6. The Riddle of the Sphinx: Lin Fengmian and the Polemics of Realism in Modern Chinese Painting
1. Mu Xin 木心, “Shuangchong beidao” 雙重悲悼 (Double mourning), Xiongshi meishu 雄獅美術 (Lion art), 248; quoted from Zheng Chao 鄭朝, “Kangri zhanzheng zhong de Lin Fengmian” 抗日戰爭中的林風眠 (Lin Fengmian in the middle of the Second Sino-Japanese War), in Lin Fengmian yanjiu wenji 林風眠研究文集 (Critical studies of Lin Fengmian) (Taipei: Gelin guoji youxian gongsi, 1990), vol. 2, 231.
2. Ai Qing 艾青, “Caise de shi” 彩色的詩 (Poetry in color), in Ai Qing shi quanji 艾青诗全集 (The poetry of Ai Qing) (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 2003), vol. 2, 1300–1303.
6. “零亂中求統一，參錯中求平衡。” Ibid., 1302.
7. For a survey of modern Chinese literary realism, see, for example, David Der-wei Wang, Fictional Realism in Twentieth-Century Chinese Fiction: Mao Dun, Lao She, Shen Congwen (New York: Columbia University Press, 1992); Marston Anderson, The Limits of Realism: Chinese Fiction in the Revolutionary Age (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990).
8. For instance, Huang Danhui 黃丹麾 and Liu Xiaotao 劉曉陶，Xu Beihong yu Lin Fengmian 徐悲鴻與林風眠 (Xu Beihong and Lin Fengmian) (Shenyang: Liaoning jiaoyu chubanshe, 2002).
9. For more on Lin Fengmian’s life and career, see Lang Shaojun 郎紹君，Lin Fengmian 林風眠 (Taipei: Yishujia chubanshe 2004); Hong Kong Museum of Art, Shiji xianqu: Lin Fengmian yishuzhan 世紀先驅：林風眠藝術展 (A pioneer of modern Chinese painting: on the exhibition of Li Fengmian’s paintings) (Hong Kong: Hong Kong Museum of Art, 2007); Lin Fengmian de shijie 林風眠的世界 (The world of Lin Fengmian) (Taipei: Minshengbao, 2000).
10. Lang Shaojun, Lin Fengmian, 20.
11. Ling Fengmian’s classmate in Paris Lin Wenzheng’s 林文錚 description, quoted from Lang Shaojun, “Zhuoyue de xiandaixing zhuiqiu: Lin Fengmian de huihua tansuo” 卓越的現代性追求：林風眠的繪畫探索 (In pursuit of sublime modernity: the painting experiments of Lin Fengmian), in Shiji xianqu, 10.
12. Lang Shaojun, “Zhuoyue de xiandaixing zhuiqiu,” 10.
13. It has been frequently debated how and when Lin Fengmian and Xu Beihong first met. Xu Beihong left France for China in the summer of 1925. Hoping to raise funds for resuming his study overseas, he took a friend’s advice to stop over in Singapore, where he was commissioned to paint portraits for local businessmen. In his research, Bao Limin 包立民 points out that Xu took an ocean liner from Marseille to Shanghai by way of Singapore in January 1926. He became acquainted with Lin Fengmian on board; Lin was on his voyage home, together with Cai Yuanpei 蔡元培. See Bao, “Xu Lin shouci huimian kaoyi” 徐林首次會面考異 (Research on the first meeting between Xu Zhimo and Lin Fengmian), in Lin Fengmian yanjiu wenjiu, vol. 2, 189–197.
14. For more on Xu Beihong’s activities in his early years, see Xu Boyang 徐伯陽 and Jin Shan 金山, eds., Xu Beihong nianpu 1895–1953 徐悲鴻年譜 1895–1953 (A biographical chronology of Xu Beihong, 1895–1953) (Taipei: Yishujia chubanshe, 1991); Liao Jingwen 廖靜文, Xu Beihong yisheng: wode huiyi 徐悲鴻一生：我的回憶 (The life of Xu Beihong: memories of mine) (Beijing: Zhongguo qingnian chubanshe, 1982); Zhuo Shengge 卓聖格, Xu Beihong yanjiu (A study of Xu Beihong) (Taipei: Taipei shili meishuguan, 1989), chapters 3–4; Chen Chuanxi 陳傳席, Zhongguo huihua lilunshi 中國繪畫理論史 (A history of Chinese painting criticism) (Taipei: Dongda tushu, 1997), 378.
15. Lin Fengmian was appointed to head the new art academy in Beijing when he first came back to China in 1926. In 1927 he took up the directorship of the Hangzhou Art Academy, and during his decade-long tenure there he was able to make the school an incubator for modernism. Among his students would emerge distinguished modern artists such as Zao Wou-ki (Zhao Wuji), Huang Yongyu, Hsi Teh-chin 席德進 (Xi Dejin), Li Keran 李可染, and Chu Teh-chun 朱德群 (Zhu Dequn).
16. Xu Beihong, “Zhongguo hua gailiang zhi fangfa” 中國畫改良之方法 (Methods of reforming Chinese painting), Xu Beihong yishu lunwen ji 徐悲鴻藝術論文集 (Xu Behong’s critical writings on art) (Taipei: Yishujia chubanshe, 1987), vol. 1, 41; “Zhongxi hua de fenye: zai Xinjiapo huaren meishuhui jianghua” 中西畫的分野: 在新加坡華人美術會講話 (The difference between Chinese and Western art: a talk at the Chinese art association in Singapore), quoted from Chen Chuanxi, Zhongguo huihua lilunshi, 378; “Zhongxue meishu jiaocai ji jiaoxue fangfa” 中學美術教材及教學方法 (Pedagogical tools and methods of high school art education), quoted from Chen Chuanxi, Zhongguo huihua lilunshi, 380.
17. See Zhuo Shengge’s discussion in Xu Beihong yanjiu, 78.
18. Xu Beihong, “Zhongguo hua gailiang zhi fangfa,” 41. When Xu Beihong and his peers proposed to renew Chinese painting in light of the pre-Song models, they had in mind the ancient painters’ accurate observation of the world and the robust energy to associate their artworks with everyday life. Their argument is nevertheless based on a rather different epistemological premise, of a strain of nineteenth-century Western realism. As a result, they tended to highlight only the sensory resemblance between the object and its representation in pre-Song painting. Their view, of course, leads to a gross reduction. The dialectic between form (xing 形) and spirit (shen 神), and between physical likeness and graphic reinterpretation, had already by the Song constituted a rich discourse. This tradition carried on in the Ming and Qing despite the painters’ alleged detachment from the “real” world.
20. For a study on the shift of the paradigm of visuality in the West, see, for example, Jonathan Crary, Techniques of the Observer: On Vision and Modernity in the Nineteenth Century (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1992).
21. Michael Sullivan, Art and Artists of Twentieth-Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996), 72.
22. The term “order of mimesis” is drawn from Christopher Prendergast, The Order of Mimesis (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986).
23. Lin was able to go to France primarily thanks to Cai’s sponsorship.
24. Lin Fengmian, “Zhi quanguo yishujie shu” 致全國藝術界書 (A letter to the Chinese circle of the arts, 1926), in Li Zheng 李諍, ed., Lin Fengmian hualun 林風眠畫論 (Lin Fengmian’s art criticism) (Zhengzhou: Henan renmin chubanshe, 1999), 17–24.
25. Lin Fengmian, “Dongxi yishu zhi qiantu” 東西藝術之前途 (The future of Easter and Western art, 1926), in Lin Fengmian hualun, 117.
26. Lin Fengmian, “Dongxi yishu zhi qiantu,” 118.
27. The most prominent example is perhaps Liang Shiming’s 梁漱溟 Dongxi wenhua jiqi zhexue 東西文化及其哲學 (Oriental and Occidental cultures and philosophies) published in 1921.
28. Lin Fengmian, “Dongxi yishu zhi qiantu,” in Lin Fengmian hualun, 42.
29. Lin Fengmian, “Huiyi yu huainian” 回憶與懷念 (Memories and remembrances), in Lin Fengmian hualun, 75.
30. See Xu’s close friend Lin Huiyin’s description, in “Dao Zhimo” 悼志摩 (In memory of Zhimo), in Lin Huiyin wenji 林徽音文集 (Works of Lin Huiyin), ed. Liang Congjie 梁從戒 (Taipei: Tianxia wenhua, 2000), 10.
31. Lin Fengmian’s inscription in Huajia 畫家 (Painter, 1934), a volume of works by the painter Huang Shaoqiang 黃少強 (1901–1942); quoted from Li Weiming 李偉銘, Tuxiang yu lishi: ershi shiji zhongguo meishu lungao 圖像與歷史:二十世紀中國美術論稿 (Pictorial images and history: a collection of critiques of twentieth-century Chinese art) (Beijing: Zhongguo renmin daxue chubanshe, 2010), 299.
32. Lin Fengmian, “Zhongguo huihua xinlun” 中國繪畫新論 (A new treatise on Chinese painting), in Zhu Pu 朱樸, ed., Lin Fengmian, hualun, zuopin, shengping 林風眠, 畫論，作品，生平 (Lin Fengmian: Theories on the art, works, biography) (Beijing: Xuelin chubanshe, 1988), 72.
33. Lin Fengmian, “Women suoxuyao de guohua qiantu” 我們所需要的國畫前途 (The future of Chinese painting we are in need of, 1933), in Lin Fengmian hualun, 104.
34. Sima Qian 司馬遷，Shiji 史記 (The record of the historian), “Tian Zhan liezhuan,” 田儋列傳 (Biography of Tian Zhan) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1959), vol. 8, 2643–2649.
35. See, for example, Sullivan, Art and Artists of Twentieth-Century China, 70; Li Yu 李渝, “Cong E’guo dao Zhongguo: Zhongguo xiandai huihua lide minzu zhuyi he xianjin fengge” 從俄國到中國：中國現代繪畫裏的民族主義和先進風格 (From Russia to China: nationalism and avant-gardism in modern Chinese painting), Xiongshi meishu 雄獅美術 (Lion art) 137 (1982): 59–60.
36. Zheng Chao 鄭朝, “Lin Fengmian zaoqide huihua yishu” 林風眠早期的繪畫藝術 (The art of Lin Fengmian’s painting in its early period), in Zheng Chao and Jin Shangyi 金尚義, eds., Lin Fengmian lun 林風眠論 (A study of Lin Fengmian) (Hangzhou: Zhejiang meishu xueyuan chubanshe, 1990), 101.
37. Li Shusheng, 李樹聲, “Fangwen Lin Fengmian de biji” 訪問林風眠的筆記 (Notes on interviewing Lin Fengmian), in Lin Fengmian yanjiu wenji, vol. 1, 217.
38. Lü Peng 吕澎，Ershi shiji zhongguo yishushi 二十世纪中國藝術史 (A history of art in twentieth-century China), (Beijing: Beijng daxue chubanshe, 2006), 303. “Guanyu Lin Fengmian de ersan shi” 關於林風眠的二三事 (A few anecdotal notes on Lin Fengmian), in Lin Fengmian baisui jinian huazhan 林風眠百嵗紀念畫展 (The world of Lin Fengmian), July 14–August 28, 2000, Taipei; http://issue.udn.com/CULTURE/FONEMAN/foneman3–2a.htm.
39. See my discussion in Fictional Realism in Twentieth Century China, chapter 6.
40. For a detailed description of the first National Exhibition of Art, see Lü Peng, Ershi shiji zhongguo yishushi, chapter 11.
