According to the Washington Post and other media sources, historian and Yale University emeritus professor Shi Jingqian died on December 26, 2021 local time, at the age of 85.
Jonathan D. Spence (1936-2021), courtesy of the publisher.
Shi Jingqian, also known as Jonathan D. Spence, was born in 1936 in Surrey, South West London, England, and graduated from Cambridge University in the United Kingdom and Yale University in the United States with a doctorate. Shi Jingqian is a well-known Expert in Chinese History and Sinologist in the United States, known for his research on the history of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Shi Jingqian has taught at the University of Winchester and the University of Cambridge. In 1965, Shi Jingqian received his Ph.D. from Yale University in the United States, and later became a professor at Yale University, the director of the Department of History, and the Center for East Asian Studies. Shi Jingqian was president of the American Historical Society from 2004 to 2005 and enjoys a high reputation in the Western sinology community. His representative works include "Cao Yin and Kangxi", "Kangxi", "In Pursuit of Modern China", "The Kingdom of the Great Khan", "The Death of Wang", "Taiping Heavenly Kingdom", "The Question of Hu Ruowang" and so on.
Shi Jingqian's greatest contribution is to tell the intricate characters and historical facts of modern and modern China through the method of "storytelling" with smooth and beautiful writing, rigorous historical research, and through the method of "storytelling", so that Western readers can understand a rich China, and Chinese readers can understand their own modern and contemporary history from the perspective of the West. The following is authorized by the publishing house and excerpted from the general preface of the "Shi Jingqian Works Series" in the Republic of China, with slight deletions. We commemorate this historian with this article.
Original author | Zheng Peikai Yan Xiu
Excerpts | Xu Yuedong
"Works of The Republic of China and Shi Jingqian", written by Shi Jingqian, translated by Wen Qiayi and others, and | of the Republic of China Guangxi Normal University Press, Sichuan People's Publishing House, published between 2010 and 2019.
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Shi Jingqian gives Western readers a "feeling" for China's modern history
In the past half century, although the Western powers have stopped invading and colonizing China, the understanding of China by the general people in the West still carries a colonial mentality and unclear myths, three points of curiosity, three points of contempt, three points of pity, and one point of hostility of "non-my race." Thinking of China's vast mountains and rivers, large population, and long history, the picture that comes to mind seems to be really illusory, like a cross-country jeep hunting in the wilderness, holding a telescope, galloping through the mountains and forests, watching bears, tigers and leopards, lion elephants, apes orangutans, zebra antelopes, suddenly flocking of beasts, wolves running and rushing, and artemisia grass is boundless, and everything is silent.
China is like a kaleidoscope, everything has been, and all kinds of tricks and combinations have become out; Chinese history is like magic, you can turn all imagination into reality, and you can turn all truth into illusion; Chinese cultural traditions are mysterious and mysterious, yin and yang change, all things in Vientiane are one, everything under the world is born of existence, there is birth from nothing, change is unchanged, unchanged is change. Don't say that the more people who listen, the more confused they become, and the more people who talk about it, the more confused they become, so China will "fake it when it is true", and the dragon will see the beginning and the end.
In fact, in Europe and the United States, I really want to understand Chinese history and culture, and there are many Western academic books to read, from Confucius to Mao Zedong, which have been discussed, and generally provide correct knowledge of historical facts. Readers who are interested in China's modern era can also learn about some of the great historical figures who have turned the tables and rains down from various academic monographs and teaching materials, learn about the coveting and encroachment of the Great Powers in the Opium War on China's territorial resources, learn about China's transformation from an imperial system of thousands of years into a political system of the Republic of China, learn about the warlord chaos and Japanese aggression, and learn about the civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party and the victory of the Communist Party.
Jonathan D. Spence (1936-2021)
If you have the patience to read some intellectual history and socio-economic history, you can also know that the Jesuit mission brought some scientific new knowledge to China, the early contact between Chinese and Western cultures provided nourishment for the Western Enlightenment, the influence of Qing Dynasty ideological rule on academic changes, the population flow and growth since the Ming and Qing dynasties, and the introduction of silver and crops in the Americas changed the structure of China's economy. It will even be found that there are so many academic monographs that discuss the events of Modern Chinese History and specific personalities, discuss the disintegration of the relationship between traditional social production and ethics, study the changes in the political system and the changes in the urban and rural structure, and how the Western Tide has impacted cultural traditions, thinking logic and education systems, and so on.
