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Some Limitations of Chinese Fiction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

John L. Bishop
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Extract

One wonders what the general reading public has made of the translations of traditional Chinese fiction which have recently appeared in bookstores, in several instances in paper-bound series usually devoted to up-to-date novels of violence and vampires. Chinese colloquial fiction before the coming of Western influences certainly contains enough of both murder and adultery to give the average reader a sense of literary familiarity; but the thoughtful reader must be puzzled by an undefinable inadequacy, by a feeling of literary promise unfulfilled, to which even the student of Chinese stories and novels must confess. Unconsciously conditioned as are we all to the premises and achievements of European fiction, we cannot fail to weigh this fiction of another culture in the same balance and find it vaguely wanting. In the following pages I intend to isolate several of the factors which contribute to our impression of disappointment upon reading those works which have long been a source of delight to the Chinese.

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Articles
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The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 15 , Issue 2 , February 1956 , pp. 239 - 247
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1956

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References

1 Tuan Ch'eng-shih’, Yu-yang tsa-tsu hsü-chi [Supplement to the Yu-yang miscellanea], 4: 11aGoogle Scholar in ts'e 56 of Hupei hsien cheng i-shu; Su Shih, Tung-p'o chih-lin [Literary remains of Tung-p'o], 6.

2 The principal descriptions are: Meng Yüan-lao, Tung-ching meng-hua lu [Memories of the eastern capital], 7b in ts'e 3 of T'ang-Sung ts'ung-shu; Nai Te-Weng, Tu-ch'eng chisheng [The Wonders of the capital], 10a–b in ts'e 1 of Lien-t'ing shih erh chung; Chou Mi, Wu-lin chiu-shih [Hangchow that was], 6: 11a–12b, in ts'e 250–2 of Pi-chi hsiao-shuo takuan.

3 Many of the poems used are tz'u, a form originally associated with musical accompaniment. The narrator's cues to his accompanist before each poem have still survived in the text of one story, Ching-shih t'ung-yen, 38.

4 Ch'ing p'ing shan t'ang hua-pen [Colloquial stories from the Ch'ing p'ing shan studio] was compiled by Hung P'ien between 1522 and 1566; Ching-pen t'ung-su hsiao-shuo [The capital edition of colloquial stories] is of disputed compilation date but contains materials antedating the Ming period; Ku-chin hsiao-shuo [Stories old and new] with an alternate title Yü-shih ming-yen [Clear words to instruct the world]; Ching-shih t'ung-yen [General words to admonish the world]; and Hsing-shih heng-yen [Constant words to arouse the world] were edited and published as a series by Feng Meng-lung in 1621, 1625, and 1628 and are referred to collectively as the San-yen [The three yen].

5 A thorough study of the development of one such novel is Richard G. Irwin'a The Evolution of a Chinese Novel: Shui-hu-chuan (Cambridge, Mass., 1953).Google Scholar

6 Translations: Jackson, J. H., Water Margin (abridged) (London, 1937)Google Scholar; Buck, Pearl, All Men Are Brothers (New York, 1937).Google Scholar

7 Translation: Brewitt-Taylor, C. H., San Kuo or Romance of the Three Kingdoms (Shanghai, 1925).Google Scholar

8 Translations: Egerton, Clement, The Golden Lotus (London, 1939)Google Scholar; Miall, Bernard, Chin Ping Mei, The Adventurous History of Hsi Men and his Six Wives (abridged) (New York, 1938).Google Scholar

9 See Bishop, John L., “A Colloquial Short Story in the Novel Chin p'ing mei,” HJAS, XVII (12 1954), 394–402.Google Scholar

10 Translations: Waley, Arthur, Monkey (abridged) (New York, 1943)Google Scholar; Richards, Timothy, A Mission to Heaven (partial, with summaries) (Shanghai, 1913).Google Scholar

11 For examples, see Ku-chin hsiao-shuo, 1, 3, 38Google Scholar; and Hsing-shih heng-yen, 15.Google Scholar

12 Translation: Waley, Arthur, The Tale of Genji (Boston, 1927–1933).Google Scholar

13 Translations: Joly, H. Bancroft, Hung Lou Meng or, The Dream of the Red Chamber, a Chinese Novel (partial) (London, 1892–1893)Google Scholar; Wang, Chi-chen, Dream of the Red Chamber (partial, with summary) (New York, 1912).Google Scholar