41. Xue Beihong, “Huo” 惑 (Puzzlement), in Xu Beihong yishu lunwen ji, vol. 1, 131. The essay was first published on April 23, 1929, in Meizhan huikan 美展匯刊 (Bulletin of art exhibition).
42. Xue Beihong, “Huo,” 132. I am using Michael Sullivan’s translation, in Art and Artists of Twentieth-Century China, 72.
43. Xue Beihong, “Huo,” 133. For a detailed account of Xu Beihong’s attitude toward Chinese modernist art circles, see Xiaobing Tang, Origins of the Chinese Avant-Garde: The Modern Woodcut Movement (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008), chapter 3, particularly 89–98.
44. Xu Zhimo, “Wo ye huo” 我也惑 (I am puzzled too); the essay was published in the same issue of Meizhan huikan that featured Xu Beihong’s essay. Reprinted in Xiongshi meishu 雄獅美術 (Lion’s art) 78 (1977): 124–129.
45. Xu Zhimo, “Wo ye huo,” 126.
46. Xu Zhimo, “Wo ye huo,” 124.
47. Lü Peng, Ershi shiji zhongguo yishushi, 204.
48. The seven members are Xu Beihong, Lin Fengmian, Liu Haisu, Xu Zhimo, Li Yishi 李毅士, Wang Yiting 王一亭, and Jiang Xiaoqian 江小鹣. See Lü Peng, Ershi shiji zhongguo yishushi, 203. For a detailed account of Xu Zhimo’s attitude toward the exhibition, see Xiaobing Tang, Origins of the Chinese Avant-Garde, chapters 1, 3, particularly 89–98.
49. Xu Boyang and Jin Shan, Xu Beihong nianpu, 57. For the polemics of promoting modern Chinese art, see Xiaobing Tang, Origins of the Chinese Avant-garde, 30–38.
50. Xiaobing Tang, Origins of the Chinese Avant-garde, 59.
51. The rivalry between the two stretched back to the early ’20s, and the first showdown happened in 1927, when Xu won the directorship of the Beijing Art Academy over Liu. For more detailed description of the rivalry between Liu Haisu and Xu Beihong, see Sullivan, Art and Artists of Twentieth-Century China, 73. The two had another ugly dispute over leadership in Chinese art in 1932. Xu Beihong nianpu, 86–88.
52. Lin Fengmian, “Zhi quanguo yishujie shu” 致全國藝術界書 (A manifesto to the circle of the arts in China), in Lin Fengmian, 27.
53. Li Yishi 李毅士, “Wo bu huo” 我不惑 (I am not puzzled), in Ruan Rongchun 阮榮春 and Hu Guanghua 胡光華, Zhongguo jindai meishushi, 1911–1949 中國近代美術史，1911–1949 (A history of modern Chinese art, 1911–1949) (Hong Kong: Shangwu yinshu guan, 1997), 175. The essay originally appeared in the May issue of Mezhan huikan.
54. Kang Youwei, “Wanmu caotang canghua mu” (Bibliography of the painting collection in ten thousand tree studio), quoted from Chen Chuanxi, Zhongguo huihua lilunshi, 361–362.
55. Ibid. When Kang Youwei, Xu Beihong, and Lu Xun faulted the literati painting of the Yuan for its disengagement from historical consciousness, they ignored the fact that one reason for the rise of literati painting was precisely dynastic crisis. Under Mongol rule, the Yuan painters took an inward turn so as to escape political and social upheaval. While their paintings brought forward an unprecedented desire for self-expression, this serves as a bitter reminder of the painters’ loss of cultural and political identity. Their minimalist touch, therefore, suggests a strong sense of depravity in both graphical and ideological terms.
56. I am referring to Xu’s romance with Jiang Biwei when the latter was still engaged to someone else. With Kang Youwei’s permission, they used Kang’s residence as a place for their rendezvous. See Xu Beihong nianpu, 13–14.
57. But Xu may have ignored the fact that as a reformer in the conservative vein, Kang Youwei based his idea of reform on a nostalgic invocation of ancient models; for him, the path to modernity lay ironically in a return to antiquity. In other words, Kang’s recommendation of Tang and Song arts might have served less as a genuine impetus for modern innovation than as a pretext for a “regressive” utopian yearning, a move “back to the future.” Implied in Kang Youwei’s and Xu Beihong’s reformist theories is a confusion of chronological and conceptual trajectories.
58. Lü Cheng’s 呂澂 letter appeared in Xin qingnian 新青年 (La Jeunesse) 6, no. 1 (1918); quoted from Chen Chuanxi, Zhongguo huihua lilunshi, 368.
59. Chen Duxiu 陳獨秀, “Meishu geming—da Lü Cheng” 美術革命：答呂澂 (Art revolution—a reply to Lü Cheng), vol. 6, 1 (1918); quoted from Chen Chuanxi, Zhongguo huihua lilunshi, 370.
60. Incidentally, Qu Qiubai 瞿秋白 (1899–1935), another leading leftist revolutionary, also came from a literatus-painter’s family and ended up turning his back on traditional art. Qu Qiubai’s father, Qu Shiwei 瞿世瑋, once took a petty office in the late Qing but was later driven to sell paintings to make ends meet. Chen Chuanxi, Zhongguo huihua lilunshi, 374–375.
61. See Liu Zaifu, Lu Xun meixue sixiang lungao 魯迅美學思想論稿 (Lu Xu’s aesthetic thought) (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 1981), 129–155.
62. See Liu Zaifu, Lu Xun meixue sixiang lungao, 140–145. Also see Chen Zhanbiao 陳占彪, “Luelun Lu Xun de fan xiandai zhuyi yishu guan” 略論魯迅的反現代主義藝術觀 (On Lu Xun’s view of antimodernism in art), Linyi shifan xueyuan xuebao 臨沂師範學院學報 Linyi shifan xueyuan xuebao (Bulletin of Linyi normal college), 30, no. 2 (2008): 90–94.
63. See Xu Beihong nianpu, 98. Lu Xun quanji, vol. 5, 515.
64. This attitude is much different from that taken by Lu Xun, to say nothing of the fact that Xu Zhimo stood firmly against the Soviet Union and its leftist revolution. The two had their first skirmish in 1924, when Xu Zhimo introduced Baudelaire’s Fleurs du mal to the Chinese audience. Lu Xun responded with ridicule of Xu’s naïve fascination with French mysticism, and in the next several years he would launch several more attacks on the poet on various pretexts. In 1928 Xu Zhimo and friends founded Xinyue (Crescent moon), a magazine calling for the restoration to literature of the disciplines of form and taste; the gulf between the two was by then unbridgeable.
65. Xu Beihong nianpu, 125.
66. For a more discussion on Lu Xun and leftist realism, see Wang-chi Wong, Politics and Literature in Shanghai: The Chinese League of Left-Wing Writers, 1930–1936 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1991), 19; Kuang Xinnian 曠新年, 1928: Geming wenxue 革命文學, (1928: revolutionary literature) (Jinan: Shandong jiaoyu chubanshe, 1998), 128–142.
67. C. T. Hsia, “Obsession with China,” in appendix, A History of Modern Chinese Fiction (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1971).
68. Quoted from Lin Fengmian yanju lunji (Studies of Lin Fengmian) (Taipei: Gelin guoji tushu gongsi), vol. 2, 236.
69. Lang Shaojun, 
(The pursuit of sublime modernity: the painting experiments of Lin Fengmian), Shiji xianqu, 21.
70. “Lin took advantage of the spontaneous interaction between ink and rice paper to blur the outline and added in flowing lines to produce a harmonious duet of planes and lines, thus bringing the traditional employment of outlined colored patches to the next level.” See Wu Guanzhong 吳冠中, “Ashes to Ashes: In Fond Memory of My Late Teacher (Summary),” in Shiji xianqu, 35.
71. David Clarke, “Exile from Tradition: Chinese and Western Traits in the Art of Lin Fengmian,” in Colours of East and West: Paintings by Lin Fengmian (Hong Kong: The University of Art Gallery—The University of Hong Kong), quoted from http://www.linfengmian.net/.
73. Wu Guanzhong 吳冠中, Preface to Lin Fengmian de shijie, 21; “Ashes to Ashes: In Fond Memory of My Late Teacher,” Shiji xianqu, 15.
74. Wu Guanzhong, Preface to Lin Fengmian de shijie, 21; “Ashes to Ashes,” 21; Lang Shaojun, Shiji xianqu, 20.
75. Wu Guanzhong, Preface to Lin Fengmian de shijie, 21; “Ashes to Ashes,” 21.
76. Du Fu 杜甫， “Chunwang” 春望 (Spring prospect), in The Selected Poems of Du Fu, trans. Burton Watson (New York: Columbia University Press, 2002).
78.“中國的洋畫家，過去我只喜歡一個林風眠。他那些寶藍衫子的安南、緬甸人像，是有著极圓熟的圖案美的。比較回味深長的卻是一張著色不多的，在中國的一個小城，土牆下站著個黑衣女子，背后跟著鴇婦。因為大部分用的是淡墨，雖沒下雨而像是下雨，在寒雨中更覺得人的溫暖。女人不時髦，面目也不清楚，但是對于普通男子，單只覺得這女人是有可能性的，對她就有點特殊的感情。” Eileen Chang 張愛玲, “Wangbuliao de hua” 忘不了的畫 (Unforgettable paintings), in Liuyan 流言(Word on the water) (Tapei: Huangguan chubanshe); translated by Andrew Jones, Written on Water (New York: Columbia University Press, 2005), 165.
80. Xu Beihong, “Yu Wang Shaoling tanhua” (A conversation with Wang Shaoling), quoted from Chen Chuanxi, Zhongguo huihua lilunshi, 384.
81. Xu Biehong, “Xinyishu yundong huigu yu qianzhan” (New art movement in retrospect and prospect), in Xu Beihong yishu lunwen ji, vol. 2, 427–435.
82. Li Yu, “Cong E’guo dao Zhongguo: Zhongguoo xiandai huihua lide minzu zhuyi he xianjin fengge,” 59–60.
83. Sullivan, Chinese Art in the Twentieth Century, 50.
84. Quoted from Chen Chuanxi, Zhongguo huihua lilunshi, 404.
85. Based on the report of Xu Boyang, Xu Beihong’s son; quoted from Zhuo Shengge, Xu Beihong yanjiu, 29.
86. Ai Zhongqi, Xu Beihong yanjiu (A study of Xu Beihong); quoted from Zhuo Shengge, Xu Beihong yanjiu, 98.
87. Lang Shaojun, “Chuangzao xinde shenmei jiego: Lin Fengmian dui huihua xingshi yuyan de tansuo” (Creating a new aesthetic structure: Ling Fengmian’s search for a new language of pictorial form), in Zoujin Lin Fengmian (The world of Lin Fengmian) (Taipei: Gelin guoji tushu gongsi, 2000), 103.
88. Lang Shaojun, “Chuangzao xinde shenmei jiego,” 83.
89. Quoted from Feng Yeh 馮葉, “Mengli zhongsheng nian yifu” 夢裏鐘聲念義父 (Remembering my godfather in dreams and amid the sounds of bells), in Lin Fengmian de shijie 林風眠的世界 (The world of Lin Fengmian).
