Ten Thousand Scrolls: Reading and Writing in the Poetics of Huang Tingjian and the Late Northern Song

297 Pages·2011·1.936 MB·English

by  Yugen Wang

Ten Thousand Scrolls
Reading and Writing
in the Poetics of Huang Tingjian
and the Late Northern Song

Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series 76
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Ten Thousand Scrolls

Reading and Writing
in the Poetics of Huang Tingjian
and the Late Northern Song
Yugen Wang

Published by the Harvard University Asia Center
Distributed by Harvard University Press
Cambridge (Massachusetts) and London 2011
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© 2011 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College

Printed in the United States of America

The Harvard-Yenching Institute, founded in 1928 and headquartered at Harvard University, is a
foundation dedicated to the advancement of higher education in the humanities and social sciences in
East and Southeast Asia. The Institute supports advanced research at Harvard by faculty members of
certain Asian universities and doctoral studies at Harvard and other universities by junior faculty at
the same universities. It also supports East Asian studies at Harvard through contributions to the
Harvard-Yenching Library and publication of the Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies and books on
premodern East Asian history and literature.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wang, Yugen.
Ten thousand scrolls : reading and writing in the poetics of Huang Tingjian and the late Northern
Song / Yugen Wang.
p. cm. -- (Harvard-Yenching Institute monograph series ; 76)
Based on the author's doctoral dissertation--Harvard University.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-674-06255-9 (acid-free paper)
1. Huang, Tingjian, 1045-1105--Technique. 2. Huang, Tingjian, 1045-1105--Influence. 3. Chinese
poetry--Authorship--History. 4. Chinese poetry--Technique--History. 5. Chinese poetry--
Appreciation--History. 6. Chinese poetry--Song dynasty, 960-1279--History and criticism. 7. Print-
ing--China--History--Song dynasty, 960-1279. 8. China--Intellectual life--Song dynasty, 960-1279. 9.
Books and reading--China--History--Song dynasty, 960-1279. 10. Authors and readers--China--
History--Song dynasty, 960-1279. I. Title.
PL2681.Z5W36 2011
895.1'142--dc22

Index by the author

Printed on acid-free paper

Last figure below indicates year of this printing
19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11
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To the memory of my parents
王和育
余玉蓮
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Acknowledgments
This book is based on my doctoral dissertation. I want to first of all thank
Professor Stephen Owen, my advisor and mentor at Harvard, for his con-
sistent support and guidance, his unwavering confidence in me, and the
many comments and suggestions he has provided on my work throughout
the years since the project was conceived. I also want to thank the other
two members of my dissertation committee, Professors Peter K. Bol and
Wilt L. Idema, both of whom were generous with their time and thoughts,
whose careful and critical reading of my dissertation made it a much bet-
ter one. Thanks also go to Professors Leo Lee and Michael Puett, whose
courses, which I took in the early years of my doctoral training, greatly en-
riched my experience at Harvard. Thanks go similarly to Tian Xiaofei,
who not only kindly shared her many insights on classical Chinese poetry
with me, and whose study on Tao Yuanming and manuscript culture in-
spired my inquiry of Huang Tingjian and print culture in many ways.
I would also like to thank my former teachers, mentors, and colleagues
in the Institute of Comparative Literature and Culture at Peking Univer-
sity, particularly Professor Yue Daiyun, my M.A. thesis advisor there. It
was Professor Yue who first introduced me into a scholarly world whose
boundaries went much beyond the horizons of my earlier training and
helped me see its boundless wonders and beauty. Her high spirit and
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viii Acknowledgments
optimism have always been a source of inspiration that keeps urging me
on whenever I am frustrated and have doubts.
I enjoyed the company and friendship of my fellow classmates during
my Harvard years, among them: Sarah M. Allen, Jack W. Chen, Chen
Wenyi, Wiebke Denecke, Hong Yue, Jin Li, Vincent Leung, Li Cho-ying,
Liu Guanglin, Luo Liang, Christopher M. B. Nugent, Zeb Raft, Peter
Shen, Jascha Smilack, Jing Tsu, Wangling Jinghua, Yang Haosheng, and
He Wenkai from MIT.
I also want to thank my colleagues and students in the Department of
East Asian Languages and Literatures at the University of Oregon.
Maram Epstein has been extremely generous with her time and advice,
reading the whole manuscript and providing helpful suggestions for revi-
sion. Stephen Durrant and Tze-lan Sang were excellent department heads
who not only showed great patience and understanding but were also at-
tentive to my special needs as a junior faculty member. Thanks go espe-
cially to Monica E. McLellan from the UO Comparative Literature pro-
gram, who gave the manuscript an intensive scrutiny and provided useful
comments from the invaluable perspective of a reader who shares my in-
terest in classical Chinese poetry but keeps critical of many of my unspeci-
fied assumptions or unsubstantiated claims.
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to the two anonymous
readers for the Harvard Asia Center Publications Program, who read the
manuscript with enthusiasm and care, and provided thoughtful criticism
and helpful suggestions for revision, which greatly improved both the
content and the style of my argument. I also want to thank William M.
Hammell, director of the Publications Program, and his predecessor, John
R. Ziemer, both of whom are a delight to work with; and Kristen Wanner,
my editor, whose careful editing and critical reading of my manuscript
considerably enhanced the quality of my prose.
Part of Chapter 5 was presented at the Early Development of Print
Culture in China workshop held at Harvard in 2005. I want to thank
Hilde De Weerdt and Joe Dennis, the co-organizers of the workshop, for
inviting me, as well as Professor Ronald Egan, who served as the discuss-
ant of my paper and provided valuable feedback and comments.
A Harvard-Yenching Doctoral Scholarship provided key support for
the first three and a half years of my Ph.D. training at Harvard. A Har-
vard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Graduate Society Term Time
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Acknowledgments ix 
Award in 2002 contributed to the conception of the project. A Summer
Research Award granted by the Office of Research and Faculty Develop-
ment at the University of Oregon in 2007 provided support in the final
stages of the project. To these institutions and organizations, I am thankful.
Last but not least, I would like to thank my wife Li for her enduring
support, understanding, and patience throughout this long journey, dur-
ing which our son, Rui, was born. Without her support the publication of
this book would have been much delayed, if not altogether impossible.
The book is dedicated to the memory of my parents, who did not
know how to read but supported my scholarly pursuit and life of reading
and writing with all their love.
W. Y. G.
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Abbreviations
BJ Shangu bieji 山谷別集
CLEAR Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews
HJAS Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies
JAOS Journal of the American Oriental Society
JAS Journal of Asian Studies
JSYS Journal of Song Yuan Studies
QTS Quan Tang shi 全唐詩
SBCK Sibu congkan 四部叢刊
SBBY Sibu beiyao 四部備要
SJZ Huang Tingjian shiji zhu 黃庭堅詩集注
SKQS Siku quanshu 四庫全書
TP T’oung Pao
TS T’ang Studies
WJ Shangu waiji 山谷外集
YZ Yuzhang Huang xiansheng wenji 豫章黃先生文集
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Contents
Abbreviations xii
Introduction 1
1 Striving for Perfection 35
2 Handle of the Hatchet 65
3 Leopard in the Fog 98
4 The Reading of Books 131
5 Ten Thousand Scrolls 162
Conclusion 195
Reference Matter
Notes 205
Bibliography 245
Index 273
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