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The Works of Li Qingzhao, Prose 2.1 through 2.5
After a delay in which I came down with various interesting illnesses, we return to The Works of Li Qingzhao, freely available via De Gruyter's Library of Chinese Humanities in Mandarin and English and via several publication formats, including two open access options (the pdf appears to be better formatted than the ebook). This week we're reading the prose chapter: 2.1 through 2.5, inclusive.
This collection uses footnotes and end notes to explicate the work. A few of this week's poems have footnotes, so look out for that.
CLP has an episode on Li Qingzhao you might find relevant.
This collection uses footnotes and end notes to explicate the work. A few of this week's poems have footnotes, so look out for that.
CLP has an episode on Li Qingzhao you might find relevant.
2.3 金石錄後序 Afterword to Catalogue of Inscriptions on Metal and Stone
右金石錄三十卷者何?趙侯德父所著書也。取上自三代，
下迄五季，鍾、鼎、甗、鬲、盤、匜、尊、敦之款識，豐
碑大碣、顯人晦士之事蹟，凡見於金石刻者二千卷，皆是
正偽謬，去取褒貶，上足以合聖人之道，下足以訂史氏之
失者皆載之，可謂多矣。嗚呼，自王涯、元載之禍，書畫
與胡椒無異;長輿、元凱之病，錢癖與傳癖何殊。名雖不
同，其惑一也。
余建中辛巳，始歸趙氏。時先君作禮部員外郎，丞相
時作吏部侍郎。侯年二十一，在太學作學生。趙、李族
寒，素貧儉。每朔望謁告出，質衣取半千錢，步入相國
寺，市碑文果實歸，相對展玩咀嚼，自謂葛天氏之民也。
後二年，出仕宦，便有飯蔬衣綀，窮遐方絕域，盡天下古
文奇字之志。日就月將，漸益堆積。丞相居政府，親舊或
在館閣，多有亡詩逸史、魯壁、汲塚所未見之書，遂盡力
傳寫，浸覺有味，不能自已。後或見古今名人書畫，三代
奇器，亦複脫衣市易。嘗記崇寧間，有人持徐熙牡丹圖，
求錢二十萬。當時雖貴家子弟，求二十萬錢，豈易得耶?
留信宿，計無所出而還之。夫婦相向惋悵者數日。
後屏居鄉里十年，仰取俯拾，衣食有餘。連守兩郡，
竭其俸入，以事鉛槧。每獲一書，即同共校勘，整集籖
題。得書、畫、彝、鼎，亦摩玩舒卷，指摘疵病，夜盡一
燭為率。故能紙札精緻，字畫完整，冠諸收書家。余性偶
強記，每飯罷，坐歸來堂烹茶，指堆積書史，言某事在某
書某卷、第幾頁第幾行，以中否角勝負，為飲茶先後。中
