Philadelphia, 1925.
Liang Sicheng, a fourth-year student in the Department of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania's Academy of Fine Arts, was a little overwhelmed by the photocopy of "Building the French Style" sent by his father, Liang Qichao. He knew every Chinese character on the paper, but he couldn't read the mysterious characters.
They are grouped together in strange ways, like the language of another world.
Text of "Building the French Style"
First, there is no architectural history in China
Published in the second year of Chongning (1103) of the Northern Song Dynasty, the French Style of Construction was edited and revised by the general Li Jiefeng, preserving the rules and wisdom of Chinese construction. However, after thousands of years, the oral instructions of the regular craftsmen gradually dispersed and were finally forgotten. It was not until 1919 that "Building the French Style" was accidentally discovered by Zhu Qizhao in the Jiangnan Library.
Liang Qichao sent this "Book of Heaven" to his eldest son, Liang Sicheng, hoping that he would not only focus on Western architecture, but also look back at Chinese traditions. On the title page of the "Book of Heaven" is Liang Qichao's handwriting: "There was this masterpiece a thousand years ago, which can be the light and favor of our culture." ”
The father's gift led Liang Sicheng and his wife Lin Huiyin, who also loved architecture, to another academic path. Liang Sicheng remembered that when he first came to Penn, Professor of Architectural History Alfred Gumil asked him about the history of Chinese architecture, and he suddenly realized that there had never been a history of architecture in China. Perhaps, "Constructing the French Style" can help him answer this question.
In 1927, Liang Sicheng went to the Institute of Humanities and Arts of Harvard University, hoping to study oriental architecture and write "History of the Chinese Palace". The list of books listed by Langdon Warner, a lecturer in oriental art, was completely unsatisfied. The list of books is filled with Western world understandings and even imaginations of Chinese painting, ceramics, jade, and carving, but few records of architecture are recorded.
He knew that he was doomed to be unable to sit in the Harvard University library and understand the history of the development of ancient Chinese architecture. If you want to crack the secret of "Building French Style", returning home may be the only choice.
In 1928, Liang Sicheng and Lin Huiyin took a group photo in Ottawa
In June 1930, the "provocation" of the Japanese architect Tadao Ito was also like a flat thunderclap, which made the Chinese architectural community feel mixed up - he was invited to give a lecture at the China Construction Society, proposed to study Chinese architecture from both documents and relics, and suggested that scholars from the two countries cooperate. However, he stressed that Chinese scholars should mainly investigate and study literature, while the study of the remains of ancient Chinese architecture should be done by Japanese scholars.
A stone stirs up a thousand layers of waves.
The China Construction Society was founded three months ago by Zhu Qizhao, the discoverer of "Building The French Style".
Ito's attitude is rather embarrassing to Chinese scholars, but it is undeniable that what he reveals is the crux of the Chinese architectural world — since ancient times, architecture has been regarded as a craftsman's skill in China and has not been valued, while scholars are accustomed to delving into ancient books, and are reluctant and disdainful of fieldwork.
In stark contrast to this is the exploration and research methods of Japanese scholars. Sekino Sadashi, Omura Nishiya, Tokiwa Daisuke and others have traveled all over China, especially Tadao Ito. Regardless of age, thought or practice, he is a pioneer in the history of Asian architecture. He was the name of the translation of "architecture", and as early as 1894 proposed translating the English word architecture as "architecture". In 1902, when Liang Sicheng was one year old, Ito Tadata embarked on a three-year expedition across China, India, Turkey and Europe, and rediscovered the long-forgotten Yungang Grottoes in temperatures of 46 degrees Celsius.
To some extent, the investigation and record of the remains of Ancient Chinese architecture at that time, and even the summary and writing of The History of Chinese Architecture, were indeed done by Japanese scholars.
This fact has long stung Chinese scholars.
Japanese architect Tadao Ito
Fifty-eight-year-old Zhu Qiju tried to take a longer-term view.
In the past few years, Zhu Qizhao has been using his savings to maintain the China Construction Society, recruiting famous artists to sort out ancient books, make models, and hold exhibitions. However, the world is unpredictable, and the frequent changes in life make him in debt. Fortunately, the China Education and Culture Foundation and the board of directors of the Sino-British Geng fund agreed to allocate funds every year, and his ideal was continued. However, old-school scholars can only correct the correctness and error of the text, and cannot crack the "grammar" of the craftsman, and although "Building the French Style" has been reproduced in the human world for more than ten years, it is still a "heavenly book". The China Construction Society needs fresh blood, especially young people who have received education in modern architecture overseas.
Liang Sicheng and Liu Dunzhen successively entered Zhu Qizhao's line of sight.