91. Lang Shaojun, “Chuangzao xinde shenmei jiego,” 131.
92. Mu Xin 木心, “Shuangchong beidao,” in Lin Fengmian yanjiu wenji, vol. 2, 231.
93. Wuming Shi 無名氏, Jinse de sheye 金色的蛇夜 (Night of the golden serpent) (Taipei: Jiuge chubanshe, 1999), 14. See Carlos Rojas’ succinct discussion of Wuming Shi and visuality in The Naked Gaze: Reflections on Chinese Modernity (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Asia Center, 2008), chapter 4.
94. Wuming Shi, Jinse de sheye, 17; Rojas’ translation, in The Naked Gaze, 111.
95. See Zhao Jiangbin and Wang Yingguo, Wuming Shi chuanqi (The legend of Wuming Shi) (Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi chubanshe, 1998), 170.
96. See Carlos Rojas, “Flowers in the Mirror: Vision, Gender, and Reflections on Chinese Modernity,” Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 2000, 270. Also see Rojas’ discussion in The Naked Gaze, 121–125.
97. Wuming Shi, Kaihua zai xingyun yiwai 開花在星雲以外 (Blossoms beyond the clouds of stars) (Taipei: Wenshizhe chubanshe, 1999), 437–438; quoted in Rojas, The Naked Gaze, 125.
98. Wuming Shi’s letter to the author, June 28, 1996.
7. A Spring That Brought Eternal Regret: Fei Mu, Mei Lanfang, and the Poetics of Screening China
1. For the rise of Chinese cinema in connection with Peking opera, see, for example, Cheng Jihua 程季華, ed., Zhongguo dianying fazhanshi 中國電影發展史 (A history of Chinese cinema) (Beijing: Zhongguo dianying chubanshe, 1963), vol. 1, chapter 1. Also see Zhong Danian, 鍾大年, “Zhongguo dianying de lishi jiqi genyuan: zailun yingxi” 中國電影的歷史及其根源：再論影戲 (The history and origin of Chinese film: on shadow theater again), Dianying yishu 電影藝術 (Cinematic art) 2, no. 3 (1994): 29–35, 9–14.
2. Gao Xiaojian 高小健， Zhongguo xiqu dianyingshi 中國戲曲電影史 (A history of Chinese movies of performing arts) (Beijing: Wenhua yishu chubanshe, 2005).
3. For a discussion of the sensation and excitement that movies and moviemaking brought to early Republican Chinese theater audiences, see Zhen Zhang, An Amorous History of the Silver Screen: Shanghai Cinema, 1896–1937 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005), chapters 1–3.
4. Li Suyuan 酈蘇元, Zhongguo xiandai dianying lilunshi 中國現代電影理論史 (A history of modern Chinese cinema theories) (Beijing: Wenhua yishu chubanshe, 2005), 162–178. Among the trumpeters of Peking opera as “national opera,” Qi Rushan 齊如山 is the most prominent figure. See Qi Rushan huiyilu 齊如山回憶錄 (A memoir of Qi Rushan) (Shenyang: Liaoning jiaoyu chubanshe, 2005), chapters 7–8. Also see Joshua Goldstein’s succinct analysis in Drama Kings: Players and Publics in the Re-creation of Peking Opera, 1870–1937 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007). For a critique of Qi Rushan’s notion of “national theater,” see chapter 4.
5. For a comprehensive discussion of the leftists’ effort to promote national cinema in the 1930s, see Ma Junrang 馬軍讓, “Minzu zhuyi suo suzao de Zhongguo dianying” 民族主義所塑造的現代中國電影 (Modern Chinese cinema as fashioned by nationalism), in Ershiyi shiji shuangyuekan 二十一世紀雙月刊 (Twenty-first century bimonthly) 15 (1993): 1112–1119.
6. These four Peking opera movies are Qiantai yu houtai 前臺與後臺 (On stage and backstage, 1939), Guzhongguo zhige 古中國之歌 (Songs of ancient China, 1941), Xiao fangniu 小放牛 (The little cowherd, 1948), Shengsi hen 生死恨 (Eternal regret, 1948). See Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng: Fei Mu dianying lungao 流鶯春夢：費穆電影論稿 (Flying oriole, spring dream: a study of Fei Mu’s movies) (Beijing: Zhongguo dianying chubanshe, 2000), chapters 15–18.
7. Spring in a Small Town was rediscovered and featured in Hong Kong in 1983. It was celebrated as the first of the ten greatest Chinese movies in the special issue of Dianying shuangzhoukan 電影雙週刊 (Movie biweekly). It again was voted by movie critics and scholars as the best of the first century of Chinese movies (1905–2005) in Hong Kong. See Chen Huiyang 陳輝揚, Mengying ji: Zhongguo dianying yinxiang 夢影集：中國電影印象 (Dream images: impressions of Chinese cinema) (Taipei: Yunchen chubanshe, 1990), 126. Also see http://movie.kingnet.com.tw/media_news/index.html?act=movie_news&r=1110868977; Li Zhuotao 李焯桃, “Yihu Zhongguo, chaohu chuantong” 宜乎中國，超乎傳統 (Befitting China, surpassing tradition), in Ain-ling Wong 黃愛玲, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu 詩人導演費穆 (Poet director Fei Mu) (Hong Kong: Xianggang dianying pinlun xuehui, 1999), 282–294.
8. See Cheng Jihua’s criticism in Zhongguo dianying fazhanshi, vol. 2, 270–271.
9. Huang Ailing’s edited volume on Fei Mu is titled Poet Director Fei Mu.
10. Quoted from Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, 27. Hence his careful design of miseen-scène and camera angle.
11. Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, 25–31.
12. Also see Zhen Zhang’s discussion in An Amorous History of the Silver Screen, chapter 3.
13. Li Suyuan, Zhongguo xiandai dianying lilunshi, 105.
14. Fei Mu, “Daoxu fa yu xuanxiang zuoyong” 倒敍法與懸想作用 (On the function of narratage and flashback), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 25.
15. Fei Mu, “Lüetan ‘kongqi’” 略談“空氣” (A brief discussion of “air”), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 27.
18. Fei Mu, “Lüetan ‘kongqi,’” 27. See Chen Shan 陳山, “Disanzhong dianying: Fei Mu dianying siwei de shuli luoji” 第三種電影：費穆電影思維的疏離邏輯 (The third kind of movie: the logic of alienation in Fei Mu’s movies), Dangdai dianying 當代電影 (Contemporary cinema) 5 (1997): 43.
19. Fei Mu, “Zaxie” 雜寫 (Miscellaneous writing, 1935), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 29.
20. See, for example, Li Hsiao-t’i, “Opera, Society, and Politics: Chinese Intellectual and Popular Culture,” Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1996, chapter 3.
22. I am referring to Peter Brooks’ terminology in The Melodramatic Imagination: Balzac, Henry James, Melodrama, and the Mode of Excess (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995), chapter 1.
23. Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, chapter 9.
24. Fei Mu, “Langshan diexueji benshi” 《狼山喋血記》本事 (Synopsis of Blood on Wolf Mountain), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 43.
25. Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, chapter 11.
26. Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, 149.
27. Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, chapter 10, especially 129–132.
28. Fei Mu, “Zhongguo jiuju de dianying hua wenti” 中國怪劇的電影化問題 (Issues on making cinema of traditional Chinese theater), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 82.
29. Fei Mu, “Zhongguo jiuju de dianying hua wenti.”
30. Fei Mu, “Zhongguo jiuju de dianying hua wenti,” 83.
31. Wong Ain-ling 黃愛玲, ed. Dianying shiren Feimu 詩人導演費穆 (Poet director Fei Mu) (Hong Kong: Xianggang dianying pinglun xiehui, 2000).
32. The aforementioned essay, “Issues on Making Cinema of Traditional Chinese Theater,” was written in conjunction with the release of Gu Zhongguo zhige 古中國之歌 (Songs of ancient China, 1941).
33. Xu Jichuan 許姬傳 et al., Zhongguo sida mingdan 中國四大名旦 (The four great female impersonators of China) (Hebei: Hebei renmin chubanshe, 1990), 105. Also see Mei Shaowu 梅紹武, ed., Yidai zongshi Mei Lanfang 一代宗師梅蘭芳 (The grand master Mei Lanfang) (Beijing: Beijing chubanshe, 1997), 216.
34. Throughout his career Mei starred in fourteen movies based on Peking opera. See Li Lingling 李伶伶, Mei Lanfang de yishu yu qinggang 梅蘭芳的藝術與情感 (The art and romance of Mei Lanfang) (Taipei: Zhibingtang chubanshe, 2008), 198–212.
35. Mei Lanfang 梅蘭芳, Yibu bu huanxing 移步不換形 (Moving forward without altering fundamental forms) (Tianjin: Baihua wenyi chubanshe, 2008), 226–252. For Mei Lanfang’s tour to the United States, see Goldstein, Drama Kings, particularly chapter 8. For Qi Rushan’s theory of national drama, see chapter 4.
36. Mei Lanfang, Yibu bu huanxing, 191–215.
37. Mei Lanfang, Yibu bu huanxing, 100.
38. See my discussion in Fin-de-siècle Splendor: Repressed Modernities of Late Qing Fiction, 1849–1911 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), chapter 2. For the ambiguous gender identity of female impersonators, see also Isabelle Duchesne, “The Chinese Opera Star: Roles and Identity,” in Jonathan Hay, ed., Boundaries in China (London: Reaction Books, 1994), 217–240; Min Tian, “Male Dan: The Paradox of Sex, Acting, and Perception of Female Impersonation in Traditional Chinese Theater,” in Asian Theater Journal 17, no. 1 (2000): 78–97.
39. Qi Rushan, Qi Rushan huiyilu, 101; Goldstein, Drama Kings, chapter 4.
40. Wang Anqi 王安祈, “Jingju meipai yishuzhong Mei Lanfang zhuti yishi zhi tixian “京劇梅派藝術中梅蘭芳主體意識之體現 (The embodiment of subjective consciousness in the Mei Lanfang school of Peking opera), in Wang Ailing 王璦玲, ed., Ming Qing wenxue sixiang zhong zhi zhuti yu shehui 明清文學與思想中之主體意識與社會 (Subjective consciousness and society in Ming and Qing literature and thought) (Taipei: Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy, 2004), 750–762.
41. Laikwan Pang, The Distorting Mirror: Visual Modernity in China (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2007), chapters 1, 4.
42. Lu Xun 魯迅, “Lun zhaoxiang zhilei” 論照相之類 (On photography and the sort), in Fen (Graves) 墳, Lu Xun Quanji 魯迅全集 (Complete works of Lu Xun) (Beijing: Renmin whenxue chubanshe, 1981), vol. 1, 187.
43. Goldstein, Drama Kings, 139–140,160–161.
44. Lu Xun, “Lüelun Mei Lanfang ji qita” 略論梅蘭芳及其他 (On Mei Lanfang and other issues), in Lu Xun quanji, vol. 5, 579–584.
45. Mei Lanfang made this statement on September 8, 1934; quoted from Lu Xun, “Luelun Mei Langfang jiqita,” 583.
46. Mei Lanfang, “Huiyi Sitannisilafusiji he Niemiluoweiqi-danqinke” 回憶斯坦尼斯拉夫斯基和聶米洛維奇. 丹欽科 (Remembering Stanislavski and Nemirovich-Danchenko), Mei Lanfang quanji 梅蘭芳全集 (Complete works of Mei Lanfang) (Shijiazhuang: Hebei jiaoyu chubanshe, 2000), vol. 3, 374–375; Chen Shixiong 陳世雄, Sanjiao duihua: Sitani, Bulaixite, yu Zhongguo xiju 三角對話：斯坦尼，布莱希特，與中國戲劇 (Trialogue: Stanislavski, Brecht, and Chinese drama) (Xiamen: Xiamen daxue chubanshe, 2003), chapter 2. Also see Cai Dengshan 蔡登山, Mei Lanfang yu Meng Xiaodong 梅蘭芳與孟小冬 (Mei Lanfang and Meng Xiaodong) (Taipei: INK Chubanshe, 2008), 237–252.
