in office c. 1380. The DMB notice has Xú dying in prison in 1380 on charges of failing to properly maintain commissariat for Hóngwǔ’s armies in the north; the preface’s softer “died in office” reflects later mid-Míng decorum.

The unusual feature of the Běiguō jí among the Sìjié’s collections is that it preserves Xú’s pre-Hóngwǔ Wúxīng retreat verse — the Shǔshān poems — as a distinct register from his later official verse. The preface’s elaborate framing of Xú’s pre-1376 retreat as quánshēn yuǎnhài (a Yì-classics doctrine of self-preservation) is one of the most explicit early-Míng prefatory defenses of yìmín withdrawal in the face of an illegitimate regional regime. Wilkinson, Chinese History, §28.4, treats Xú as one of the canonical Wúzhōng Sìjié. F. W. Mote, Poet Kao Ch’i (1962), ch. 4, gives the standard Western-language treatment.

The textual history: no Míng-period printing in the century after Xú’s death; Zhāng Qǐáo’s commissioned printing (alongside his recension of Yáng Jī’s Méiān jí KR4e0041) is the parent of the SBCK transmission. The Sìkù WYG recension reduces the ten-juǎn SBCK structure to six juǎn — likely a re-arrangement by genre rather than a textual loss.

Translations and research

• L. Carrington Goodrich and Chaoying Fang, eds. Dictionary of Ming Biography 1368–1644. New York: Columbia UP, 1976. Entry on Xú Bēn (vol. 1, pp. 595–596).
• F. W. Mote. The Poet Kao Ch’i, 1336–1374. Princeton: PUP, 1962. Ch. 4 on the Wú-zhōng Sì-jié.
• Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, §28.4 (Míng bié-jí).

Other points of interest

The pairing of Xú Bēn at Shǔshān 蜀山 and Zhāng Yǔ at Qīngshān 菁山 in the Wúxīng hills during the late-Yuán Zhāng Shìchéng regime is one of the canonical episodes of mid-14th-century literary withdrawal; the two retreats are within about half a day’s walk of each other, and the Wúxīng verse from this period (preserved in Běiguō jí and KR4e0038 / KR4e0042 Jìngjū jí) constitutes a documentary witness to the Sìjié’s pre-Hóngwǔ literary community.

Links

• Xu Ben (Wikipedia, Chinese)
• Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, §28.4 (Míng biéjí).