After Liang Sicheng returned to China, he founded the Department of Architecture at Northeastern University. Liu Dunzhen graduated from the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Architecture of Tokyo Higher Technical School in Japan, and taught at the Department of Architecture of Chuo University after returning to Japan. In 1931 and 1932, Liang Sicheng and Liu Dunzhen resigned from their teaching positions and joined the China Construction Society, serving as the director of the French Department and the director of the Literature Department, respectively. With their arrival, the study of the Construction French finally began to shift from "paper" to the ground.
Liu Dunzhen was four years older than Liang Si. It is said that when the two first met, Liu Dunzhen asked Liang Sicheng where to start studying Chinese architecture. Suddenly, they were childlike and decided to take it upon themselves to write down their answers on a piece of paper. Compared with the two, the answer is surprisingly consistent, and there are only two words--"material" and "栔". The authenticity of this legend is difficult to discern, and the fictional Yuliang complex in "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" seems to have been repeated in Liang Sicheng and Liu Dunzhen.
Soon, they found their respective assistants, mo zongjiang, fifteen, and Chen Mingda, seventeen. Within a few years, the Literature Department recruited Shan Shiyuan, Liu Rulin and others, the French Style Department had Shao Ligong and Liu Zhiping, and the responsible surveying and mapping were Liu Nance, Song Linzheng, Wang Biwen, Zhao Fashan, Ji Yutang and others. Whether it is to conduct text research or go out to investigate, there is plenty of room for display.
Of course, the China Construction Society is not Zhu Qizhao's private club, nor is it a small group of these people. At that time, most of China's most prestigious architects were recruited as members. Like many societies during the Republic of China period, there were also celebrities from the political, economic, scientific, and cultural circles, such as Zhou Yichun, Ren Hongjun, Xu Xinliu, Zhu Jiahua, Hang Liwu, Ye Gongqi, Qian Xinzhi, Chen Yuan, Li Siguang, Li Ji, Ma Heng and others. At its peak, there were eighty-six staff and members.
Zhu Qizhao, the founder of the China Construction Society
Second, race against time with a journey of thousands of miles
The carriages were crowded, and when they encountered a dry river, they had to get off the bus and walk on the cobblestones and fine sand for a while; if they drove on the muddy road, they had to come down to help push the cart. It was not until dusk that Liang Sicheng and his party finally arrived at their destination in Jixian County, Hebei Province.
This was the first time in His life that Liang Sicheng had roamed the countryside in China for a long time.
Going to Hebei is an accidental and inevitable journey. Japanese scholar Sasashi Sekino visited Zhu Qizhao with a photo of The Dule Temple in Jixian County, and proposed that The Sino-Japanese cooperation in the investigation, the Japanese team should be responsible for surveying and mapping, and the Chinese side would study the literature and examine it. Sekino believes that Dule Temple may be the oldest surviving building in China. Zhu Qizhao did not reply positively, but told Liang Sicheng this information.
In the spring of 1932, Liang Sicheng took his younger brother Liang Sida, who was studying at Nankai University, to Jixian County. Dule Temple did not disappoint them. The temple was built in the second year of the Liao Dynasty (984), seventy-seven years after the fall of the Tang Dynasty, but one hundred and sixteen years before the publication of the Construction of the French Style. When mapping the Guanyin Pavilion and the Mountain Gate, Liang Sicheng found that the temples of the Liao Dynasty were indeed completely different from the Ming and Qing dynasty architectures he was familiar with. He wrote excitedly that it "inherits the legacy of the Tang Dynasty, the construction of the Lower Qi Song Dynasty, and the study of important materials on the transformation of mainland architecture, and rare treasures."
Liang Sicheng suffered a car accident in his early years while riding a motorcycle, and injuries to his right leg and spine plagued him all his life, but he did not hesitate to climb up the mountain gate and excitedly measure the size of each bucket arch and record them one by one. He also found that the changes in the ridge decoration of the mountain gate, especially the fin tail in the upper section and the kiss in the lower section, clearly showed the evolution of architectural fashion from the Tang to the Song. Soon, he completed the "Jixian Dule Temple Guanyin Pavilion Mountain Gate Examination". This is the first ancient architecture survey report written by Chinese, which begins with the assertion that "the study of ancient buildings is indispensable for field investigation and mapping of relics." He was convinced that the architectural remains scattered on the land of China could help him gain insight into the thousand-year-old secrets that had been lost, and tortuously reach the fading era.
After the trip to Dule Temple, the focus of liang Sicheng and others gradually shifted to field investigation, mapping and research. The China Construction Society began a real metamorphosis. They believe that this path is feasible.
Dule Temple Mountain Gate, quoted from the Bulletin of the China Construction Society, Vol. 3, No. 2, 1932.