47. There has been a long debate regarding Brecht’s reception of Chinese theater. For a recent study of Brecht’s “epic theater” and Chinese theater, see Min Tian, “Alienation Effect for Whom? Brecht’s (Mis)interpretation of the Classical Chinese Theater,” Asian Theater Journal 14, no. 2 (Fall 1997): 200–222; Carol Martin, “Brecht, Feminism, and Chinese Theater,” The Drama Review 43, no. 4 (1999): 77–85.
48. See Ye Xiushan 葉秀山, Gu Zhongguo de ge: Ye Xiushan lun jingju 古中國的歌：葉秀山論京劇 (Melodies of ancient China: Ye Xiushan on Peking opera) (Bejing: Zhongguo renmin daxue chubanshe, 2007), 389–400, 261–342.
49. Gilles Deleuze, Foucault, trans. Sean Hand (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1988), 52.
50. Fei Mu, “Shensihen tekan xuyan” 生死恨特刊序言 (Foreword to the brochure of Eternal Regret), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 104.
51. The famous scene of “nocturnal soliloquy” (yesu 夜訴), for instance, is cast in blue, as opposed to the scene of dream reunion, dominated by red.
52. Translation from a DVD album, Wei Haimin Meipai jingdian changqiang Shengsihen 魏海敏梅派經典唱腔生死恨 (Eternal Regret: Wei Haimin’s classical theater in honor of the Mei school) (Taipei: Fengchao yinyue, 2007).
53. See Zheng Peikai 鄭培凱, “Xiqu yu dianying de jiuge: Mei Lanfang yu Fei Mu de Shengsihen” 戲曲與電影的糾葛：梅蘭芳與費穆的《生死恨》 (The entangled relationship between traditional theater and movie: Mei Lanfang and Fei Mu’s Eternal Regret), in Wenyi lilun yu tongsu wenhua 文藝理論與通俗文化 (Literary theory and popular culture), ed. Peng Hsiao-yen 彭小妍 (Taipei: Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy, 1999), vol. 2, 570 note 30.
54. See Francesca Bray, Technology and Gender: Fabrics of Power in Late Imperial China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), chapters 4–5.
55. But the recognition of Spring in a Small Town came as late as the 1980s. The eclipse of the movie from the late forties to the early eighties and its belated “rehabilitation” bespeak the dynamics of Chinese cinema on both aesthetic and political fronts.
56. Fei Mu, “Guochanpian de chulu wenti” 國產片的出路問題 (On the future of Chinese-made cinema), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 94.
57. Fei Mu, “Guochanpian de chulu wenti.”
58. I am referring to Joseph Lau’s popular terminology in describing the sentimental inclination of modern Chinese literature.
59. Brooks, The Melodramatic Imagination, chapter 1.
60. As a matter of fact, the story of Spring in a Small Town has been likened to that of Yulihun 玉梨魂 (Jade pear spirit, 1911), the ultimate example of the mandarin ducks and butterflies romance.
61. See Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, 366–367. For the movie’s relationship with the mandarin ducks and butterflies fiction tradition, see Chen Hongshi 陳弘石, ed., Zhongguo dianying: miaoshu yu chanshi 中國電影：描述與闡釋 (Chinese cinema: description and interpretation) (Beijing: zhongguo dianying chubanshe, 2002), 38.
62. See Cheng Jihua, for instance, Zhongguo dianying fazhanshi, vol. 2, 268–272.
63. For discussions of Spring in a Small Town, see Li Shaobai, “Zhongguo xiandai dianying de qianqu: Fei Mu he Xiaocheng zhichun de lishi Yiyi” 中國現代電影的前驅：論費穆和小城之春的歷史意義 (The forerunner of modern Chinese cinema: on Fei Mu and the historical significance of Spring in a Small Town), Dianying yishu 電影藝術 (Cinematic art) 5 (1996): 34–78; Ying Xiong, “Xiaocheng zhichun yu dongfang dianying” 小城之春與東方電影 (Spring in a Small Town and oriental cinema), Diangying yishu 電影藝術 (Cinematic art) 1, no. 2 (1993): 11–18, 46–52; Luo Yijun 羅亦軍, “Fei Mu xinlun” 費穆新論 Dangdai dianying 當代電影 (Contemporary cinema) 5 (1997): 4–15; Chen Mo 陳墨, “Fei Mu dianying lun” 費穆電影論 (On Fei Mu’s movies) Dangdai dianying 當代電影 (Contemporary cinema) 5 (1997): 26–40; Chen Shan 陳山, “Disanzhong dianying,” 41–47; Chen Shan 陳山, “Yongyuan de Xiaocheng zhichun” 永遠的小城之春 (Spring in a Small Town forever), Beijing dianying xueyuan xuebao 北京電影學院學報 (Journal of Beijing academy of cinema) 1 (2002): 50–58. Also see Susan Daruvala, “The Aesthetics and Moral Politics of Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town,” Journal of Chinese Cinema 1, no. 3 (2007): 169–185.
64. Fei Mu, “Daoyan, juzuozhe, xiegei Yang Ji” 導演，劇作者—寫給楊紀 (Director, playwright—to Yang Ji), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 99.
65. Li Zhuotao 李焯桃 (Li Cheuk-to), “Yihu zhongguo, chaohu chuantong,” 宜乎中國，超乎傳統 (Befitting China, surpassing tradition), 2000, 61–62, in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 282.
66. Ding Yaping 丁亞平, Yingxiang zhongguo 影像中國： 1945–1949 (Imaging China: 1945–1949) (Beijing: Wenhua yishu chubanshe, 1998), 374–376. For a general introduction to Bazin’s cinematic aesthetics, see Ian Aitken, European Film Theory and Cinema: A Critical Introduction (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001), chapter 7, particularly 179–193.
67. Aitken, European Film Theory and Cinema, 179, 182, 187.
68. Lin Niantong 林年同， “Zhongguo dianying de yishuxingshi yu meixue Sixiang” 中國電影的藝術形式與美學思想 (The artistic form and aesthetic thought of Chinese cinema), in Zhongguo dianying meixue 中國電影美學 (The aesthetics of Chinese cinema) (Taipei: Yunchen chuban gongsi, 1991), 27.
69. Fei Mu, “Zhongguo jiuju de dianyinghua wenti,” 82.
70. See Lin Niantong, “Zhongguo dianying de kongjian yishi” 中國電影的空間意識 (The sense of spatiality of Chinese cinema) in Zhongguo dianying meixue, 86–87.
71. In Lin Niantong’s words again, the movie relies heavily on the perspective of “horizontal distance” (pingyuan 平遠), a key notion of spatial composition in classical Chinese painting, to show a broad, embracing approach to reality. But “horizontal distance” does not promise a placid, detached view any more than calling forth an internal dynamics composed by montage, dissolves, and other techniques. See “Zhongguo dianying de yishuxingshi yu meixue Sixiang,” 23–35.
72. Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, 395.
73. The still camera–long take–long shot style is fairly standard in today’s European art films (as well as Taiwan New Wave and Jia Zhangke), but important German expressionist directors Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau and Josef von Sternberg both used a lot of long takes combined with tracking shots. Mizoguchi Kenji also used intricate camera movements in conjunction with his long takes, so perhaps the combination wasn’t altogether out of the ordinary from the 1930s to the 1950s.
74. Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, chapters 19–20.
75. Fei Mu is said to have offered no script to his actors; instead he explained to them the dramatic situation he intended, asking them to flesh out their parts accordingly. He paid special attention to music, set, and lighting; he did away with the “fourth wall” of realist theater in recourse to pantomime and stylized movements; and he had actors take voice and acting lessons from Chinese opera performers. See Chen Mo, Liuying chunmeng, 340–342.
76. Sun Qiying 孫企英, “Fei Mu de wutai yishu” 費穆的舞臺藝術 (Fei Mu’s art of stage play), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 185.
77. Quoted from Sun Qiying, “Fei Mu de wutai yishu,” 188.
78. See Chen Huiyang’s interview with Wei Wei, in Mengying ji, 124.
80. I am using Julie Landau’s translation, in Beyond Spring: Tz’u Poems of the Sung Dynasty (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 123–124.
81. See Ronald Egan, Word, Image, and Deed in the Life of Su Shi (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard-Yen-ching Institute Monograph Series, Asia Center, 1994), 326.
83. Jie Li, “Home and Nation Amid the Rubbles: Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town and Jia Zhangke’s Still Life,” Modern Chinese Literature and Culture 21, no. 2 (2009): 88.
84. For Pasolini’s concepts such as “cinema and poetry,” see Heretical Empiricism, ed. Louise K. Barnett, trans. Ben Lawton and Louise K. Barnett (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988). Chen Shan has pointed out the resemblance between Fei Mu’s cinematic language and Pasolini’s notion of “cinema of poetry.” He particularly calls attention to Fei Mu’s use of voiceover, which is highly suggestive of a free indirect style favored by Pasolini; see Chen Shan, “Disanzhong dianying,” 45. See also Deleuze’s discussion of free indirect discourse in Cinema 1: The Movement-Image, trans. Hugh Tomlinson and Barbra Habberjam (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1986), 72–76.
85. Gilles Deleuze, Cinema 2: The Time Image, trans. Hugh Tomlinson (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1989), 2–9. The crystal image fashions time as a two-way mirror that splits the present into two directions, “one which is launched toward the future while the other falls into the past. Time consists of this split, and it is … time, that we see in the crystal” (81). David Rodowick describes the time image as one that shuttles between actual and virtual, that records or deals with memory, confuses mental and physical time, and is sometimes highlighted by incommensurable spatial and temporal links between shots. See Rodowick, Gilles Deleuze’s Time Machine (Durham: Duke University Press, 1997), 79–117.
86. See Sam Rohdie, The Passion of Pier Paolo Pasolini (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995), 51–55; also see Deleuze’s discussion, Cinema 1, 72–76.
87. See Deleuze, Cinema 2. With the cinema of neorealism as his case in point, Deleuze argues that “what defines neo-realism is this build-up of purely optical situations (and sound ones, although there was no synchronized sound at the start of new-realism). It is perhaps as important as the conquering of a purely optical space in painting, with impressionism”; “this is a cinema of the seer and no longer of the agent” (2). “As for the distinction between subjective and objective, it also tends to lose its importance, to the extent that the optical situation or visual description replaces the motor action. We run in fact into a principle of indeterminibility: we no longer know what is imaginary or real, physical or mental, in the situation, not because they are confused, but because we do not have to know and there is no longer even a place from which to ask” (7).
88. Ye Jiaying 葉嘉瑩，Wang Guowei jiqi wenxue piping 王國維及其文學批評 (Wang Guowei and his literary criticism) (Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju, 1980), 255. Wang Keping, “Wang Guowei’s Aesthetic Thought in Perspective,” in Chung-ying Cheng and Nicholas Bunnin, eds., Contemporary Chinese Philosophy (Oxford: Blackwell, 2002), 37–56.
89. Wang Guowei 王國維, Renjian cihua 人間詞話 (Remarks on the song lyric and the human condition), ed. Chen Hongxiang 陳鴻翔 (Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 2002), 115.