However, for the general reader, academic monographs are too profound, textbooks are too boring, and unfamiliar names, place names, events, and debates make people more and more confused the more they look at them, and their brains are full of paste. I really don't understand why the Chinese Empire opposed trade, free trade, and open doors, why the people who have always paid attention to etiquette, righteousness, and peace suddenly became revolutionary masses, and I don't understand what the Chinese people were thinking. It seems that the more I know many characters and events, the more confused I am, like looking at flowers in the fog.
In the past few decades, Europe and the United States have produced a prodigious shi jingqian (Jonathan Spence) who studies Chinese history, and his greatest contribution is to use beautiful and fluent writing to combine the intricate characters and historical events of modern China, through rigorous historical research, with reference to the research results of experts, and with the traditional historical method of "telling stories", so that Western readers can "see the clouds and see the blue sky" and have a "feeling" for China's historical experience.
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Every book written by Shi Jingqian,
Almost to achieve "no word no source"
The Chinese name "Shi Jingqian" was given to him by Fang Zhaoyao, a predecessor of Chinese historiography, during his doctorate in history at Yale University, with obvious meaning and high expectations. Sima Qian's "Records of History" is rich in materials, rigorous in examination, clear in narrative, well-organized, and vivid in writing, "on the occasion of the investigation of heaven and man, through the changes of ancient and modern times, into the words of a family". Shi Jingqian is a modern historian, unlike Sima Qian, who was born in the tradition of "Shi Bu Wu Zhu" and has the mission of "investigating the time of heaven and man", but his research on the history of China from the late Ming Dynasty to the present, the method and style of narrative follow the spirit of the "History of History", and indeed deserve the praise of "changing through ancient and modern times, becoming a family".
From his first book, Ts'ao Yin and the K'ang-hsi Emperor: Bondservant and Master, he combined archival historical materials and various literary and historical materials of Cao Xueqin's ancestors to write about the Kangxi Emperor's healing techniques, while also outlining the inner world of the Qing Dynasty's Tianzi. This solid research foundation on the original materials allowed him to incarnate Kangxi in his third book, Emperor of China: Self-Portrait of K'ang-hsi, using a first-person narrative method to exert historical imagination, fully displaying the joys and sorrows of the Kangxi Emperor, and allowing Western readers to see a flesh-and-blood Chinese emperor. To write Kangxi and turn all objective historical materials into autobiographical styles, we must look at the world from the perspective of the Son of Heaven, involve all kinds of things under the world, and build from a macroscopic perspective to the sake of the long-term peace and stability of the Qing Empire. In this way, the autobiography of Kangxi, which is superficially written as a pretense, must actually consider all aspects of the Chinese Empire and present the whole picture of the Chinese Empire from the perspective of ruling the world.
"Cao Yin and Kangxi", shi jingqian, translated by Wen Qiayi, the | of the Ideal State Guangxi Normal University Press, March 2014.
Shi Jingqian's second book, To Change China: Western Advisers in China (1620-1960), explores how modern Westerners participated in and promoted the historical changes in China, from the early missionaries John Tang and Nan Huairen, to Gordon, Hurd, Ding Yunliang, and Fu Lanya in the late Qing Dynasty, all the way to The Republic of China, Borodin, Bethune, Chennault, and Stilwell, which opened his research interest in the contact and exchange of Chinese and Western cultures. He wrote a series of subsequent related books. His interests, from the activities of Westerners in China to the stimulation and adaptation of thinking triggered by the contact between Chinese and Western cultures, explore the dilemma of mutual understanding and misunderstanding when different cultures collide.
Specific characters have unique and fascinating stories in specific historical circumstances, not only for Westerners in the late Ming Dynasty in the Chinese Empire, but Chinese exotic encounters in Europe in the early 18th century are even more unimaginable. Like Holmes, Shi Jingqian used his advantage of mastering a variety of European languages to enter the labyrinth of Chinese and foreign historical materials, trace the clues hidden behind the curtain of history, and imagine how the characters who went to foreign countries lived in the cracks between the historical and cultural contacts between China and foreign countries, and how their encounters remained into historical memories. He mixed chinese and foreign historical materials, picked up gold, tracked down matteo Ricci in the late Ming Dynasty, crossed the ocean, traveled from the west to the east, and came to China to preach, and also wrote about a public case of Hu John, a Catholic in Guangdong, who was exiled to France, and integrated the Western imagination and depiction of China after the Mongol Western Expedition.