Liang Sicheng's ultimate goal in cracking "Construction French Style" is to write a history of Chinese architecture, but he knows that it is impossible to sit in the study to examine the origin and meaning of each term in "Construction French Style", let alone create a history of Chinese architecture. Only the remnants of ancient buildings scattered on the earth can provide a lot of intuitive evidence for his understanding of "Building the French Style" and writing the history of Chinese architecture.
Through many trips to Hebei, he gradually explored a set of methods for investigating and studying ancient buildings: first of all, he studied history books, local chronicles and Buddhist classics in the library, screened some ancient buildings that may exist, and sorted out the list as a reference in order to draw up a itinerary. To save costs, they first try to find photographs of the building, make an initial estimate of its construction or rebuilding, and then decide whether it is worth a site visit. Every time they go out, they carry an electrician-style backpack for easy climbing, with ropes, telescopic poles, and mapping and photography equipment. In addition, there are not too many advanced instruments, and there is not much film, which needs to be used sparingly. Some auxiliary tools are mostly designed according to experience.
In the imagination of later generations, the journey of Liang Sicheng and others is poetic. But poetry is only a return to happiness after suffering, and the road to investigation is actually extremely difficult.
Coaches are always on time, and torrential rains often come unexpectedly. Natural disasters or man-made disasters may affect the expedition. Because of the war, they delayed for half a year before they were able to go to Jixian County. After finishing work in Baodi County, the long-distance bus back to Beiping was stopped due to heavy rain. They rode in a mule car from three o'clock in the morning to four o'clock in the afternoon, braving the rain to travel to several places before finally catching a bus bound for Beiping. They gradually became accustomed to staying in temples and eating vegetarian food for many days in a row. Sometimes even drinking water is a luxury, and when they are thirsty, they suddenly find a well, but when they see the microorganisms floating on the surface of the water, they have to endure it, preferring to continue to run in the heat. All this encountered in Hebei is only the beginning of a long journey. On the way forward, it is lucky to find food. They will have to endure sudden changes and run tirelessly at the expense of their own health.
The expedition to Beiping and Hebei is the starting point of the journey of ten thousand miles, and it is a rehearsal and a prologue.
In 1933, when Liang Sicheng, Liu Dunzhen, Lin Huiyin, Mo Zongjiang and others arrived in Datong in the autumn rain, the former capital of Northern Wei and the capital of Liaojin could not find a hotel to borrow. Fortunately, Li Jingxi, the station manager of Datong Station, and Liang Sicheng were old acquaintances, and the group had a place to live. In the end, with the help of Datong city officials, a restaurant promised to serve three meals, one bowl of soup noodles per person per meal. Life in the Yungang Grottoes is even more difficult. A farmer gave up a house with no doors and windows, only a roof and four walls. The temperature difference between day and night is very large, and only boiled potatoes and corn batter are served for three meals. But they were lucky enough to get dozens of grams of sesame oil and two cabbages from a garrison platoon leader with half a dozen nails.
On this trip to Shanxi, they obtained a large number of clues from the Longmen Grottoes, Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes and other caves. In the future, Liang Sicheng and others will return to Shanxi again and again. Shanxi has deep historical roots, and is also a resort of Buddhist and Taoist culture; more importantly, the climate is dry, the mountains are reckless, and many ancient buildings have escaped war and man-made disasters, and have been fortunately preserved.
After Lin Huiyin returned to Beiping early, Liang Sicheng continued south to Ying County, a holy place he had dreamed of for a long time. Ever since he learned that there might be a wooden pagoda of the Liao Dynasty in Ying County, this pagoda had become a heart disease for him. In Beiping, he always consciously or unconsciously chanted to Lin Huiyin, "It should not be too difficult to go to Shangying County", or implied, "Shanxi has built the best bus roads.". Lin Huiyin couldn't help but laugh at himself, "I had to laugh and say Amitabha, he was so lucky that he was not a movie star!" But he could not determine whether this legendary ancient pagoda was the original work of the Liao Dynasty.
Later, he actually came up with a pedantic-sounding method and sent a letter to Ying County, the envelope said "Exploring the Highest Photo Studio in Ying County, Shanxi", hoping that the recipient could help him take a photo of the wooden tower. He didn't know who would receive the letter, how the recipient would respond, and he didn't even know if the letter would arrive in Ying County as scheduled. All he could do was wait. Not long after, this naïve wish actually came true, and the owner of the Baohuazhai Photo Studio in YingXian County took a photo of shakya pagoda in the Buddha Palace Temple and sent it to him, the shopkeeper did not want money, only wanted to get a little Beiping's letter paper and letterhead, because there was no South Paper Shop in Ying County.