即舉杯大笑，至茶傾覆懷中，反不得飲而起。甘心老是鄉
矣，雖處憂患貧窮，而志不屈。收書既成，歸來堂起書庫
大櫥，簿甲乙，置書冊。如要講讀，即請鑰上簿，關出卷
帙。或少損污，必懲責揩完塗改，不復向時之坦夷也。是
欲求適意而反取憀憟。余性不耐，始謀食去重肉，衣去重
采，首無明珠、翠羽之飾，室無塗金、刺繡之具。遇書史
百家字不刓闕、本不訛謬者，輒市之儲作副本。自來家傳
周易、左氏傳，故兩家者流，文字最備。於是几案羅列，
枕席枕藉，意會心謀，目往神授，樂在聲色狗馬之上。
至靖康丙午歲，侯守淄川，聞金人犯京師，四顧茫
然，盈箱溢篋，且戀戀，且悵悵，知其必不為己物矣。建
炎丁未春三月，奔太夫人喪南來，既長物不能盡載，乃先
去書之重大印本者，又去畫之多幅者，又去古器之無款識
者，後又去書之監本者，畫之平常者，器之重大者。凡屢
減去，尚載書十五車。至東海，連艫渡淮，又渡江，至建
康。青州故第尚鎖書冊什物，用屋十餘間，期明年春再具
舟載之。十二月，金人陷青州，凡所謂十餘屋者，已皆為
煨燼矣。
建炎戊申秋九月，侯起復知建康府。己酉春三月罷， 具舟上蕪湖，入姑孰，將卜居贛水上。夏五月，至池陽， 被旨知湖州，過闕上殿，遂駐家池陽，獨赴召。六月十三 日，始負擔，捨舟坐岸上，葛衣岸巾，精神如虎，目光爛 爛射人，望舟中告別。余意甚惡，呼曰:「如傳聞城中緩 急，奈何?」戟手遙應曰:「從眾。必不得已，先棄輜重， 次衣被，次書冊卷軸，次古器，獨所謂宗器者，可自負 抱，與身俱存亡。勿忘也。」遂馳馬去。途中奔馳，冒大 暑，感疾，至行在，病痁。七月末，書報臥病。余驚怛， 念侯性素急，奈何!病痁或熱，必服寒藥，疾可憂。遂解 舟下，一日夜行三百里。比至，果大服茈胡、黃芩藥，瘧 且痢，病危在膏肓。余悲泣，倉皇不忍問後事。八月十八 日，遂不起。取筆作詩，絕筆而終，殊無分香賣履之意。
葬畢，余無所之。朝廷已分遣六宮，又傳江當禁渡。
時猶有書二萬卷，金石刻二千卷，器皿、茵褥，可待百
客，他長物稱是。余又大病，僅存喘息。事勢日迫，念侯
有妹壻任兵部侍郎，從衛在洪州，遂遣二故吏，先部送行
李往投之。冬十二月，金人陷洪州，遂盡委棄。所謂連艫
渡江之書，又散為雲煙矣。獨餘少輕小卷軸書帖、寫本
李、杜、韓、柳集，《世說》、《鹽鐵論》，漢、唐石刻
副本數十軸，三代鼎鼐十數事，南唐寫本書數篋，偶病中
把玩，搬在臥內者，巋然獨存。
上江既不可往，又虜勢叵測，有弟迒任勅局刪定官，
遂往依之。到台，台守已遁。之剡，出陸，又棄衣被，
走黃巖，雇舟入海，奔行朝，時駐蹕章安。從御舟海道之
溫，又之越。庚戌十二月，放散百官，遂之衢。紹興辛亥
春三月，復赴越。壬子，又赴杭。
先侯疾亟時，有張飛卿學士，攜玉壺過視侯，便攜
去，其實珉也。不知何人傳道，遂妄言有「頒金」之語;
或傳亦有密論列者。余大惶怖，不敢言，亦不敢遂已，盡
將家中所有銅器等物，欲赴外廷投進。到越，已移幸四
明，不敢留家中，並寫本書寄剡。後官軍收叛卒，取去，
聞盡入故李將軍家。所謂巋然獨存者，無慮十去五六矣。
惟有書畫硯墨可五七簏，更不忍置他所。常在臥榻下，手
自開闔。在會稽，卜居土民鍾氏舍。忽一夕，穴壁負五簏
去。余悲慟不得活，重立賞收贖。後二日，鄰人鍾復皓出
十八軸求賞，故知其盜不遠矣。萬計求之，其餘遂牢不可
出。今知盡為吳說運使賤價得之。所謂巋然獨存者，乃十
去其七八。所有一二殘零不成部帙書冊，三數種平平書
帖，猶愛惜如護頭目，何愚也邪!
今日忽閱此書，如見故人。因憶侯在東萊靜治堂，裝 卷初就，芸籤縹帶，束十卷作一帙。每日晚吏散，輒校勘 二卷，跋題一卷。此二千卷，有題跋者五百二卷耳。今手 澤如新，而墓木已拱，悲夫!