"The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci" traces back to the late Ming Dynasty Jesuits who came to China to preach, how to adapt to the Chinese cultural environment, how to use the popular European memory as a stepping stone, and how to break into the community of scholars who are keen on the examination and attach importance to the recitation of poetry. "The Question of Hu" is about a Chinese Catholic Hu who traveled to France at the behest of Father Jean-Fran ois Foucquet, but because of his misbehaving behavior, he was exiled to a foreign country and even imprisoned in a lunatic asylum, and only three years later was able to return to his hometown in Guangdong. Shi Jingqian used the Vatican's Papal Archives, the British Library archives, and the Paris National Foreign Affairs Archives to piece together an incredible picture of the Story of the Guangdong Chinese Exile in France in the early years of yongzheng.
"The Chan's Great Continent: China in Western Minds" looks at how Westerners imagined the historical process of China, from the Lubulu beggar monks and Marco Polo in the Mongolian Yuan period to the contemporary Nixon and Kissinger, not only writing about the Chinese experiences remembered by Westerners in China, but also about how literati writers who have never come to China imagine China and influence the Impression of China on the general public. For Chinese readers, these historical materials obtained through careful combing of the Ouxi archives and literary and historical groups, sewn into a beautiful story by Tiansun's skillful hand, are like a delicate silk tapestry, which is not only fascinating, but also broadens our horizons, understanding how intricate the encounters, collisions and interactions of different cultures are, often thrilling, and even more bizarre than fiction.
After its publication in 1974, Kangxi caused a sensation in the publishing world, became popular with readers, became a bestseller, and was even praised by Theodore H. White as "a classic: elevating scholarship to the realm of beauty". Western historians have also begun to pay attention to Shi Jingqian's rhetorical strategy of writing history, praising him for his own style, the unique wisdom of cutting historical materials, and never publicizing a new theoretical framework with little fanfare, but inadvertently, with vivid storytelling, showing the historical and cultural thinking that historical figures and events can bring to us.
In 1978, he wrote a fourth book, "The Death of Woman Wang", based on the local history of Tancheng in Shandong, Huang Liuhong's "Fuhui Quanshu", and Pu Songling's "Liaozhai Zhiyi" as the historical basis, exploring the living environment and imagination space of the small people in the early Qing Dynasty, from the macroscopic universal picture of the world and the observation of Chinese and Western cultures, pushing the lens to the life of peasants and peasant women in remote rural areas, interspersing Pu Songling's literary imagination into the dream, with different angles of reality and fictional close-ups. Reorganized the living conditions of the rural areas of Shandong in the seventeenth century. What has aroused the most discussion in the historical circles of this book is to cut Pu Songling's dreamlike and beautiful text to fictionalize the dream of the woman Wang Shi before her death. Shi Jingqian's use of literary materials to write history, of course, is not to present the actual historical facts, not the "history of faith" of the woman Wang," but it can trigger readers to imagine Shandong in the early years of the Qing Dynasty, touching on the "possible situations" of the historical environment at that time in terms of historical consciousness.
"The Death of Wang Shi", shi Jingqian, translated by Li Xiaokai, | of the Republic of China Guangxi Normal University Press, September 2011.
The most important thing in writing history is to rely on documentary evidence, if the literature does not clearly provide materials, can we use imagination to reconstruct historical scenes? This is the most ambiguous area of modern historical writing, and it is also the key to the continuous questioning and deconstruction of postmodern historiography. They not only questioned the lack of historical materials, or a batch of "broken and rotten newspapers", but there were probably more missing materials than remaining, which were not enough to reflect the historical reality, and made people question the reliability of all historical materials even more. Historical philosophers such as Hayden White, in his Metahistory, proposed that all historical materials, including first-hand materials and archives, are recorded by specific individuals, and that when specific people are involved, there are subjective ideological and emotional tendencies, and it is inevitable that there will be the historical limitations of "people", and it will be impossible to be completely scientific and objective, and it is impossible to record the complex situations involving people and things in great detail. Without mixing in with the historical imagination that uses rhetorical logic. He even went on to point out that there is no big difference between historical writing and literary writing, but the use of words, through the means of imaginary rhetoric, and different tendencies of writing strategies, to invent a text.
This kind of subjective writing theory, which has its basis and goal of argument, is difficult to dismiss as nonsense, but it deliberately distorts the basic intention of literary creation and historical truth-seeking. It is worth mentioning here that Shi Jingqian's works cannot be classified into the subjective fictional history writing of "postmodernity", because every book he writes strictly abides by the laws of traditional historiography, tries to use the surviving historical materials, and falls from the Chinese history books Fang Zhi archives to the Western history archives, almost achieving "no word and no history". When he connects the gaps in historical materials and reasons about possible historical situations, he also clearly tells the reader what the documentary material is and what the author interprets the history "may" be, and never confuses the public.
