Xūzhāi yuèfǔ 虛齋樂府
Yuè-fǔ of the Empty Studio by 趙以夫 (撰)
About the work
The Xūzhāi yuèfǔ 虛齋樂府 is the SBCK two-juǎn (upper and lower) cí collection of Zhào Yǐfū 趙以夫 (1189–1256; zì Yòngfù 用父, hào Xūzhāi 虛齋 / Zhīshān lǎorén 芝山老人), a Sòng imperial-clan member who reached Cānzhī zhèngshì 參知政事 in the late Chúnyòu period. The collection is closed by Zhào’s own postface dated Chúnyòu jǐyǒu 淳祐己酉 (1249) Mid-Autumn, in which he refers to himself as “Zhīshān lǎorén” and explains the collection’s genesis: he had himself written nothing systematic but his son’s pupil retrieved discarded drafts; Huáng Yùquán 黃玉泉 had recorded several dozen pieces from memory; the two were combined into the present volume. The collection sits in the late-Southern-Sòng prosodic-school stream: Jiāng Kuí 姜夔’s Jiǎo zhāo 角招 and Zhǐ zhāo 徵招 are explicitly cited and matched (in the Jiǎo zhāo’s headnote: “Jiāng Báishí 姜白石 made the Jiǎo zhāo and Zhǐ zhāo — I composed a plum-flower piece and sang it to the Jiǎo zhāo, since the old yuèfǔ Dàméihuā Xiǎoméihuā are both in the jiǎo-mode”).
Tiyao
No tíyào in the SBCK source file; Zhào Yǐfū’s own 1249 postface follows. — The Sìkù tíyào for this text is at the corresponding WYG entry (which the catalog meta does not record for this id); the SBCK is the principal modern witness.
Zhào Yǐfū’s own postface (Chúnyòu jǐyǒu / 1249, Mid-Autumn, signed Zhīshān lǎorén): “The Táng saw more than a thousand authors named in the shī; the cí-tunes apart from the Huājiān jí are not many recorded — and màncí especially are seldom recorded. In our dynasty’s peace-and-plenty, Liǔ Qíqīng 柳永 and Zhōu Měichéng 周邦彥 succeeded each other in writing new patterns; the various houses then enlarged again; the tunes are now complete. Those who later lean on their music find that when the words are crafted the sound is not always harmonious; when the sound is harmonious the words are not always crafted — this is its difficulty. In ordinary times I did not press myself to gather them up; whenever I matched-and-yielded among friends I would just throw them away. My pupil Xīzǐ 奚子 happens by, from the old book retrieves broken drafts, and from Huáng Yùquán has noted-down several dozen pieces — together one volume. I laughed and said: literature is a small art, all the more so the chángduǎnjù; now I am old, can do no more. So I write this at the back, to record my failings.”
Abstract
The Xūzhāi yuèfǔ is preserved in the SBCK (number 0500) in two juǎn (upper and lower), reproducing a Southern-Sòng cutting. The upper volume contains around twenty-seven cí (including three Tàn chūn màn 探春慢, three Lóngshān huì 龍山會, three Yì jiù yóu màn 憶舊游慢, three Qìn yuán chūn 沁園春, six Hè xīn láng 賀新郎); the lower volume contains the famous matching-pieces to Jiāng Kuí 姜夔 — Àn xiāng 暗香, Shū yǐng 疏影 — alongside Wěi fàn 尾犯, two Yàn chūn tái 燕春臺, and Yù zhú xīn 玉燭新. Modern editions: the Quán Sòng cí of Táng Guīzhāng 唐圭璋 preserves around 80 cí; Cí Bǎojuān 慈寶娟, Zhào Yǐfū jí jiàozhù (2010s) gives a critical edition. The Sòng shǐ (vol. 423) preserves Zhào’s biography: imperial-clan descendant via Sòng Tàizōng’s [Zhào Tíngměi] branch, jìnshì of Jiādìng 10 / 1217, governorships at Línglíng, Sìmíng (Níngbō) and elsewhere across the Bǎoqìng–Chúnyòu period; reached Cānzhī zhèngshì under Lǐzōng. The cí are mostly post-1230, with explicit Mid-Autumn / Double-Ninth / Qīngmíng pieces from Sìmíng (Yuèhú 月湖, Jiǔxiān shān 九僊山) and Niànshēng / Imperial-birthday pieces from his court tenure. The matching-Jiāng-Kuí pieces (Àn xiāng, Shū yǐng, Jiǎo zhāo) anchor Zhào in the Báishí line of late-Southern-Sòng prosodic cí — alongside Wú Wényīng 吳文英 and Zhāng Yán 張炎 (whose Shānzhōng báiyún cí would be at KR4j0052).
Translations and research
- Táng Guī-zhāng 唐圭璋 et al., Quán Sòng cí 全宋詞 (Zhōng-huá shū-jú, 1965; rev. 1999), vol. 4 — collated corpus.
- Wú Xióng-hé 吳熊和 and others, Sòng cí biān-nián xì-dì 宋詞編年系地 — Zhào Yǐ-fū chronology.
- Sòng shǐ 423 — zhuàn of Zhào Yǐ-fū.
Other points of interest
Zhào’s matching of Jiāng Kuí’s Jiǎo zhāo and Zhǐ zhāo tunes — using the jiǎo-mode prosody for a plum-blossom piece in conscious continuation of the ancient Dàméihuā / Xiǎoméihuā lineage — is one of the most theoretically self-conscious gestures in the late-Sòng cí; the headnote essentially restates Jiāng’s prosodic program. The volume’s matching to Jiāng Kuí’s Àn xiāng and Shū yǐng — among the most-imitated tune-pairs in the late-imperial cí — adds Zhào to the canonical “hé Báishí” lineage along with Wú Wényīng, Zhāng Yán, and the late-Qīng revivalists.