昔蕭繹江陵陷沒，不惜國亡而毀裂書畫;楊廣江都傾
覆，不悲身死而復取圖書，豈人性之所著，死生不能忘
歟?或者天意以余菲薄，不足以享此尤物耶?抑亦死者有
知，猶斤斤愛惜，不肯留人間邪?何得之艱而失之易也!
嗚呼!余自少陸機作賦之二年，至過蘧瑗知非之兩
歲，三十四年之間，憂患得失，何其多也!然有有必有
無，有聚必有散，乃理之常。人亡弓，人得之，又胡足
道。所以區區記其終始者，亦欲為後世好古博雅者之戒
云。
Re: 2.3 金石錄後序 Afterword to Catalogue of Inscriptions on Metal and Stone
What is this book, Catalogue of Inscriptions on Metal and Stone, in thirty chapters? It is a work written by Zhao Defu [Mingcheng]. Taking as his subject two thousand inscriptions carved on bronze vessels and stelae dating from the Three Dynasties of high antiquity all the way down to the Five Kingdoms of recent times, including both interior and exterior inscriptions on bells, ding tripods, steamers, li tripods, basins, water ves- sels, wine beakers, and grain containers, as well as those concerning the lives of both eminent officials and obscure scholars found on rounded or rectangular stelae, he corrected their errors, distinguished the authentic from the spurious, and evaluated their historical value. He composed colophons on all those inscriptions that suffice either to affirm the Way of the sages or to emend mistakes in the historiographical record. The contents are rich indeed. The calamities suffered by Wang Ya and Yuan Zai show that there is no difference between hoarding works of art and hoarding pepper.1 Likewise, both Changyu and Yuankai were sick men. What does it matter that one was obsessed with money and the other with the Zuo Commentary?2 Their sicknesses went by different names, but their delusion was the same.
It was in the xinsi year of the Jianzhong period [1101] that I married into the Zhao family. At that time, my late father was serving as vice director of the Ministry of Rites, and the grand councilor [her father-in- law, Zhao Tingzhi] was vice director of the Ministry of Personnel. My husband, twenty-one years old, was a student in the National University. The Zhaos and Lis are undistinguished families that have always been poor. On the leave days of the first and fifteenth of every month, when he requested holiday leave, we would pawn some clothes to raise five hundred cash. Then we’d walk to Xiangguo Monastery to buy fruits and rubbings of inscriptions. We’d take them home, sit down together, and spread them out, savoring them. We felt that we were living in the har- monious era of Getianshi.1 Two years later, my husband came out to serve as an official. We then resolved to eat vegetarian meals and wear clothes of coarse cloth, so that we might fulfill our intent to gather from every distant place and remote region as many of the empire’s ancient inscrip- tions and rare engraved works as we could. As the days and months passed, our collection grew. The grand councilor stayed in the imperial city, and many of our relations worked in the palace libraries and archives. They had access to lost odes, little-known histories, and such books as those recovered from the walls of Lu and the tomb of Ji.2 When we came upon such rare works, we exerted ourselves to make copies of them. Once awakened to the flavor of this activity, we could not stop. Later, when- ever we came upon a piece of calligraphy or a painting by a celebrated artist, whether ancient or recent, or a precious vessel from the Three Dynasties, we would take off a layer of clothing to pawn for it. I re- member that once during the Chongning period [1102–6] someone brought a peony painting by Xu Xi [10th c.] to show us. He was asking two hundred thousand for it. In those days it would have been hard even for young persons in eminent officials’ families to come up with such a sum. The man left it with us for two days, but we finally decided we could not purchase it and returned it to him. Afterward, my husband and I looked at each other dejectedly for several days.