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Shi Jing moved to the Chinese historical tradition of "talent, learning, knowledge, and morality".
Offers an interesting modern interpretation
Shi Jingqian's historical works are often appreciated by both elegant and popular, taking into account academic research and popular reading, on the one hand, allowing experts and scholars to think about the meaning and direction of historical exploration, on the other hand, allowing general readers to deeply understand China's modern history, especially the pursuit of the living environment of the Chinese and the meaning of life. Books such as "The Search for Modern China" written by him can best show his mastery of historical knowledge and the fluency of his writing, can be impartial, and discuss things on the facts, but it is full of historical sympathy and understanding, so that Western readers can understand that China is a real place, even if it is difficult to identify with the development of Chinese history, but also see that the historical figures who live and struggle in it are people with flesh and blood and feelings, in a specific bleak historical environment. Courageously pursue a glimmer of light in the vast future.
"In Search of Modern China" is written in the form of a textbook general history, which describes the political and economic changes from the end of the Ming Dynasty to the present, and does not forget to discuss Cao Xueqin and "Dream of the Red Chamber", Cai Yuanpei, Chen Duxiu, Hu Shi, Lu Xun and so on in the "May Fourth" period, pointing out the long-term impact of cultural changes.
These two historical works are written in the mainstream way of traditional historiography to present the full picture of history, and after publication, they have become historical bestsellers in the European and American book markets, and since 1990, they have become the general textbooks for Chinese history courses in Western universities, influencing generations of college students and cultural people. He went on to publish God's Chinese Son: The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom of Hong Xiuquan, Treason by the Book, and more recently, Return to Dragon Mountain: Memories of a Late Ming Man It can vividly present China's historical experience, set off a best-selling boom, make Western readers have a deeper understanding of The changes in China's modern history, and deepen their sympathy for China's history and culture.
"Taiping Heavenly Kingdom", [American] Shi Jingqian, Zhu Qingbao and other translations, ideal country | Guangxi Normal University Press, September 2011.
Shi Jingqian's historical works are so popular that they are loved by the vast number of readers, and they are also ridiculed by some traditional pedantic historians, saying that he is a "storyteller" historian who has never looked at the scriptures and examined historical facts that have never been seen before in the pile of old paper, and his vision is excessively broad, and he has not exhausted his life's efforts to focus on a certain historical event and become an "authoritative expert" on a specific historical theme. There are also some social and economic historians who pride themselves on the social science method, believing that although Shi Jingqian has written many works, he has not been able to put forward a set of theoretical frameworks, has made no contribution to the scientific nature of historical research, and does not rely on the universal nature of social sciences that is "universal and applicable", and has not made efforts to integrate Chinese historical and cultural research into universal social sciences, at best, it has only aroused Western interest in China's history and culture. These criticisms are actually skin theories, with narrow academic views and localist professional positions, rejecting the basic humanistic spirit of history and the development of pluralistic universal concerns.
Writing the whole picture of history from the perspective of political events is the mainstream way of writing traditional Chinese historiography, the "Spring and Autumn" chronicle lists important deeds, and the narrative of "Historical Record" takes "Benji" as the scripture, "Column Biography" as the weft, supplemented by table chronicles, which has become the general rule of Writing Chinese history. Sima Guang's "Zizhi Tongjian" and the various later "chronicles at the end", although they are listed separately in the traditional historical style, are actually all-phase political events. This is not only the case in the Chinese historiography tradition, but also in Western historiography, which began in ancient Greece and was mainly based on narrating "stories". Herodotus's History, a mixture of sources and anecdotes, is cut out and presented in a narrative style of "storytelling". The ancient Greek text historein, the original meaning is "inquiry", which means that Sima Qian said in the "History of Taishi Gong Self-Introduction", "Reckless (net) luo tianxia lost the old news, the king's traces flourished, the original inspection of the end, see the prosperity and decline."
