文章精義

Wénzhāng jīngyì 文章精義

The Essential Principles of Literary Composition by 李耆卿 (撰)

About the work

The Wénzhāng jīngyì 文章精義, in one juǎn, is a Southern Sòng treatise on prose composition (wén) by Lǐ Qíqīng 李耆卿. Cast as a series of compact aphoristic notices arranged loosely by topic — the Classics as fountainhead of prose; the comparative virtues of Hán Yù 韓愈, Liǔ Zōngyuán 柳宗元, Ōuyáng Xiū 歐陽修, Sū Shì 蘇軾, and others; principles of brevity, elaboration, “skill versus clumsiness”; the differing dispositions of the Sū 蘇 (Mín 岷) and Chéng 程 (Luò 洛) traditions — the book ranges across the whole post-Hàn prose tradition. Its great virtue, in the eyes of the Sìkù editors, is its refusal to take sides in the late-Sòng dàoxué polemics: Lǐ assesses the Sū and the Chéng on the literary merits of their writing, declaring that “Sū’s prose does not transcend the zònghéng (rhetorical) tradition; Chéng’s prose does not transcend the xùngǔ (exegetical) tradition” — a balanced judgment that, as the editors observe, “a Southern Sòng writer would seldom dare to make.” The work is also the locus classicus of the famous formulas “Hán wén rú cháo, Sū wén rú hǎi” 韓文如潮，蘇文如海 (“Hán’s prose is like the tide, Sū’s prose is like the sea”) and the “spring silkworm spinning its cocoon” (chūn cán zuò jiǎn 春蠶作繭) image of prose composition, both of which were repeated for centuries without their source being known.

Tiyao

Wénzhāng jīngyì. The book has no transmitted edition; the various bibliographies do not record it. It survives only in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn 永樂大典. It is there attributed simply to one Lǐ Qíqīng, without indication of date, and nothing is known of who Qíqīng was. Examining Jiāo Hóng’s 焦竑 Jīngjí zhì 經籍志, there is a “Lǐ Tú 李塗, Wénzhāng jīngyì, in two juǎn” — both the title and the surname agree with the present text, so Qíqīng is perhaps the zì of Tú. The records leave it unverifiable; whether the work is in one juǎn or two cannot be settled. His discussion of prose takes the Six Classics as its source, refusing to be hemmed in by phonic-prosodic minutiae and chapter-and-verse pedantry; on the difference between skilled and unskilled writing, prolix and concise diction, the sources and outcomes of styles, he distinguishes them one by one as crisply as black and white — he is a man of real critical taste. He says that “Sū’s prose does not transcend the zònghéng tradition; Chéng’s prose does not transcend the xùngǔ tradition” — an even-handed verdict, breaking the partisan division between the Luò 洛 and Mín 岷 schools, and especially one that a Southern Sòng man would not normally bring himself to say. Further, the popular sayings “Hán’s prose like the tide, Sū’s prose like the sea” and the “spring silkworm spinning its cocoon” — formulas in everyday use whose source no one had identified — are now, on examination, found to be in this book. Evidently the book was originally famous and circulated in transcription, so that even after its slender bulk made it prone to loss its phrases survived in oral tradition. After some centuries of obscurity it has now, under our enlightened reign, come to light again — these enduringly compelling formulations doubtless cannot be effaced.

Abstract

The Wénzhāng jīngyì is a one-juǎn aphoristic treatise on prose that stands out, in the late Southern Sòng critical landscape, for two qualities: its insistence on the Classics as the source of wén, and its impartiality across the dàoxué / gǔwén divide. Lǐ’s procedure is to gather short evaluative notices — typically a sentence or two — on individual writers and individual stylistic principles, occasionally arranging them in pairs (“Sū’s prose / Chéng’s prose”), but more often free-standing. The aphoristic form anticipates the later YuánMíng “literary aphorism” (wén lùn 文論) tradition of which Wén shuō 文說 (KR4i0046) is a representative example.

Authorship and date are vexed. The work survives only because the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn preserved a (presumably already shortened) recension, attributed to “Lǐ Qíqīng”, with no date. Jiāo Hóng’s Jīngjí zhì records the same title in two juǎn under “Lǐ Tú”; the Sìkù editors infer that “Qíqīng” is Tú’s zì. No CBDB entry exists for either form. Lǐ’s references — including the well-developed SūChéng polemic — place him after the consolidation of dàoxué in the late twelfth century. Lǐ Yú’s 李漁 Qīng-era references and the work’s quotational presence in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn (the principal collection of pre-Míng texts) make a Southern Sòng date secure; a defensible window is therefore late twelfth to late thirteenth century (1190–1279), adopted here.

The Sìkù recension is the standard. Two phrases — “Hán wén rú cháo, Sū wén rú hǎi” and the chūn cán zuò jiǎn metaphor — passed into the general critical vocabulary, so that for centuries they were quoted with no idea of where they came from; the Sìkù identification of Lǐ’s book as the locus classicus is a small but durable scholarly contribution.

Translations and research

• Guō Shào-yú 郭紹虞, Zhōng-guó wén-xué pī-píng shǐ 中國文學批評史 (Shàng-hǎi gǔ-jí, 1979 rev.), discusses Wén-zhāng jīng-yì in the chapter on late-Sòng critical writing.
• Wáng Yùn-xī 王運熙 and Gù Yì-shēng 顧易生 (eds.), Zhōng-guó wén-xué pī-píng tōng shǐ — Sòng Jīn Yuán juǎn 中國文學批評通史—宋金元卷 (Shàng-hǎi gǔ-jí, 1996) — places the work in late-Sòng gǔ-wén theory.
• The Wén-zhāng jīng-yì is reprinted in Wáng Shuǐ-zhào’s 王水照 multi-volume Lì-dài wén-huà huì biān 歷代文話彙編 (Fù-dàn dà-xué, 2007), the standard modern corpus of Chinese prose-criticism.
• Stephen Owen, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought (Harvard, 1992), discusses Lǐ’s aphorisms in his treatment of late-Sòng wén-criticism (pp. 421–423 et passim).

Other points of interest

The book is interesting not only for its content but for the manner of its transmission: an example of a once-widely-cited Sòng critical work that survived not through any catalog tradition but through (i) oral repetition of its catchphrases, and (ii) the conservative preservation policy of the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn. The Sìkù reconstruction made it available again; the modern Lìdài wénhuà huì biān gives it its first proper critical edition.

Links

• Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §30.5.
• Kyoto Zinbun Sìkù tíyào
• Wikidata Q11160033 (文章精義).