Approaches to Teaching The Plum in the Golden Vase (The Golden Lotus)
Edited by Andrew Schonebaum
Modern Language Association of America, forthcoming July 2022
The Plum in the Golden Vase (also known as The Golden Lotus) may be the first long work of Chinese fiction written by a single (though anonymous) author. Featuring both complex structural features and psychological and emotional realism, the novel centers on the rich merchant Ximen Qing and his household and describes the physical surroundings and material objects of a Ming dynasty city. The essays in this volume provide ideas for teaching the novel from a variety of approaches, from questions of genre, intertextuality, and the novel’s reception to material culture, family and social dynamics, and power structures in sexual relations.
Many Faces of Mulian: The Precious Scrolls of Late Imperial China
By Rostislav Berezkin
University of Washington Press, 2017
The story of Mulian rescuing his mother’s soul from hell has evolved as a narrative over several centuries in China, especially in the baojuan (precious scrolls) genre. This genre first appeared around the fourteenth century and endures as a living tradition. In exploring the evolution of the story, Berezkin illuminates changes in the literary and religious characteristics of the genre. Ultimately, he reveals the special features of baojuan as a type of performance literature that had its foundations in multiple literary traditions.
Slapping the Table in Amazement: A Ming Dynasty Story Collection by Ling Mengchu
Translated by Shuhui Yang and Yunqin Yang
University of Washington Press, 2018
Slapping the Table in Amazement is the unabridged English translation of the famous story collection Pai’an jingqi by Ling Mengchu (1580–1644), originally published in 1628. The forty lively stories gathered here present a broad picture of traditional Chinese society and include characters from all social levels. We learn of their joys and sorrows, their views about life and death, and their visions of the underworld and the supernatural. The volume includes translations of verse and prologue stories as well as marginal and interlinear comments.
The Book of Swindles: Selections from a Late Ming Collection by Zhang Yingyu
Translated by Christopher Rea and Bruce Rusk
Columbia University Press, 2017
The Book of Swindles, compiled by an obscure writer from southern China, presents a fascinating tableau of criminal ingenuity. The flourishing economy of the late Ming period created overnight fortunes for merchants—and gave rise to a host of smooth operators, charlatans, forgers, and imposters seeking to siphon off some of the new wealth. Each story comes with commentary by the author, who expounds a moral lesson while also speaking as a connoisseur of the swindle. This volume provides a wealth of detail on social life during the late Ming.
Translated by Qiliang He
University of Minnesota, 2016
The Ming Studies Research Series, published by the Society for Ming Studies and distributed by the Center for Early Modern History, began in 1984 with the publication of Keith Hazelton’s Synchronic Chinese-Western Calendar. Since then, the series has published both reference works and scholarship that have become essential resources for the Ming studies scholar. A translation of A Short History of the Ming Dynasty by Li Guangbi was published as Volume 7 of its Ming Studies Research Series.
Geo-Narratives of a Filial Son: The Paintings and Travel Diaries of Huang Xiangjian (1609—1673)
By Elizabeth Kindall
Harvard University Asia Center, Harvard East Asian Monographs, 2016
Huang Xiangjian, a mid-seventeenth-century member of the Suzhou local elite, journeyed on foot to southwest China and recorded its sublime scenery in site-specific paintings. Kindall’s innovative analysis of the visual experiences and social functions Huang conveyed through his oeuvre reveals an unrecognized tradition of site paintings, here labeled geo-narratives, that recount specific journeys and create meaning in the paintings. Ultimately these works were intended to create personas and fulfill specific social purposes among the educated class during the Ming-Qing transition.
Idle Talk Under the Bean Arbor: A Seventeenth-Century Chinese Story Collection by Aina the Layman with Ziran the Eccentric Wanderer
Edited by Robert Hegel
University of Washington Press, 2017
Written around 1660, this unique Chinese short story collection uses the seemingly innocuous setting of neighbors swapping yarns on hot summer days under a shady arbor to create a series of stories that embody deep disillusionment with traditional values. The tales, ostensibly told by different narrators, parody heroic legends and explore issues that contributed to the fall of the Ming dynasty a couple of decades before this collection was written. These stories speak to all troubled times, confronting the pretense that may lurk behind moralistic stances.
Monks in Glaze: Patronage, Kiln, Origin, and Iconography of the Yixian Luohans
By Eileen Hsiang-ling Hsu
Brill Academic Publishers, 2016
Monks in Glaze is a complete reassessment of the famous group of large glazed ceramic sculptures known as the Yixian Luohans. Drawing upon hitherto-unknown epigraphic documents, Hsu proposes a new date for the group’s production and identifies the kiln center near Beijing as its birthplace. Delving into the social and economic issues of religious patronage, imperial workshop practice, and nuanced style of post-Yuan Buddhist art, Hsu convincingly shows that such a large group of masterworks were products of the commercial economy of the Ming dynasty.