Tai Shi Gong's "Five Emperors Benji", which records ancient anecdotal materials, also faces similar problems, and he also made a review: "The Yellow Emperor of the Hundred Houses of Speech, his writing is not elegant, and it is difficult to recommend Mr. Gentleman to say it." ...... Yu tasted the west to The Void Tong, the north through Zhuolu, the east gradually over the sea, the south floating river Huaiyi, to the elders are often called the Yellow Emperor, Yao, Shun, the wind religion is particularly special, in short, not close to the ancient literati. Thucydides, after Herodotus, was quite dismissive of the rumors of the past, believing that reliable history was only contemporary records, so he wrote the history of contemporary wars as the "Peloponnesian War History", which had personal experience in the "inquiry" of the materials, and could also interview many parties who had experienced the situation to argue and argue. Although the style of writing history is different, and more emphasis is placed on the reliability of the data source, its presentation of the causes and consequences of the war is still a full-phase narrative of political events. Whether it is Sima Qian, Herodotus, or Thucydides, the rhetorical technique of narrating history is to use clear words to tell a beautiful story. By the time of the European Enlightenment, Edward Gibbon had written a history of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, adhering to this basic principle of "storytelling" in writing history.
However, modern historians, first influenced by the Rank school in the 19th century, emphasized scientific empirical evidence in the field of historical research, took the examination of historical facts as the main task of historical research, and conducted examinations at length to show the specialization of historical research. The establishment of academic institutions, the professional division of literature, history and philosophy, the professional evaluation of academic professional professionals, and the promotion of academic careers have turned the ideal of cultural scholarship into a preferential remuneration bowl, which has intensified the tendency of historical research to drill the horns and horns, forcing serious and talented historians to go with the flow and put all their spirits on the normative requirements of the historical discipline system, so that historical works with all-phase narratives are rejected by the academy and become the field of history textbooks and popular historical interpretations without historical views and historical knowledge. By the second half of the 20th century, the scientific objectivity of historical research was challenged, and many historians swung from one extreme to the other, turning to discussion dominated by "viewpoints" and "problem consciousness", full of political correctness and social consciousness, emphasizing class, race, gender, and vulnerable groups, from various cultural critical perspectives, to carry out the work of "turning history upside down", turning historical research into a field of ideological struggle.
All in all, writing history from new angles and new perspectives, expanding our understanding of history, or pointing out the limitations and discrimination of traditional historical writing, certainly has its value, but the tradition of historical writing that is fully narrated should not be broken. Not only that, although historical research has become an academic professional field, it cannot abandon the basic humanistic care of academic research, cannot reject the efforts of academic popularization, cannot regard historical themes that ordinary people are interested in as worthless clichés, and still less can it take the difficulty and dullness of their writing ability as an excuse for profound learning. From this point of view, Shi Jingqian can not only write about the macroscopic history of China, but also explore new areas of historical research in the practice of historical narrative, and reveal new views and problem consciousness with vivid brushstrokes.
The Chinese historiography tradition requires historians to have "talent, learning, and knowledge" (Liu Zhiji), and Zhang Xuecheng added "morality". In the "General Righteousness of Literature and History", Zhang Xuecheng explains it like this: "Righteousness exists in knowledge, words exist in talent, and conquest exists in learning", emphasizing that it is necessary to have the understanding and care of cultural traditions, to have the literary style of writing narratives, and to have the learning to distinguish between falsehood and truth. Regarding the "ShiDe" he himself proposed, Zhang Xuecheng set up a special chapter in the "General Meaning of Literature and History" and made a detailed explanation, and the key lies in it: "Those who can have historical knowledge must know ShiDe." Who is virtuous? It is said that the heart of the author is also. ”
In his book On Dai Zhen and Zhang Xuecheng, Yu Yingshi pointed out that Zhang Xuecheng's historical thinking inherits the Chinese Confucian tradition, attaches too much importance to political ethics, and emphasizes "Shi De" in favor of the traditional morality of Zang, rather than the objectivity emphasized by modern historiography: "Although its main purpose is to show that historians must strive for justice when it comes to good and evil, they will not let their own selfish views (people) damage the 'justice of the road' (heaven)" of history!" However, this distinction between heaven and man is still different from the objectivity and subjectivity of history often discussed in modern Western historians. ”
If we put Zhang Xuecheng's demand for "Shi De" together with Yu Yingshi's comments and observe Shi Jingqian's historical works, we will find that Shi Jingqian's modern Western historical training makes it impossible for him to fall into the traditional Chinese "Shi De" misunderstanding of Confucian morality. On the contrary, as a Western scholar, he is far away from Chinese politics, has no personal connection with China's modern political ethics, does not have the identity of the rise and fall of ethnic groups, has no interests, and will not damage the grand duke of history with his own selfish views. From this point of view, Shi Jingqian's practice of writing Chinese history cooperates with Yu Yingshi's reflection on modern historiography and provides a rather interesting modern interpretation of the Chinese historical tradition of "talent, learning, knowledge, and morality".