This innovative sourcebook builds a dynamic understanding of China’s early medieval period (220–589) through an original selection and arrangement of literary, historical, religious, and critical texts. A tumultuous and formative era, these centuries saw the longest stretch of political fragmentation in China’s imperial history, resulting in new ethnic configurations, the rise of powerful clans, and a pervasive divide between north and south.
Deploying thematic categories, the editors sketch the period in a novel way for students and, by featuring many texts translated into English for the first time, recast the era for specialists. Thematic topics include regional definitions and tensions, governing mechanisms and social reality, ideas of self and other, relations with the unseen world, everyday life, and cultural concepts. Within each section, the editors and translators introduce the selected texts and provide critical commentary on their historical significance, along with suggestions for further reading and research.
Inhaltsverzeichnis
Chronological Contents
Acknowledgments
A Note on the Translations
Abbreviations
Introduction
Part I. The North and the South by Jessey J. C. Choo
1. Return to the North? The Debate on Moving the Capital Back to Luoyang, by Jessey J. C. Choo
2. The Disputation at Pengcheng: Accounts from the Wei shu and the Song shu, by Albert E. Dien
3. Between Imitation and Mockery: The Southern Treatments of Northern Cultures, by Jessey J. C. Choo
4. Literary Imagination of the North and South, by Ping Wang
Part II. Governing Mechanisms and Social Reality by Yang Lu
5. Managing Locality in Early Medieval China: Evidence from Changsha, by Yang Lu
6. Classical Scholarship in the Shu Region: The Case of Qiao Zhou, by J. Michael Farmer
7. Ranking Men and Assessing Talent: Xiahou Xuan’s Response to an Inquiry by Sima Yi, by Timothy M. Davis
8. On Land and Wealth: Liu Zishang’s ‚Petition on Closing Off Mountains and Lakes‘ and Yang Xi’s ‚Discussion on Abolishing Old Regulations Regarding Mountains and Marshes‘, by Charles Holcombe
9. Crime and Punishment: The Case of Liu Hui in the Wei shu, by Jen-der Lee
10. Marriage and Social Status: Shen Yue’s ‚Impeaching Wang Yuan‘, by David R. Knechtges
11. Religion and Society on the Silk Road: The Inscriptional Evidence from Turfan, by Huaiyu Chen
Part III. Cultural Capital by Wendy Swartz
12. The Art of Discourse: Xi Kang’s ‚Sound Is Without Sadness or Joy‘, by Robert Ashmore
13. Poetry on the Mysterious: The Writings of Sun Chuo, by Paul W. Kroll
14. The Art of Poetry Writing: Liu Xiaochuo’s ‚Becoming the Number-One Person for the Number-One Position‘, by Ping Wang
15. Six Poems from a Liang Dynasty Princely Court, by Xiaofei Tian
16. Pei Ziye’s ‚Discourse on Insect Carving‘, by Jack W. Chen
17. Classifying the Literary Tradition: Zhi Yu’s ‚Discourse on Literary Compositions Divided by Genre‘, by Wendy Swartz
18. Zhong Rong’s Preface to Grades of the Poets, by Stephen Owen
19. Book Collecting and Cataloging in the Age of Manuscript Culture: Xiao Yi’s Master of the Golden Tower and Ruan Xiaoxu’s Preface to Seven Records, by Xiaofei Tian
Part IV. Imaging Self and Other by Wendy Swartz
20. Biographies of Recluses: Huangfu Mi’s Accounts of High-Minded Men, by Alan Berkowitz
21. Classifications of People and Conduct: Selections from Liu Shao’s Treatise on Personality and Liu Yiqing’s Recent Anecdotes from the Talk of the Ages, by Jack W. Chen
22. The Literary Community at the Court of the Liang Crown Prince, by Ping Wang
23. Self-Narration: Tao Yuanming’s ‚Biography of the Master of Five Willows‘ and Yuan Can’s ‚Biography of the Master of Wonderful Virtue‘, by Wendy Swartz
24. On Political and Personal Fate: Three Selections from Jiang Yan’s Prose and Verse, by Paul W. Kroll
25. The Shadow Image in the Cave: Discourse on Icons, by Eugene Wang
Part V. Everyday Life by Jessey J. C. Choo and Albert E. Dien
26. Dietary Habits: Shu Xi’s ‚Rhapsody on Pasta‘, by David R. Knechtges
27. The Epitaph of a Third-Century Wet Nurse, Xu Yi, by Jen-der Lee
28. Festival and Ritual Calendar: Selections from Record of the Year and Seasons of Jing-Chu, by Ian Chapman
29. Custom and Society: The Family Instructions of Mr. Yan, by Albert E. Dien
30. Adoption and Motherhood: ‚The Petition Submitted by Lady [née] Yu‘, by Jessey J. C. Choo
31. Estate Culture in Early Medieval China: The Case of Shi Chong, by David R. Knechtges
Part VI. Relations with the Unseen World by Robert Ford Campany
32. Biographies of Eight Autocremators and Huijiao’s ‚Critical Evaluation‘, by James A. Benn
33. Divine Instructions for an Official, by Stephen R. Bokenkamp
34. Tales of Strange Events, by Robert Ford Campany
35. Texts for Stabilizing Tombs, by Timothy M. Davis
36. Reciting Scriptures to Move the Spirits, by Clarke Hudson
37. Confucian Views of the Supernatural, by Keith N. Knapp
38. Encounters in Mountains, by Gil Raz
List of Contributors
Index
Über den Autor
Wendy Swartz is an associate professor of Chinese literature at Rutgers University. She is the author of Reading Tao Yuanming: Shifting Paradigms of Historical Reception (427–1900) and articles on early medieval Chinese poetry and classical literary thought and criticism.Robert Ford Campany is a professor of Asian studies and religion at Vanderbilt University. He is the author of Making Transcendents: Ascetics and Social Memory in Early Medieval China and three other books and numerous articles on the history of Chinese religions and the comparative study of religion. Yang Lu has taught at Princeton University and the University of Kansas and is a professor of Chinese history at Peking University. He specializes in the history of medieval China and of Buddhism. His publications include works on the cultural and political history of the Tang dynasty, Buddhist scholasticism in China, and Chinese historiography.Jessey J. C. Choo is an assistant professor at Rutgers University and specializes in the cultural history of medieval China. She is currently finishing a book-length study on memory, identity, and the transformation of mortuary and commemorative rituals in medieval China.Ebooks vom selben Autor / Herausgeber
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