Wèixuān wénjí 未軒文集
Not-Yet-Pavilion Literary Collection by 黃仲昭 (撰)
About the work
The literary collection of Huáng Zhòngzhāo 黃仲昭 (1435–1508; given name Qián 潛, used his zì in life), hào Wèixuān 未軒, of Pútián 莆田 (Xīnghuà, Fújiàn) — the third of the Hànlín sān jūnzǐ 翰林三君子 caned and demoted in Chénghuà 3 (1467) for memorialising against the Inner-Court Lantern-display (章懋 KR4e0126, 莊㫤 KR4e0127, 黃仲昭). 12 juǎn — 6 of prose, 5 of poetry, 1 of cí, with additional poetry-prose and an epitaph appended. Compiled by his disciple Liú Jié 劉節. Unlike Zhāng and Zhuāng who in retirement turned to jiǎngxué (lecture-teaching), Huáng turned to zhìshū (gazetteer-compilation) — Bāmǐn tōngzhì, Yánpíng fǔzhì, Shàowǔ fǔzhì, Nánpíng xiànzhì, Xīnghuà fǔzhì. Lín Hàn 林瀚’s epitaph for him praises his prose: húnhòu diǎnzhòng, wú jiānshēn áokǎo zhī yǔ — thick-and-weighty, without difficult-deep / rasping-stiff language.
Tiyao
Wèixuān wénjí in 12 juǎn — by Huáng Zhòngzhāo of the Míng. Zhòngzhāo’s given name is Qián 潛; he went by his zì; native of Pútián. Chénghuà bǐngxū (1466) jìnshì; office reached Jiāngxī tíxué qiānshì. This collection was compiled by his disciple Liú Jié: 6 juǎn of prose, 5 of poetry, 1 of cí, with poetry-prose and epitaphs appended. When Zhòngzhāo was biānxiū, together with Zhāng Mào and Zhuāng Chāng in memorialising against yuánxiāo yānhuǒ (the New-Year fireworks/lanterns) poems, they were caned at court and demoted in office; at the time they were called the Hànlín sān jūnzǐ. Later Mào and Chāng both made jùtú jiǎngxué (gathering-pupils-and-lecturing) their occupation, while Zhòngzhāo alone kèyì jìshù (devoted himself to commemorative writing) — the Bāmǐn tōngzhì, Yánpíng fǔzhì, Shàowǔ fǔzhì, Nánpíng xiànzhì, Xīnghuà fǔzhì are all his compilation-record. Therefore Fēngshān and Dìngshān’s name fills the world; Zhòngzhāo’s nearly being eclipsed by them. Yet the three men’s qìjié (breath-of-conduct) is the same, their being-in-office qīngjiè (pure-isolated) the same, their prose’s zhìshí (substantial-real) is roughly the same — one cannot, because Zhòngzhāo dǔzhì lìxíng (sincerely-aimed and firmly-practised) and did not produce yǔlù (recorded-sayings), thus distinguish higher-or-lower among them. Lín Hàn’s composition of Zhòngzhāo’s epitaph praises his zuòwéi wénzhāng húnhòu diǎnzhòng wú jiānshēn áokǎo zhī yǔ — “in the making of literature, thick and weighty, with no difficult-deep, rasping-stiff language”; Zhèng Yuè’s Púyáng wénxiàn zhuàn also says his Wèixuān jí in some juǎn is wéncí diǎnyǎ (literary diction is elegant). Now examining his collection: though still flowing in the píngshí zhī gé (level-substantial style) of his day, with character of person already high, naturally without bǐyǔ (vulgar speech). To stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the makers — one should not, because of his tǎnyì (level-easy), treat it as a defect. Compiled and presented in the sixth month of Qiánlóng 43 (1778). Compilers as usual.
Abstract
The third panel of the Hànlín sān jūnzǐ triptych. The Sìkù judgement here is unusually self-conscious: the editors note that the Three Gentlemen’s joint memorial against the Inner-Court Lantern-display made them equally famous in Chénghuà 3 (1467), yet by Qiánlóng times the names of Zhāng Mào (Fēngshān) and Zhuāng Chāng (Dìngshān) “filled the world” while Huáng — who turned away from jiǎngxué toward gazetteer-work and never produced a yǔlù — was nearly eclipsed. The editors’ explicit recovery is on character-grounds: same qìjié, same qīngjiè in office, same zhìshí in prose. This is one of the cleaner cases in the entire Sìkù Míng biéjí of the editors recovering a forgotten remonstrant as a deliberate documentary act.
The five Fújiàn gazetteers compiled by Huáng — Bāmǐn tōngzhì, Yánpíng, Shàowǔ, Nánpíng, Xīnghuà — are the principal Míng-mid documentary basis for Fújiàn provincial historiography and are independently catalogued; Bāmǐn tōngzhì survives complete and is a Sìkù cúnmù (catalogue-only) text. The present Wèixuān wénjí therefore preserves Huáng’s literary side; his gazetteer-output is the larger documentary mass elsewhere.
The catalog meta gives no dates; CBDB id 67703 supplies 1435–1508. Given name Qián 潛 noted; he is invariably cited by his zì Zhòngzhāo.
Translations and research
- L. Carrington Goodrich and Chaoying Fang, eds., Dictionary of Ming Biography 1368–1644. New York: Columbia UP, 1976: notice of Huáng Zhòng-zhāo.
- Míng shǐ j. 179 — Huáng Zhòng-zhāo biography.
- Joseph Dennis, Writing, Publishing, and Reading Local Gazetteers in Imperial China, 1100–1700. Harvard Asia Center, 2015 — for the mid-Míng Fú-jiàn gazetteer corpus.
- Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, §28 (Míng bié-jí) and §22 (gazetteer literature).
Other points of interest
Huáng’s identity as the gazetteer-author of the Three Gentlemen — and the Sìkù explicit recovery of him on character-grounds against the post-Míng historical eclipse — makes this entry an unusual locus for the Sìkù’s editorial logic on factional-memory preservation. The five Fújiàn gazetteers (with the Bāmǐn tōngzhì the leading provincial gazetteer of mid-Míng) are the documentary mass of his career.