Shǎoshì shānfáng jí 少室山房集
Shǎo-shì Mountain Studio Collection by 胡應麟 (撰), 江湛然 (輯)
About the work
The massive 120-juǎn literary collection of Hú Yìnglín 胡應麟 (1551–1602), zì originally Yuánruì 元瑞, changed to Míngruì 明瑞, hào Shàoshì shānrén 少室山人 / Shíyángshēng 石羊生, of Lánxī 蘭溪 (Zhèjiāng). Hú was a Wànlì 丙子 (1576) jǔrén; never jìnshì; he wandered to the Hòu Qī Zǐ circles of Lǐ Pānlóng and Wáng Shìzhēn and became their leading second-generation theoretical voice. His major works include the Shīsǒu 詩藪 — the most influential single Míng shīhuà (poetry-criticism) treatise — and the Sìbù zhèngé 四部正譌 (Corrections to Errors in the Four Divisions), the foundational text of Míng biànwèi (forgery-detection) scholarship. The 120-juǎn WYG recension is the Wànlì wùwǔ (1618) consolidated edition by Jiāng Zhànrán 江湛然 (a Shèrén / Hùizhōu native) during his tenure as Jīnhuá tōngpàn. The collection is a consolidation of about 20 separately-circulated sub-collections, of which Wáng Shìzhēn’s Shíyángshēng zhuàn lists the names: YùYān, huánYuè, jìxié, yánqī, wòyóu, bàoshèng, Sāndòng, Liǎngdū, Lányīn, Jīyuán. Zhū Yízūn’s Míngshī zōng records different sub-titles: Hándān, Huáyáng, Yǎngkē, Lóujiāng, Báiyú, Húshàng, Qīngxiá. Hú’s lifetime practice was to suí zuò suí kè biéběn dānxíng (“each work as composed was separately cut and circulated”); the differing sub-title lists in Wáng and Zhū’s records reflect each-having-seen-what-was-available.
Tiyao
Shǎoshì shānfáng jí in 120 juǎn — by Hú Yìnglín of the Míng. Yìnglín, zì Yuánruì, changed to zì Míngruì, native of Lánxī. Wànlì bǐngzǐ (1576) jǔrén. Once travelled with Lǐ Pānlóng and Wáng Shìzhēn; what he composed Shīsǒu — all fùhé (matching-and-attaching) to Shìzhēn’s Yìyuàn zhīyán. Hence later detractors-of-the-Seven-Masters together with Yìnglín chì zhī (rejected him). Yet his prose-and-poetry’s bǐlì hóngchàng (brush-strength imposing-and-fluent), augmented by his xióngbó zhī cái (imposing-broad talent), also is quite zònghéng biànhuà (longitudinal-horizontal, transformative), bù jǐn wèi fēngqì suǒ yòu (not entirely fenced-in by the era-air). At the Jiājìng to Lóngqìng end, when students yǐ mófǎng piāoqiè wéi shì (took imitation and plagiarism as occupation), and kōngshū yǎnlòu (empty-thin, slow-shabby) was all-not-avoided — Yìnglín alone could gēndǐ qúnjí, fā wèi wénzhāng (“root-anchor in the many books, issue into prose”) — although somewhat injured by rǒngzá (cluttered-mixed), his jìsòng yānbó (memorization broad-and-deep) is also one age’s qiàochǔ (uplifted-standing-out) talent.
This work is headed by Wáng Shìzhēn’s composed Shíyángshēng zhuàn (Biography of the Stone-Sheep-Born), saying Yìnglín has YùYān, huánYuè, jìxié, yánqī, wòyóu, bàoshèng, Sāndòng, Liǎngdū, Lányīn, Jīyuán various collections — totally more than 20 juǎn. Zhū Yízūn’s Míngshī zōng separately records Hándān, Huáyáng, Yǎngkē, Lóujiāng, Báiyú, Húshàng, Qīngxiá various collections — without Sāndòng and Jīyuán names. Surely while Yìnglín was alive, his various collections were all suí zuò suí kè biéběn dānxíng (“each work composed was separately cut and circulated”); Shìzhēn and Yízūn each according-to-what-they-saw — hence the names have differences. This collection is Wànlì wùwǔ by the Shèrén Jiāng Zhànrán at the time of Jīnhuá tōngpàn — what he cut — the hébiān zhī běn (combined-edition copy). Compiled and presented in the fifth month of Qiánlóng 43 (1778). Compilers as usual.
Abstract
Hú Yìnglín of Lánxī is the principal second-generation Hòu Qī Zǐ theoretical voice — the figure who systematized the Wáng Shìzhēn Yìyuàn zhīyán program into the Shīsǒu 詩藪 (the most influential Míng shīhuà) — and also one of the founders of Míng biànwèi (forgery-detection) scholarship via the Sìbù zhèngé 四部正譌. The 120-juǎn WYG recension is the Jiāng Zhànrán 1618 consolidated edition that brought together about 20 separately-circulated sub-collections; the differing sub-title lists in Wáng Shìzhēn (in the appended Shíyángshēng zhuàn) and Zhū Yízūn (in Míngshī zōng) reflect the suí zuò suí kè (each-work-as-composed-was-cut) circulation pattern. The collection’s importance for Míng intellectual history is concentrated in: (i) the consolidated biéjí prose and verse; (ii) the supplementary documentation of Hú’s biànwèi methodology, jìsòng yānbó (broad memorization); (iii) the appended Wáng Shìzhēn-authored biography — itself an important critical document.
The 1-juǎn appendix Shíyángshēng zhuàn by Wáng Shìzhēn is the canonical biographical document of Hú Yìnglín.
Date bracket: 1576 (Hú’s jǔrén, earliest sub-collection) — 1618 (the Wànlì wùwǔ consolidated edition). Composition window ends with Hú’s death in 1602. CBDB 34738 confirms 1551–1602.
Translations and research
- Robert E. Hegel, The Novel in Seventeenth-Century China (New York: Columbia UP, 1981) — context for late-Míng critical and editorial culture.
- Stephen Owen, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought (Cambridge, MA: Harvard, 1992) — translates portions of Shī-sǒu.
- L. Carrington Goodrich and Chaoying Fang, eds., Dictionary of Ming Biography 1368–1644. New York: Columbia UP, 1976: full entry on Hú Yìng-lín.
- Susan Cherniack, “Book Culture and Textual Transmission in Sung China,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies — context for the biàn-wèi tradition Hú extended.
- Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, §28 (Míng bié-jí) and §6 (textual scholarship).
Other points of interest
The HúWáng Shìzhēn friendship and Wáng’s Shíyángshēng zhuàn are foundational documents of late-Míng literary patronage; the suí zuò suí kè circulation pattern of Hú’s many sub-collections is a useful case-study of Míng pre-consolidation biéjí circulation.