Later, we lived in seclusion in our hometown for ten years.1 By manag- ing our expenses carefully, we had more than enough for food and cloth- ing. Then my husband served successively as prefect in two separate places, and we devoted all of his salary to purchasing books and writing materials.2 Whenever we obtained a new book, the two of us would col- late together, comparing other editions, then produce a corrected copy with a new title page. When we obtained a calligraphic scroll, painting, or ritual bronze, we would also pore over it to amuse ourselves, identify- ing any defects we could find. Our custom was to limit ourselves to the duration of one candle per night. In this way, we were able to gather works with a quality of paper and completeness in their texts and brush- work that were superior to those of other collectors. It happens that I have a good memory, and in the evenings after dinner we would sit in our hall named Returning Home and brew tea.3 We’d point to a pile of books and, choosing a particular event, try to say in which book, which chapter, which page, and which line it was recorded. The winner of our little contest got to drink first. When I guessed right, I’d hold the cup high and burst out laughing until the tea splattered the front of my gown. I’d have to get up without even taking a sip. Oh, how I wished we could grow old living like that! So even though our lives were fraught with apprehensions and poverty, what we valued and strove for was never compromised. When our books were complete, we built a library in Returning Home, with large cabinets marked with numbers. We arranged the books ac- cordingly inside. Whoever wanted a book to read would have to get a key and record the book’s number in a log before taking it out. If the borrower made the slightest mark or smudge on a page, it was his or her responsibility to repair or clean it. We were no longer as easygoing as at first. In this way, what had started as an amusement turned into a source of vexation. I couldn’t stand it, so I decided that we would eat no more than one meat dish per meal and dress in no more than one colored gar- ment at a time. I wore no pearls or feathers in my hair and kept no gilded or embroidered article in my household. Whenever we came across a book of any kind whose text had no lacunae and was free of misprints, we would buy it on the spot to use as a back-up copy. Our family special- ized in the study of the Classic of Changes and the Zuo Commentary, and so our collection was particularly complete with regard to scholarship on those two works. Eventually, books were scattered all over our desks and were stacked in piles on our pillows and mats. Our thoughts met with those in the books, and our minds communicated with their authors. Our eyes went forth among their pages, and our souls were enriched by them. Certainly the joy that they gave us was superior to that of dancing girls or raising dogs and horses.
In the bingwu year of the Jingkang period [1126], when my husband was serving as prefect of Zichuan, we heard that the Jin armies had at- tacked our capital. We had no idea what to do. We gazed at our overflow- ing boxes and brimming trunks with both fond attachment and distress. We knew they would not be ours for long. In the third month of the dingwei year of Jianyan [1127], we hurried south for my mother-in-law’s funeral. Realizing that we could not take all those superfluous things with us, we first set aside the large printed books, then we set aside the paintings with multiple panels, and then we set aside the ancient vessels with no inscriptions. Finally, we set aside books in National University editions, ordinary paintings, and all heavy vessels. But even after these many reductions, we still traveled with fifteen carts of books. When we reached Donghai, we crossed the Huai River in a string of boats. Then we crossed the Yangzi River and arrived at Jiankang [Nanjing]. We had left under lock and key more than ten rooms of books and other items at our old residence in Qingzhou. We planned to return the following year and transport them south by boat. But in the twelfth month, the Jin sacked Qingzhou. The more than ten rooms of belongings were reduced to ashes.