90. See Zhang Shaokang 張少康, Gudian wenyi meixue lungao 古典文藝美學論稿 (A theoretical draft of classical literary aesthetics) (Taipei: Shuxin chubanshe, 1989), 21–44, 485–502.
91. In Wang Guowei’s 王國維 terminology, the poetic vision enables them to cross the state of ge 隔 or obstruction to the state of buge 不隔 or nonobstruction. With the genre of the song lyric as his case in point, Wang Guowei originally referred the two terms to the emotional effect of artificiality versus spontaneity. Whereas obstruction can be caused by indulgence in personal feeling and rhetorical ornamentation, nonobstruction happens when the poets are moved to express themselves in the truest terms and intersubjectivity. In Wang’s affective schemata, it is pathos—feeling resulting from various forms of obstruction in life—that best drives sensitive poets to conjure up works of nonobstruction: “of all that is written, I love only what a man has written with his blood.”
92. Wang Guowei, Renjian cihua, entry 40.
93. Lin Niantong, “Zhongguo dianying de yishuxingshi yu meixue Sixiang,” 46. Based on the notion of “continuum within obstruction,” Lin calls attention to the element of continued movement, you 游 or roaming, that characterizes Chinese cinematic aesthetics.
94. Owen, “The Omen of the World,” 21.
95. Owen, “The Omen of the World,” 21.
96. Rey Chow, Sentimental Fabulations: Contemporary Chinese Films (New York: Columbia University Press, 2008), 18.
97. Chow, Sentimental Fabulations.
98. This is, of course, is derived from the famous dictum in The Dream of the Red Chamber. See Wai-yee Li’s succinct interpretation of the three possible connotations of qing buqing, in Enchantment and Disenchantment: Love and Illusion in Chinese Literature (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), 207–208. See my discussion in the case of Hu Lancheng in chapter 4.
99. Mei Lanfang, “Diyibu caise xiqupian Shengsihen de paishe” 第一部彩色戲曲片生死恨的拍攝 (The making of the first color picture in China, Eternal Regret), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan Fei Mu, 213–236.
8. And History Took a Calligraphic Turn: Tai Jingnong and the Art of Writing
1. Tai Jingnong started to refer to the phrase as early as the 1940s. See Shu Wu’s 舒蕪 essay, “Yi Tai Jingnong xiansheng” 憶臺靜農先生 (Remembering Mr. Tai Jingnong), in Xu Liping, 許禮平 ed., Tai Jingnong shiji 臺靜農詩集 (A collection of poems by Tai Jingnong) (Hong Kong: Han Mo Xuan, 2001), appendix, 27.
2. Zuo Qiuming 左丘明, Chunqiu zuozhuan zhengyi ‧ Chenggong ernian 《春秋左傳正義‧成公二年》 (Taipei: Taiwan guji chubanshe, 2001)，810.
3. Tao Qian 陶潛, “Zijiwen” 自祭文 (An essay of self-obituary), in Gong Bin 龔斌, ed. and annotation, Tao Yuanming ji jiaoqian 陶淵明集校箋 (Annotations of Tao Yuanming’s works) (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 2004), 462–468.
4. Wang Can 王粲, “Zeng Cai Zidu shi” 贈蔡子篤詩 (A poem for Cai Zidu): “Life is indeed hard; let us not act against our wishes” (人生實難, 願其弗與), in Yu Shaochu 俞紹初, ed. and annotation, Jianan qizi ji 建安七子集 (A collection of works by the seven talents of the Jian’an era) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1989)，78.
5. Yang Bojun 楊伯駿, Liezi jishi; shuofu 列子集釋 (Annotations of Liezi) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1985), juan 8 (shuofu 説符), 266.
6. Jinshu 《晉書》 (Book of Jin), Benzhuan 本傳, juan 49: “時率意獨駕，不由徑路，車跡所窮，輒慟哭而反。” (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1999)，900.
Tai Jingnong is known for his scholarship on Wei-Jin literature. See “Xiruan lun” 嵇阮論 (On Xi Kang and Ruan Ji), in Tai Jingnong Lunwenji 臺靜農論文集 (A collection of scholarly essays by Tai Jingnong) (Hefei: Anhui jiaoyu chubanshe, 2002), 108–120. Also see Tao’s Zhongguo wenxue shi 中國文學史 (A history of Chinese literature) (Taipei: National Taiwan University Press, 2004), vol. 1, 77–84.
7. Xu Liping 許禮平, “Taigong Jingnong xiansheng xingzhuang” 臺公靜農先生行狀 (A chronology of Mr. Tai Jingnong’s life), in Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, appendix, 68. Also see Lin Wenyue 林文月, “Through Upheaval and Bloodshed: A Short Biography of Professor Tai Jingnong,” Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews 28 (2006): 215. Also see Xu Liping’s research regarding whether Tai Jingnong joined the Chinese Communist Party in the 1920s, in “Tai gong dangji kao” 臺公黨籍考 (A study of the party membership of Mr. Tai), in Pingguo ribao 蘋果日報 (Apple daily), December 2, 2012.
8. See the recollection of Tai Jingnong’s close friend Li Jiye 李霽野, “Cong tongyan tao hefa” 從童顏到鶴髮 (From childhood era to aging years), in Chen Zishan 陳子善, ed., Huiyi Tai Jingnong 回憶臺靜農 (Remembering Tai Jingnong) (Shanghai: Shanghai jiaoyu chubanshe, 1995), 6.
9. See Tai Jingnong’s essay, “Jiuqi fengnuan shaoniankuang: yi Chen Duxiu xiansheng” 酒旗風暖少年狂：憶陳獨秀先生 (Warm breeze blown by wine tavern banner during the uninhibited youthful days: in memory of Mr. Chen Duxiu), in Huiyi Tai Jingnong, appendix, 343–349.
11. Tai Jingnong, Tai Jingnong fashu ji vol. 1, 46, 47.
12. Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 72–78.
13. Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 64.
14. Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 66. The other four members are Li Jiye 李霽野, Wei Suyuan 韋素園, Wei Congwu 韋叢蕪, Cao Jinghua 曹靖華.
15. Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 66.
16. There are 42 letters included in Lu Xun quanji 魯迅全集 (Complete works of Lu Xun) (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1981).
17. Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 82.
18. The subject of the story may very well be inspired by a poem of Wang Can (177–217). I want to thank Professor Cheng Yu-yu of National Taiwan University for this discovery. Wang Can王粲， “Qiaishi, sanzhiyi” 七哀詩三之一 (Poems of seven sorrows, the first one), Yu Shaochu 俞紹初, ed. and annotation, Jianan qizi ji 《建安七子集》 (Works of the seven talents of the Jian’an era) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1989), 84.
西京亂無象，豺虎方遘患。
復棄中國去，遠身適荊蠻。
親戚對我悲，朋友相追攀。
出門無所見，白骨蔽平原。
路有飢婦人，抱子棄草間。
顧聞號泣聲，揮涕獨不還。
未知身死處，何能兩相完？
驅馬棄之去，不忍聽此言。
南登霸陵岸，迴首望長安。
悟彼下泉人，喟然傷心肝。
19. Lu Xun ends his preface to the volume with a compliment to Tai Jingnong’s fiction: “It is indeed not easy to seek ‘great joy’ in Tai’s works, but he has made a contribution to literature. While our literature is permeated with subjects on the sadness and pleasure of love, and the bright and dark sides of the city, no one has done more than Tai Jingnong in transcribing onto paper the death and life of the country and the smell of the soil.” Zhongguo xinwenxue daxi, xiaoshuo erji 中國新文學大系, 小説二集 (Compendium of modern Chinese literature, fiction, volume 2) (Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi chubanshe, 2003), vol. 4, 16. A reader can easily see that instead of the “tears and sniveling” formula, Tai adopts a detached, understated stance to relate how peasants are driven into a dehumanized existence of either “earthworms” or “human pigs” (“Qiuyin men” 蚯蚓們 [Earthworms]; “Renzhi” 人彘 [Renzhi]); how women are victimized by arranged marriage and feudal institutions (“Zhuyan” 燭焰 [Candle flame]; “Xinfen” 新墳 [New tomb]). Meanwhile, in a manner reminiscent of Lu Xun, he ponders the moral quandary of his narrative as such: exposé aside, can writing truly answer the needs of the peasants being described? This issue on the morality of form has been discussed by Marston Anderson, The Limits of Realism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), chapter 2.
20. Tai Jingnong, Dizhizi, Jiantazhe 地之子, 建塔者 (Sons of the earth, tower builders) (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1984), 26.
23. “Zai jiulou shang” 在酒樓上 (In the tavern) is one of the exceptions in which Lu Xun conceded to local customs. But his narrative stance betrays a sense of distance.
24. Yue Hengjun 樂蘅軍, “Beixin yu fenxin” 悲心與憤心 (A heart of compassion and a heart of wrath), in Lin Wenyue, ed., Tai Jingnong xiansheng jinian wenji 臺靜農先生紀念文集 (A collection of essays in memory of Mr. Tai Jingnong) (Taipei: Hongfan shudian, 1991), 225–246.
26. Tai Jingnong, Dizhizi, Jiantazhe, 121.
28. Tai Jingnong was arrested on April 7, 1928. See Lin Wenyue, “Through Upheaval and Bloodshed,” 216. Tai Jingnong, “Yi Chang Weijun yu beida geyao yanjiu hui” 憶常維鈞與北大歌謠研究會 (Remembering Chang Weijun and the society of folksong studies at Peking University), Huiyi Tai Jingnong, 353; Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 69–71.
29. See Li Jiye in note 8. Lin Wenyue, “Through Upheaval and Bloodshed,” 216. Tai Jingnong was arrested on October 12, 1932, for allegedly possessing “new-style bombs” and “Communist propaganda.” Later it was proved that the “new-style bombs” were equipment for making cosmetics that his friend had left in his keeping and the “Communist propaganda” was nothing but books published by the Unnamed Society.
30. Tai was arrested on July 26, 1934, together with Fan Wenlan 范文瀾 (1893–1969), and was taken to the Military Police Headquarters in Nanjing. He was released six months later, thanks to the intervention of scholars such as Cai Yuanpei, Xu Shoushang, and Shen Jianshi. See Lin Wenyue, ed., Tai Jingnong xiansheng jinian wenji, 216.
31. Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 83–84.
32. Tai Jingnong, Dizhizi, Jiantazhe, 116.
33. “Fallen flowers” of course is a conventional theme in classical Chinese poetry. This “window” is also open to a whole repository of classical Chinese poetic invocations. Given his literary training, Tai Jingnong could not have been unaware of the rich symbolism of fallen flowers, ranging from the passage of time (Liu Xiyi 劉希夷: “The girl of Luoyang with beautiful looks/Sighs upon seeing fallen flowers”) to meditation on solitude (Wang Wei 王維: “Singing birds come and go as mood wanes/Fallen flowers pile up after a long sit); a flamboyant adventure of youth (Li Bai 李白: “Whereto after stepping on all fallen flowers?/Walk in laughter into foreign maids’ tavern”); a nostalgic look at the past (Du Fu 杜甫: “At a good time in the south of the Yangtze River/I encounter you again in the season of fallen flowers”); a gesture of romantic longing (Li Shangyin 李商隱: “The guest in the high pavilion is gone/The flowers in the yard flow in chaos”); a reminiscence about bygone romance (Yan Shu 晏殊: “Flowers fall against wishes/Swallows return like old acquaintances”); an apocalyptic awakening to the evanesence of life (Li Yu 李煜: “Spring is gone amid flowing water and fallen flowers/heaven, earth”). See, for instance, Yang Chunqiao 楊春俏, “Liushui luohua chunquye: zhongguo gudian shige zhong de luohua yixiang” 流水落花春去也: 中國古典文學中的落花意象 (Spring is gone with flowing water and fallen flowers: on the imagery of fallen flowers in classical Chinese poetry), http://www.yuwenonline.com/Article/gdwx/shige/200603/3813.html.