In the ninth month of the wushen year of Jianyan [1128], my husband came out of mourning and was appointed prefect of Jiankang. His ap- pointment ended in the third month of the following year.1 We prepared a boat to take us to Wuhu and into Gushu, intending eventually to find a new place to live along the Gan River. But in the fifth month, when we had reached Chiyang, my husband received an imperial command ap- pointing him prefect of Huzhou and was summoned for an audience before the imperial throne.2 So we decided to make our home in Chiyang, with my husband going on by himself in response to the summons. On the thirteenth day of the sixth month, he was packed and, having left our boat, sat on the bank. Dressed in coarse clothes with a kerchief around his head, his mood that of a tiger on the prowl, his eyes darting and flashing, he looked toward our boat and bid farewell. I was in a ter- rible state of mind and shouted to him, “What shall I do if I hear the town is threatened?” He pointed at me and answered from afar, “Go with the crowd. If you must, discard the household belongings first, then our clothes, then the books and paintings, and then the ancient vessels. But the ritual vessels, be sure to take them with you wherever you go. Live or die with them. Don’t forget!” With this, he galloped off. Hurrying toward his destination, he paid no attention to the summer heat and, as a result, fell ill. By the time he reached the traveling court, his sickness was serious. A letter from him at the end of the seventh month informed me that he was confined to bed. I was frightened, knowing that, as he was high-strung by nature, any illness would be dangerous. If he developed a fever, he was bound to take cooling medicines, and then his condition would become worse. I had our boat untied and sailed day and night to be with him, covering three hundred li a day. By the time I arrived, he had in fact taken large doses of bupleurum and scutellaria.3 His fever was constant now, and he had also developed dysentery. His condition was beyond treatment. I wept bitterly and was too upset to ask what plans he had made for me after he was gone. On the eighteenth day of the eighth month [of 1129], he could no longer get up. He picked up a brush and wrote out a poem. When he finished the poem, he died. He had no final instructions regarding “dividing up the incense or selling sandals.”
After I buried him, I had nowhere to go. The court had dispatched the empress and palace ladies to
a separate location, and it was said that crossing the Yangzi River would soon be prohibited. At the time, I still had twenty thousand books, two thousand folios of inscriptions on metal and stone, and enough utensils and bedding to receive a hundred guests. My other superfluous things were comparable in quantity. I my- self was very sick, and my breathing was extremely weak. I thought of my late husband’s brother-in-law [Li Zhuo], who was vice minister of the Ministry of War and was then protecting the empress at Hongzhou. I dispatched two trusted clerks to him, sending along a portion of our pos- sessions with them for safekeeping. In the twelfth month of 1129, the Jin armies sacked Hongzhou, and everything I had sent was lost. The books that had been ferried across the Huai River in a string of boats were turned into smoke and clouds. All I had left were a few small, light- weight scrolls of calligraphy inscriptions; manuscript copies of the works of Li Bai, Du Fu, Han Yu, and Liu Zongyuan; A New Account of Tales of the World and Discourses on Salt and Iron; a few dozen mounted rubbings of stone inscriptions from the Han through Tang dynasties; some ten bronze vessels from the Three Dynasties; and a few cases of manuscripts from the Southern Tang. From time to time I would amuse myself with these during my illness. These were the only remnants I had left, as I lay sick in bed.
It was impossible to go farther up the Yangzi River, and moreover the invaders’ movements were unpredictable. My younger brother Hang was serving as reviser in the Law Code Office, and so I decided to go seek refuge with him. By the time I got to Taizhou, the prefect there had fled. When I got to Shan, I proceeded over land. I discarded my clothes and beddings as I hurried to Huangyan, where I hired a boat and set out to sea, hoping to catch up with the traveling court.1 At the time the emperor had docked at Zhang’an. I followed the imperial ship to Wenzhou and from there went back to Yue. In the twelfth month of the gengxu year [1130], when the officials were dismissed, I proceeded to Quzhou. In the third month of the xinhai year of Shaoxing [1131], I went again to Yue. In the renzi year [1132], I returned to Hangzhou.