34. Tai Jingnong “Jiuqi fengnuan shaoniankuang: yi Chen Duxiu xiansheng”; Xu Liping, “A Chronology,” 74. Lin Wenyue, “A Short Biography,” 218. More than one hundred pieces of correspondence between Tai Jingnong and Chen Duxiu have been preserved. Tai Jingnong took these letters to Taiwan and kept them even during the era of the White Terror.
35. These writings can be found in Chen Zishan 陳子善, ed., Wo yu Lao She yu jiu: Tai Jingnong wenji 我與老舍與酒：臺靜農文集 (Lao She and I and wine: a collection of literary works by Tai Jingnong) (Taipei: Lianjing chuban gongsi, 1992).
36. The manuscript is preserved at the Main Library, National Taiwan University. I thank Dr. Liao Chao-heng 廖肇亨 of Academia Sinica for locating a copy of the manuscript for me. See also Liao’s discussion in his essay “Tai Jingnong xiansheng de mingqing wenhua shiguan” 臺靜農先生的明清文化史觀 (Mr. Tai Jingnong’s view of Ming and Qing cultural history). A shorter version of it is published as “Cong lanshu shangya dao gediao gengxin: Tai Jingnong kan wanming wenhua” 從爛熟傷雅到格調更新:臺靜農看晚明文化 (From “too ripe to be elegant” to “stylistic renovation”: Tai Jingnong’s view of late Ming culture), Gugong wenwu yuekan 故宮文物月刊 (The National Palace Museum monthly of Chinese art) 279 (June 2006): 102–111.
37. See Marston Anderson’s discussion of Lu Xun’s Old Stories Retold, in “Lu Xun’s Facetious Muse,” in Ellen Widmer and David Der-wei Wang, eds., From May Fourth to June Fourth: Film and Fiction in Twentieth-Century China (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1992).
38. Chen Duxiu’s letter to Tai Jingnong, now in the National Taiwan University Library.
39. See Prasenjit Duara, Rescuing History from the Nation: Questioning Narratives of Modern China (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), chapter 1.
40. Had he lived longer, Chen Duxiu would have agreed with the conceptual and rhetorical framework of the essay “Jiashen sanbainian ji” 甲申三百年祭 (Commemoration of the three hundredth anniversary of the Jiashen year [1644]), written by Guo Moruo 郭沫若 (1892–1978) in 1944. Guo analyzes the fall of the Ming by referring to an array of man-made and natural causes, with a special focus on the tension between intellectuals’ sense of a historical breakdown, their rebellious desire, and their commitment to the Confucian mandate of loyalty. By revisiting the traumatic year of 1644, Guo, like Tai Jingnong, seems to invoke a parallel between the past and the present. But by seeking the moral lesson of 1644, Guo, like Chen Duxiu, opts for a leftist interpretation. Historical hindsight proves that this is a rather traditional, even Confucian, confirmation of the vindictive cycle of history. In view of the fact that Guo’s essay has since become a classic sanctioning the eventual Communist Revolution while Tai’s novella has remained unpublished, even when coming to the anti-Nationalist united front, Tai Jingnong took a rather lonely stance.
41. Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 11.
42. See Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 10, 14, 6, 7. The poem on the Moon Festival of “bingyin” 丙寅 year has been noted as a mistaken date. The year should have been “wuyin” 戊寅, 1938; see Xu, 6–7.
43. Tai Jingnong, “Yijia heishi shanshang meihua fangsheng” 移家黑石山上梅花方盛 (Moving home to the Heishi mountain when plum blossoms were blooming), in Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 12.
44. “Xingxing chong xingxing” 行行重行行 (On and on, going on and on)
The Hu horse leans into the north wind;
the Yueh bird nests in southern branches.
胡馬依北風，越鳥巢南枝
45. C. T. Hsia, “Obsession with China,” A History of Modern Chinese Fiction (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1971), 533–554.
46. Xu Liping, ed., Tai Jingnong shiji, 16–17. “獲麟” (capturing a unicorn) refers to the belief that an untimely capture of the sacred creature may turn out to be an ominous sign. “十四年，春，西狩於大野，叔孫氏之車子鉏商獲麟，以為不祥，以賜虞人。仲尼觀之，曰：’麟也。’然後取之.” See Chunqiu zuozhuan zhengyi‧aigong shisi nian 春秋左傳正義‧哀公十四年 (Annotations of the Zuozhuan, year fourteen of prince ai) (Taipei: Taiwan guji chubanshe, 2001), 1930–1931.
《孔子家語‧辯物》：”叔孫氏之車士曰子鉏商，採薪於大野，獲麟焉，折其前左足，載以歸，叔孫以為不祥，棄之于郭外．使人告孔子曰：”有麇而角者，何也？”孔子往觀之，曰：’麟也．胡為來哉？’反袂拭面，涕泣沾襟。叔孫聞之，然后取之．子貢問曰：’夫子何泣爾？’孔子曰：’麟之至，為明王也，出非其時而見害，吾是以傷焉．’” Chen Shike陳士珂, ed., Kongzi jiayu shuzheng；bianwu 孔子家語疏證;辯物 (Taipei: Taiwan shangwu yinshuguan, 1971), 115–116.
47. Referring to the general of the early Western Han, Fan Kui 樊噲 (?–189), who was a dog butcher before joining the insurrection of Liu Bang, the founder of the Han. See Shiji 史記, “Fan, Li, Teng, Guan liezhuan di sanshiwu” 樊酈滕灌列傳第三十五(Biographies of Fan Kui, Li Shang, Xiaohou ying, Guan Ying) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2000), 2053–2068.
48. Liu Yiqing 劉義慶, Yang Yong 楊勇, ed. and annotation, Shishuo xinyu jiaojian; rongzhi 世說新語校箋·容止(A new account of tales of the world; looks and manners) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2007), 555. “裴令公有雋容姿，一旦有疾至困，惠帝使王夷甫往看。裴方向壁臥，聞王使至，強回視之。王出，語人曰：’雙眸閃閃若巖下電，精神挺動，體中故小惡’。”
49. Lai Yonghai 賴永海, Yang Weizhong 楊維中, trans. and annotation, Xinyi lengyanjing 新譯楞嚴經 (A new translation of Śūramgama-sūtra), (Taipei: Sanmin shuju, 2003), vol. 9, 357. “若魘咎歇，其心離身，返觀其面，去住自由，無復留礙”.
50. Tai Jingnong, “Tai Jingnong shuyiji xu” 臺靜農書藝集序 (Foreword to the collection of Tai Jingnong’s calligraphy, 1996); English translation quoted from Tai Jingnong: Paintings, ed. Xu Liping (Hong Kong: Han Mo Xuan Publishing Co., 2001), 141.
51. According to Mr. Wang Dehou 王得后, former curator of the Museum of Lu Xun, Beijing, Lu Xun rarely used modern writing tools such as the fountain pen for writing. Most of his manuscripts have been preserved, and they are almost all written with the brush. See, for example, Lu Xun shougao ji 鲁迅手稿集 (Collection of Lu Xun’s manuscripts) (Hong Kong: Wenxue yanjiu she, 1966).
52. Yang Xiong 揚雄, “言，心聲也；書，心畫也”, in Zhu Rongzhe 朱榮哲, ed. and annotation, Xinbian fayan; wenshen 新編法言；問神 (New edition of exemplary sayings; inquisition of the divine) (Taipei: Taiwan guji chubanshe, 2000), 172.
53. See, for example, Yu-jung Kao’s 高友工 discussion in “Zhongguo wenhuashi zhongde shuqing chuantong” 中國文化史中的抒情傳統 (The lyrical tradition in Chinese cultural history), in Zhongguo meidian yu wenxue yanjiu 中國美典與文學研究 (A study of Chinese aesthetics and literature) (Taipei: National Taiwan University Press, 2004), 137–151. With the cursive script of the Tang as his example, Kao argues that calligraphy constitutes an integral part of the chain of manifestations of lyricism, which Kao takes as the quintessential form of Chinese aesthetic sensibility. Also see Ronald Egan, “Nature and Higher Ideals in Texts on Calligraphy, Music, and Painting,” in Zongqi Cai, ed., Chinese Aesthetics: The Ordering of Literature, the Arts, and the Universe in the Six Dynasties (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2004), 277–309.
54. Xiong Bingming 熊秉明, Zhongguo shufa lilun tixi 中國書法理論體系 (The theoretical system of Chinese calligraphy) (Taipei: Xiongshi meishu, 1997), chapter 1. “Xiangxing” 象形 or hieroglyphic formation has traditionally been regarded as one of the major forms in the configuration of the Chinese script system. The fact is that the pictographic dimension is always already mixed with the ideographic dimension of Chinese characters. Both dimensions have nevertheless frequently been taken in traditional treatises as constituting a semiotic illumination of the mind and logos in transparency.
55. Robert E. Harrist Jr., “Replication and Deception in Calligraphy of the Six Dynasties Period,” in Zongqi Cai, ed., Chinese Aesthetics, 47.
56. See Haun Saussy’s succinct analysis in “The Prestige of Writing: 文, Letter, Picture, Image, Ideography,” in Great Walls of Discourse: And Other Adventures in Cultural China (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Asia Center, 2001), 35–74. Saussy argues forcefully that like Western linguistic discourse, the Chinese concept of letter and character is no less bound to a logocentric myth and that behind its ideographic discourse looms a yearning for an unmediated representation of “writing.”
57. See, for example, Yang Yongde 楊永德 and Yang Ning 楊寧, “Lu Xun yu beituo” 魯迅與碑拓 (Lu Xun and stone rubbing), in Lu Xun zuihou shiernian yu meishu 魯迅最後十二年與美術 (Lu Xun and the arts in his last twelve years) (Beijing: Wenhua yishu chubanshe, 2007), 209–211. Lu Xun started collecting stone rubbings in 1912 when he was working at the Ministry of Education in Beijing, and his enthusiasm lasted at least to the late teens. He edited three volumes featuring his collections of rubbings of tomb tablets and stone carvings. As late as 1935 and early 1936, Lu Xun was still actively collecting rubbings of Han dynasty stone wall carvings through friends, including Tai Jingnong.
58. See Lu Tingqing 盧廷清, Shenyu, jinba, Tai Jingnong 沉鬱, 勁拔, 臺靜農 (Melancholy and resolute: Tai Jingnong) (Taipei: Xiongshi meishu, 2001), 31.
59. For a history of the rise and development of Chinese calligraphy, see, for example, Li Xiaokun 李蕭錕, Zhongguo shufa zhilü 中國書法之旅 (A journey of Chinese calligraphy) (Taipei: Xiongshi meishu, 2003). For a description of the genesis of calligraphy in ancient times and its rise as a form of art in the East Han era, see chapters 1–10.
60. Harrist, “Replication and Deception in Calligraphy of the Six Dynasties Period,” 33. Also see Jiang Xun’s perceptive analysis of the formation of Chinese calligraphy after the “southern migration” of the fourth century; Jiang Xun 蔣勲, “Shufa shi shengming de wancheng” 書法是生命的完成 (Calligraphy is the completion of life), in Mingjia hanmo 名家翰墨 (A magazine of Chinese brush art) 11 (1991): 63.
61. Qin Xianci 秦賢次, “Tai Jingnong xiansheng de wenxue shuyi licheng” 臺靜農先生的文學書藝歷程 (The experience of Mr. Tai Jingnong’s literary and calligraphic art), in Lin Wenyue, ed., Tai Jingnong xiansheng jinian wenji, 7.
62. Quoted from Lu Tingqing, Shenyu, jinba, Tai Jingnong, 48.
63. Bai Qiansheng, Fu Shan’s World: The Transformation of Chinese Calligraphy in the Seventeenth Century (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Asia Center, 2003), 65.
64. See, for example, Lu Tingqing, Shenyu, jinba, Tai Jingnong, 49.
65. Quoted from Lu Tingqing, Shenyu, jinba, Tai Jingnong, 49.
66. Through Hu Xiaoshi 胡小石 (1888–1962). See Lu Tingqing, Shenyu, jinba, Tai Jingnong, 54, 58.
67. For a critical overview of the late Ming trends of calligraphy, see Bai Qiansheng, Fu Shan’s World, chapter 1.
68. “南都尚可為。死，吾分也。勿紟棺，以志吾痛。” Ni Huiding 倪會鼎, Ni Yuanlu nianpu 倪元璐年譜 (A biographical chronology of Ni Yuanlu) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1994), 72.
69. Lu Tingqing, Shenyu, jinba, Tai Jingnong, 54.
70. I am borrowing the concept from W. J. T. Mitchell, Iconology: Image, Text, Ideology (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986).
71. See Liao Chao-heng’s discussion.
74. Tai Jingnong, Jingnong fashu ji, volume 1, 4, 5.
75. Tai Jingnong, “Ji Bowaiwong” 記波外翁 (On Qiao Dazhuang), Longbo zawen 龍坡雜文 (Miscellaneous essays of dragon slope) (Taipei: Hongfan shudian, 1988), 91–101.
77. See the reminiscences of Tai Jingnong’s students and friends about his teaching life and chairmanship of the Chinese Department at National Taiwan University, in Lin Wenyue, Tai Jingnong xiansheng jinianwenji 臺靜農先生紀念文集 (A collection of essays in memory of Mr. Tai Jingnong) (Taipei: Hongfan, 1991).
78. The Stone Gate at the Baoxie Passageway, Shanxi Province, lies in the tunnel south of the valley plank road. It was constructed in the Han dynasty (206 B.C.–220 A.D.), and rebuilt in the second year (509) of the Yongping reign of the Northern Wei dynasty (386–534) in commemoration of the builders of the past generations. Inscriptions left by celebrities in ancient China after the Han and Wei dynasties are well preserved, regarded as the Inscriptions on the Stone Gate. Li Xiaokun, Zhongguo shufa zhilu, 84.
79. Tai Jingnong, “Lun xiejingsheng” 論寫經生 (On sutra transcribers), in Tai Jingnong lunwenji, 362–366.
80. Until the last years of his career Tai Jingnong had been known for a very cavalier attitude toward his calligraphic works. He is said to have given away numerous pieces either at his own will or at the request of students and acquaintances. See, for example, Zhang Dachun’s 張大春 recollection, “Jinguan naqu” 儘管拿去 (Take it as you wish), in Tai Jingnong xiansheng jinian wenji, 199–202.
81. See Andrea Bachner’s perceptive analysis in her dissertation, “Paradoxical Corpographies: Towards an Ethics of Inscription” (Harvard University, 2007), particularly her discussion of Chinese Malaysian Sinophone writers Zhang Guixing and Huang Jinshü, in part IV, “Sa(l)vage Inscriptions,” 296–425.
82. Tai Jingnong, foreword to Longbo zawen, 1.
83. For a recent discussion of the affinity between calligraphy and music, see, for example, Yang Zhao 楊照, “Lingting shufa zhongde yiyue” 聆聽書法中的音樂 (Listening to the music in calligraphy), China Times, literary supplement, October 13, 2007. For the mutual illumination between calligraphy and dance, the best example in recent years is the renowned choreographer Lin Huaimin’s 林懷民 work “Xingcao” 行草 (cursive script), a dance inspired by the cursive script of calligraphy. The dance was premiered by Lin’s troupe Cloud Gate in December 2001. See http://www.cloudgate.org.tw/cg/about/index.php?about=history.
84. See, for example, He Bingwu 何炳武 and Shang Jianfei 尚建飛, “Yinyue yu shufa” 音樂與書法 (Music and calligraphy), Xibei daxue xuebao zhexue shehui kexueban 西北大學學報 (哲学社會科學版) (Northwestern University journal, edition of social sciences) 2 (2003).
85. I am benefiting from Dennis J. Schmidt’s discussion on language and music; see Lyrical and Ethical Subjects: Essays on the Periphery of the Word, Freedom, and History (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2005), 61–76.
86. Wang Bo 王勃, Wang Bo shi 王勃 (Poetry of Wang Bo) (Beijing: Beijing tushu chubanshe, 2002), 78.
87. See my essay “Houyimin xiezuo” 後遺民寫作 (Postloyalist writing), in Houyimin xiezuo 後遺民寫作 (Postloyalist writing) (Taipei: Ryefield, 2007), 23–70.
88. See, for example, Jiang Zhaoshen 江兆申, “Longbo shufa” 龍坡書法 (The calligraphy of East Slope), in Lin Wenyue, ed., Tai Jingnong xiansheng jinian wenji, 89–100; and particularly Gong Pengcheng 龔鵬程, “Lirenzhiai” 里仁之哀 (Mourning a benevolent man), 196.
89. Tai Jingnong, “Shi jing sangluan” (A first encounter with losses and disturbances), in Longbo zawen, 148.
90. Du Fu 杜甫, “Maowu wei qiufeng suopoge” (茅屋為秋風所破歌; A song about my hut being blown down by an autumn storm), in Qiu Zhaoao, 仇兆鰲, ed., Dushi xiangzhu 杜詩詳注(Annotated poetry of Du Fu) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1985), 832.
91. Xie Lingyun 謝靈運, “Shuzude ershou bingxu” 述祖德二首並序, in Yan Shaobo, ed. and annotation, Xie Lingyun ji jiaozhu 謝靈運集校注 (Annotated works by Xie Lingyun) (Taipei: Liren shuju, 2004), 154.
92. See Xiaofei Tian’s discussion of Xu Xin and the other two literati/officers of the Liang, Yan Zhitui 顏之推 (531–591) and Shen Jong 沈炯 (503–561), who were either permanently or temporarily stranded in the north as a result of the dynastic turmoil, in Beacon Fire and Shooting Star, chapter 8. For more discussion of Yu Xin, see Tai Jingnong, Zhongguo wenxueshi, volume 1, 265–268; Kang-i Sun Chang, Six Dynasties Poetry (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), chapter 5, particularly 178–183. The theme “lament for the south” is derived from the Chuci; see Song Yu’s 宋玉 Zhaohun 招魂：”目極千里兮傷春心，魂兮歸來哀江南。” Hong Xingzu 洪興祖，Chuci buzhu 楚辭補注 (Supplementary annotations of the Song of the South) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2006), 215.
93. Translated by Eugene Wang, “The Taming of the Shrew: Wang Hsi-chih (303–361) and Calligraphic Gentrification in the Seventh Century,” in Cary Y. Liu, C. Y. Ching, and Judith Smith, eds., Character and Context in Chinese Calligraphy (Princeton: The Art Museum, Princeton University, 1999), 134.
96. The script in Japan was discovered by Yang Shouqing 楊守敬 (1839–1915), a diplomat and veteran calligrapher of the late Qing era. Yang featured a copy in his Linsuyuan tie 臨蘇園帖 (Collection of scripts of Linsu garden), but the script was not made available in print until after 1934. See http://www.sh.xinhuanet.com/2005–02/02/content_3675428.htm.
Coda: Toward a Critical Lyricism
1. For instance, see Wang Hui, The End of the Revolution: China and the Limits of Modernity (London: Verso, 2009).
2. For instance, see Xu Jilin 許紀霖, Qimeng ruhe qisi huisheng: xiandai Zhongguo zhishifenzi de sixiang kunjing 啓蒙如何起死回生: 現代中國知識分子的思想困境 (How can enlightenment be resuscitated? The predicament of modern Chinese intellectuals) (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 2011).
3. First made known by Clifford Geertz in his anthropological research, “involution” indicates “a process whereby a social or cultural pattern persists and fails to transform itself into a new pattern even after it has reached definitive form.” Prasenjit Duara applies this concept to his survey of the changing state and rural power structure in early Repulican China. For Duara, in “state involution,” the formal structures of the state grow simultaneously with informal structures; state involution occurs when “state organizations expand not through the increasingly efficient use of existing or new inputs … but through the replication, extension, and elaboration of an inherited pattern of state-society relations.” While the formal state depends on the informal structures to carry out may of its functions, it is unable to extend its control over them. The result is the paradoxical coexistence of “success and failure, growth and disintegration in the same structure.” I am using the term in a different context. If “revolution” denotes an overcoming of that which is established through extreme measures, “involution,” by contrast, points to an introverted tendency, a move that expands and curls in such a way as to turn inward upon itself. Prasenjit Duara, Culture, Power, and State: Rural North China, 1900–1942 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1991), 74. Also see Clifford Geertz, Agricultural Involution: The Processes of Ecological Change in Indonesia (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1963). I discuss the notion extensively in Fin-de-siècle Splendor: Repressed Modernities of Late Qing Fiction, 1849–1911 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), introduction.
4. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, An Aesthetic Education in the Era of Globalization (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2012), 1–34.
6. Spivak, An Aesthetic Education, 12–15.
12. See, for instance, Martha Nussbaum, Poetic Justice: The Literary Imagination and Public Life (Boston: Beacon Press, 1995); Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989); Judith Butler, Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of “Sex” (New York: Routledge, 1995). Nussbaum is especially well known for her inquiry into the emotional power generated by literature in regard to deliberating public affairs. For a description of the recent literary turn in political thought and analysis, see Simon Stow, Republic of Readers? The Literary Turn in Political Thought and Analysis (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2007).
13. See, for instance, Peng Feng 彭鋒，Yinjin yu bianyi: xifang meixue zaizhongguo 引進與變異：西方美學在中國 (Importation and transformation: Western aesthetics in China) (Beijing: Shoudu shifan daxue chubanshe, 2006).
14. Tang Yonghua 湯擁華. Zong Baihua yu “Zhongguo meixue” de kungjing 宗白華與”“中國美學”的困境 (The predicament of Zong Baihua’s “Chinese aesthetics”) (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 2010).
15. Wang Lili 王麗麗. Zai wenyi yu yishi xingtai zhijian: Hu Feng yanjiu 在文藝與意識形態之間: 胡風研究 (Between literature and ideology: a study of Hu Feng) (Beijing: Zhongguo renmin daxue chubanshe, 2003).
16. Peter Button, Configurations of the Real in Chinese Literary and Aesthetic Modernity (Amsterdam: Brill, 2009).
17. Button bases his argument primarily on Jean-Luc Nancy and Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe’s The Literary Absolute: The Theory of Literature in German Romanticism (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988). Also see Thomas Moran’s review in MCLC Resource Center (2011) at http://mclc.osu.edu/rc/pubs/reviews/moran.htm. Given the ubiquitous impact of capitalist hegemony, Button never explains clearly how he manages to grant himself an ahistorical position immune to the infection of eidoaesthetics. He also overlooks the fact that premodern Chinese literary thought need not be understood in eidoaesthetic terms and played an active role in forming the aesthetic discourse in modern China. Even Cai Yi’s aesthetic theory is not necessarily fully under the hegemonic impact of either eidoaesthetics or socialist aesthetics.