Previously, when my husband was extremely ill, a certain Academician Zhang Feiqing came to see him bringing a jade pitcher that he then took away with him. The pitcher was actually made of jade-like stone. I do not know who started the rumor, but it was falsely said that there was talk of “an imperial behest of gold.”3 Some even said there was going to be a secret inquiry into the matter. I was terrified. I did not dare to speak out, but I also did not dare do nothing. I decided that I would take all my household’s bronze vessels and other objects and present them to the traveling court. By the time I got to Yue, the emperor had already moved to Siming.4 I did not want to keep those things in my house, and so I stored them all in Shan, together with the book manuscripts. Subse- quently, when the imperial army was rounding up rebels, what I had stored there was all taken away. Later, I heard that it ended up in the household of the old general Li. Of “the remnants I had left,” fifty or sixty percent was now lost. All that remained were some six or seven boxes of calligraphy, paintings, inkstones, and ink. I could not bear to put them anywhere else, so I kept them beside my bed, where I’d open them occasionally. At Kuaiji (Yue), I resided in a place owned by a local named Zhong.5 One night, a thief broke in through a wall and carried five of my boxes off. I was so grief-stricken I thought I’d die, and I offered a handsome reward to get them back. Two days later my landlord, Zhong, brazenly produced eighteen scrolls, asking for the reward. So I knew the thief was not far away. I tried everything I could to recover the rest, but nothing would free it up. Today I know that eventually Wu Shuo, the assistant fiscal commissioner, bought everything for a low price. At this point, seventy or eighty percent of “the only remnants I had left” was lost. What remained were just one or two random and fragmentary vol- umes that did not make any complete title or set, together with just a few common calligraphy manuscripts. Yet I still treasured them as if they were my life itself. How foolish I am!
Today when I chance to open one of my books, it is like meeting an old friend. I remember when my husband sat in Quiet Governance Hall in Donglai.1 Each folio of an inscription was mounted on scented paper and tied with a silken cord. Ten folios were bound together as a single volume. Every day in the evening, after the clerks had gone home, my husband would add editorial collations to two inscriptions and would write a colophon for one. Of the total of two thousand inscriptions, only 502 have colophons. Today the brush strokes in his colophons still look freshly made, but the tree trunks beside his grave are already thick. How sad it is!
Re: 2.3 金石錄後序 Afterword to Catalogue of Inscriptions on Metal and Stone
From the time I was two years younger than Lu Ji when he wrote his rhapsody until I was two years older than Qu Yuan when he perceived the error of his ways, that is, in thirty-four years, how numerous have been the worries and losses I have suffered!1 Nevertheless, possession is always followed by loss, just as the act of gathering always gives way even- tually to dissolution. It is a fundamental principle of things. One man loses a bow; another man finds it. What does it matter? The only reason I have taken the trouble to record all this here is to warn persons of later generations who are learned and fond of ancient things.
[see endnote]
Re: 2.3 金石錄後序 Afterword to Catalogue of Inscriptions on Metal and Stone
‘colophons on all those inscriptions that suffice either to affirm the Way of the sages’ ? so just–salutary moral shit?
A scholar so inclined could get something out of this and working with Anglosphere writing on misers such as the titles cited in Our Mutual Friend (lives of the misers, et al)
‘The Zhaos and Lis are undistinguished families that have always been poor.’ Bitch you JUST SAID—
‘ Once awakened to the flavor of this activity,’ curious phrasing
This is dumb to say but it really is interesting that someone in 1134 has a concept of earlier writing as *ancient*.
I still don’t have a clear concept of these nobles’ functional relationships to their ancestral homes: the extent to which they live there, their relationship to these places’ rents and governance.
The transition into this ‘no more than one meat dish’ bit was awkward in the intro, and it’s awkward now. It seems to relate to frugality in order to buy books, the theme of this section of the essay, but to have an strange causal relationship to the rest of the paragraph it sits in.
What IS the Zuo Commentary?
“Formerly, when Xiao Yi was conquered at Jiangling, he did not regret the loss of his kingdom, but he did destroy his books and paintings [so that his enemies would not obtain them]. When Yang Guang was over- thrown at Jiangdu, he did not bemoan his own death, but he did arrange to take his books and paintings with him into the afterlife.” This is the stupidest shit I ever heard, I am appalled
I think you can read her husband as careless, but perhaps also read both of them as completely unprepared for and ignorant of the scale of the coming conflict. And honestly, who can prepare for or immediately gauge and adapt to that level of crisis? Ought we to live in expectation of it?
Re: 2.3 金石錄後序 Afterword to Catalogue of Inscriptions on Metal and Stone
Zuo Commentary: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zuo_Zhuan