18. For a general summary of the debate, see Wenyibao bianjibu 文藝報編輯部 (Editorial department of Wenyibao), Meixue wenti taolunji 美學問題討論集 (A collection of discussions on the polemic of the aesthetic) (Beijing: Zuojia chubanshe, 1957). For a critical description of the debate, see Zhang Qiqun 章啓群, Bainian Zhongguo meixue shilue 百年中國美學史略 (A general history of Chinese aesthetics of the past century) (Beijing: Beijing University Press, 2005), chapters 6–8. Also see Woei-lien Chong, “Combining Marx with Kant: The Philosophical Anthropology of Li Zehou,” Philosophy East and West 49, no. 2 (1999): 120–135.
19. See, for instance, Qian Niansun 錢念孫, Zhu Guangqian: chushi de jingshen yu rushi de shiye 朱光潛：出世的精神與入世的事業 (Zhu Guangqian: transcendental spirit and engaged career) (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 2005), chapter 9.
20. For more discussion of “sedimentation,” see Peng Feng, Yinjin yu bianyi, chapter 8.
21. Chong, “Combining Marx with Kant,” 120–149; Jane Cauvel, “The Transformative Power of Art: Li Zehou’s Aesthetic Theory,” Philosophy East and West 49, no. 2 (1999): 150–171. Liu Zaifu 劉再復, Li Zehou meixue gailun 李澤厚美學概論 (A general introduction to Li Zehou’s aesthetics) (Beijing: Sanlian chubanshe, 2010), 29–36. Chong’s words on Li Zehou’s philosophical orientations: “While Marx focuses on the crucial aspect of the capacity of the collective human subject to engage in economic production by means of ‘tools,’ Kant provides Li with the philosophical framework to reflect on the mental and ideal aspects of human nature, that is the faculties of knowledge, ethics and aesthetics” (121).
22. Li Zehou, “Subjectivity and ‘Subjecticality’: A Response,” Philosophy East and West 49, no. 2 (1999): 174–183.
23. Li Zehou, Meixue sijiang 美學四講 (Four talks on aesthetics), in Meixue sanshu 美學三書 (Three books on aesthetics) (Hefei: Anhui wenyi chubanshe, 1999), 508–517; 531–535. See also Yimao wushuo 乙卯五說 (Five lectures in the year of yimao) (Beijing: Zhongguo dianying chubanshe, 1999), 160–162. In Shji xinmeng 世紀新夢 (A millennial dream) (Hefei: Anhui jiaoyu chubanshe, 1998), Li declares that the ultimate tenet of his scholarship is qinggan or feeling/affection: “The meaning of human life lies in feeling, including the relationship between human and God, which in the end is an affective issue rather than a cognitive issue” (243); “[My scholarship] starts with the tool-oriented being and ends with the feeling-oriented being” (247).
24. Li Zehou, Shiyong lixing yu legan wenhua 實用理性與樂感文化 (Pragmatic reason and a culture of optimism) (Beijing: Sanlian chubanshe, 2005), 55–115. For an interpretation of qingbenti, see Liu Zaifu, Li Zehou meixue gailun, 53–59.
25. Confucian and Mencian statements aside, Li is inspired particularly by the passages from Guidian bamboo clips: daoshi yuqing 道始於情 (The Way originates with feeling/circumstance) and lisheng yuqing 禮生於情 (The rite arises from feeling/circumstance); see my discussion in chapter 1. Li Zehou, Shiyong lixing yu legan wenhua, 55–56; also see Liu Zaifu, Li Zehou meixue gailun, 58.
26. Li Zehou, Shiyong lixing yu legan wenhua, 3–54.
27. Li Zehou, Shiyong lixing yu legan wenhua, 3–54; see also Chong, “Combining Marx with Kant,” 124. One can find the similarity and difference between Li and Spivak in explicating the necessity of Bildung.
28. Tzu-lin Mei and Yu-kung Kao, “Tu Fu’s ‘Autumn Meditations’: An Exercise in Linguistic Criticism,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 28 (1968): 44. They mention Empson’s Seven Types of Ambiguity (1930) and The Structure of Complex Words (1951); Richards’ Practical Criticism (1929) and The Philosophy of Rhetoric (1936). They also mention the impact of Northrop Frye in footnote 1.
29. The two articles are “Syntax, Diction, and Imagery in T’ang Poetry” and “Meaning, Metaphor, and Allusion in T’ang Poetry,” published in Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies in 1971 and 1978 respectively. In the second article they pay tribute to Roman Jakobson; see HJAS 38 (1978): 349–351. I wish to acknowledge Chen Guoqiu’s succinct analysis of Kao’s career and theory, in “Cong lushi meidian dao Zhongguo wenhuaishi de shuqing chuantong” 從律詩美典到中國文化史的抒情傳統: 高友工抒情美典論初探 (From the aesthetics of regulated verse to the lyrical aesthetics of Chinese cultural tradition), Zhengda zhongwen xuebao (Bulletin of the Department of Chinese Literature, National Cheng-chih University) 10 (2008): 53–90.
30. Yu-kung Kao, “Lyric Vision in Chinese Narrative Tradition: A Reading of Hong-lou Meng and Ju-Lin Wai-Shih,” in Andrew Plaks, ed., Chinese Narrative: Critical and Theoretical Essays (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977), 232.
31. Yu-kung Kao, “The Aesthetics of Regulated Verse,” in Shuen-fu Lin and Stephen Owen, eds., The Vitality of Lyric Voice: Shih Poetry from the Late Han to the T’ang (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 332–384.
32. Yu-kung Kao, “Chinese Lyric Aesthetics,” in Alfred Murck and Wen C. Fang, eds., Words and Images: Chinese Poetry, Calligraphy, and Painting (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1991), 47–90.
33. Yu-kung Kao, “Chinese Lyric Aesthetics,” 55. Kao emphasizes that his approach pays special attention to the creative process of the poet (48–49).
34. Yu-kung Kao, “Chinese Lyric Aesthetics,” 53.
35. Gu Xin, for instance, argues that Li’s three-pronged theoretical approach to aesthetics ends up being subsumed by a Hegelian vision of subjectivity, in “Subjectivity, Modernity, and Chinese Hegelian Marxism: A Study of Li Zehou’s Philosophical Ideas from a Comparative Perspective,” Philosophy East and West 46, no. 2 (1996): 205–245. Also see Li’s comment in “Subjectivity and ‘Subjecticality’: A Response,” Philosophy East and West 49, no. 2 (1999): 174–183.
36. Shen Congwen, “Chouxiang de shuqing.”
37. For the Buddhist connotation of zhao and its associated imagery, such as light and vision, in the sixth-century China, see Xiaofei Tian’s most stimulating analysis in Beacon Fire and the Shooting Star: The Literary Culture of the Liang (502–557) (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard East Asian monograph series, 2007), chapter 5. Again, Shen Congwen’s reference to zhao indicates his indebtedness to medieval Chinese aesthetics.
38. The phrase sisuo (思索) is traceable to Xunzi; 《荀子·勸學》 (Xunzi: inculcation of learning)：”故誦數以貫之，思索以通之。”
39. Shen Congwen 沈從文, “Zhi Jiliu” 致吉六 (To Jiliu) (Dec 7, 1948), in Shen Congwen quanji 沈從文全集 (Complete works of Shen Congwen; hereafter SCQJ) (Taiyuan: Beiyue wenyi chubanshe, 2009), vol. 18, 519. Shen Congwen, “Yigeren de zibai” 一個人的自白 (My own confession), in SCQJ, vol. 27, 8–9; also see his moving description of his argument with his sons in 1949, “Zhengzhi wusuo buzai” 政治無所不在 (Politics exists everywhere), in SCQJ, vol. 27, 41.
40. Xu Shen in Shuowen jiezi indicates that si referes to “contain” (思，容也). See Duan yucai 段玉裁注, Shuowen jiezi zhu 說文解字注 (Annotations of Shuowen jiezi) (Taipei: Ding Yuan wenhua shiye youxian gongsi, 2003), 501. In Shangshu hongfan 尚書洪範 (Book of documents, grand canon), si is defined as “contain/embrace/encompass, meaning that which contain anything and everything that the heart/mind entertains” (思曰容，言心之所慮，不包也。); see Qu Wanli 屈萬里， Shangshu Jinzhu Jinyi hongfan 尚書今註今譯 (Shangshu: modern annotations and interpretations) (Taipei: Shangwu yinshuguan,2009), 119.
41. Liu Xie, “Shensi” 神思 (Spirit thought), in Wenxin diaolong; trans. Owen, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought, 201. “神思之謂也。文之思也，其神遠矣。故寂然凝慮，思接千載；悄焉動容，視通萬里；吟詠之間，吐納珠玉之聲；眉睫之前，卷舒風云之色；其思理之致乎！”
42. Feng Zhi 馮至. Feng Zhi Quanji 馮至全集 (Complete works of Feng Zhi) (Shijiazhuang: Hebei jiaoyu chubanshe, 1999), vol. 1, 111. See Wang Xiaojue’s discussion in Modernity with a Cold War Face (Cambridge, Mass.: East Asia Center, Harvard University, 2013), chapter 5. I am using her translation.
43. Tai Jingnong, “Laoqu” 老去 (Aged), in Tai Jingnong shiji 臺靜農詩集 (A collection of poems by Tai Jingnong), ed. Xu Liping 許禮平 (Hong Kong: Han Mo Xuan, 2001), 70.
44. Chu T’ien-wen 朱天文, “Huayi qianshen” 花憶前身 (Remembrances of the flowery previous incarnation), in her collection of writings also titled Huayi qianshen (Taipei: Ryefield Publications, 1996), 3–49.
45. Wu Hung, A Story of Ruins: Presence and Absence in Chinese Art and Visual Culture (London: Reaktion Books, 2012), chapter 3.
47. Jie Li, “Home and Nation Amid the Rubble: Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town and Jia Zhangke’s Still Life,” Modern Chinese Literature and Culture (Fall 2009): 89–125.
48. Zhang Zhaohe, afterword to Shen Congwen jiashu 沈從文家書 (Family letters of Shen Congwen) (Taipei: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1998), 367.
49. Zhao Tingyang 趙汀陽, Tianxia tixi: shijie zhidu zhexue daolun 天下體系: 世界制度哲學導論 (Under heaven: introduction to world philosophical systems) (Beijing: Zhonguo renmin daxue chubanshe, 2011); Gan Yang 甘陽， Tongsantong 通三統 (Unification of three orthodoxies) (Beijing: Sanlian shudian, 2007). The three are the Confucian, Maoist, and Deng Xiaoping orthodoxies; Yan Xuetong 閻學通 and Xu Jin 徐進, Wangba tianxia sixiang jiqidi 王霸天下思想及啓迪 (The thought of kingly hegemony and its illumination) (Beijing: Shijie zhishi chubanshe, 2009).
50. Liu Xie, “Wuse,” Wenxin diaolong, in Owen, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought, 284. With modification. “古來辭人，異代接武，莫不參伍以相變，因革以為功，物色盡而情有餘者，曉會通也。”