In his letter, Liang Sicheng described to Lin Huiyin the original version of the thousand-year-old wooden pagoda he "fell in love with". At the first sight of it, his ecstasy was hard to conceal, "I saw it flickering in the sunset reflection, and I saw it become a silhouette, which was my greeting to this tower." Wait until you officially go to see you, "It's so good that you can't breathe for half a day!" In another letter, he exclaimed unreservedly: "This tower is truly a great and unique work. Without seeing this tower, I don't know to what extent the possibility of wooden structures has reached. I admire it very much, admiring the era when this tower was built, and the unknown great architects and unknown craftsmen in that era. ”
Liu Dunzhen made other arrangements, and left in a hurry after arriving in Ying County. Liang Sicheng took his assistant Mo Zongjiang and couldn't wait to climb up and down and start mapping and shooting.
In autumn in Shanxi, the weather changes rapidly. One clear afternoon, Liang Sicheng was working intently at the top of the tower, when suddenly there was a thunderclap out of thin air, frightening him into almost loosening the chain in his hand and falling from two hundred feet (about 61 meters) in the air. Another day, he and Mo Zongjiang were on the beams on the top of the wooden tower, measuring until five o'clock in the afternoon, and without warning, there was a fierce storm, thunder and lightning. They hurried down, but unexpectedly, the book of survey records was blown open by the wind, and one page even flew to the railing, fortunately they caught up in time, and if they were half a second late, ten days of work would all be wasted.
After working in Ying County for a week, Liang Sicheng returned to Beiping on September 26, 1933. Unexpectedly, the next day, the Ta Kung Pao gave him a special "greeting". Since September 27, the Ta Kung Pao Literary and Art Supplement has published a 10,000-word article "Our Wife's Living Room" in several periodicals. Clear-eyed people know that this article alludes to Lin Huiyin. Lin Hui, because of her hospitality, she and Liang Sicheng's home in Beizongbu Hutong often gathered celebrities in the cultural circles, and it was obvious that Bing Xin was quite dismissive of this. In her writing, Lin Huiyin was "a famous flower in the social world at that time, especially tender when he was sixteen or seventeen years old", Liang Sicheng was "a tired, depressed and somewhat nested gentleman", naturally, BingXin would not let go of Xu Zhimo, who was "white and windy, naturally thin", although Xu Zhimo had died two years ago.
Lin Huiyin saw this article about the first time, because her poem "Shimmer" was also published in the same edition of the September 27 literary supplement and was surrounded by "Our Wife's Living Room". Lin Huiyin did not make any written response to this. Ten days later, she published in the Ta Kung Pao "A Little News about Ancient Architecture", documenting Liang Sicheng's search for and mapping the YingXian Wooden Pagoda. She did not resort to words, but she happened to bring back a pot of vinegar from Shanxi, so she sent someone to give it to Bingxin.
Lin Huiyin during a field trip
The history of Chinese architecture is like a detective novel, which is a metaphor made by Lin Huiyin. Liang Sicheng pinned his hopes on "Building the French Style". He believed that only by deciphering "Constructing the French Style" could he have "considerable certainty" to write a history of Chinese architecture; and in order to "translate" the "Construction of the French Style" and solve many lost puzzles, he had to set off again and again, wandering in the deep mountains and wilderness, running between unknown rural towns, facing the vigilant or confused eyes of the locals, between disappointment and hope, and playing against the silence of time. The thousand-year-old relics that remain on the earth quietly provide them with all kinds of hints.
But they knew that there was not much time left for them.
Liang Sicheng calls fieldwork a "race against time" because Western architecture is dominated by stone, while Chinese architecture is dominated by wood, and it is constantly subject to wind and rain and wanton transformation by later generations. Accidents often happen inadvertently, "a splash of mars on a blazing incense will also turn the entire temple into ashes." After entering the Republic of China, the government often demolished ancient buildings in the name of "breaking superstitions"; at the same time, warlords were fighting, the Japanese army was pressing forward step by step, and the threat of war was getting closer and closer. All of this urges them to keep setting off. The word "orphan case" began to appear frequently in Liang Sicheng's articles. His ecstasy jumped on the paper to witness these "isolated cases", but the "lonely cases" meant how fragile these ancient buildings were, and how lucky it was to find this time. Behind the ecstasy, there is even more deep sorrow. Racing against time, in fact, is ultimately a contest with yourself.
In 1933, Lin Huiyin once called Liang Sicheng and Liu Dunzhen "a few dead-eyed architects" and "gave up the good opportunity for them to build bungalows and rolled up the covers to survey and map everywhere." In fact, this group of dead-eyed architects has a deeper vision and greater ambitions. They not only have to visit, search for, and preserve the ancients, but also try to rewrite their own era. They work tirelessly to sort out the past and look to the future. They hope that by investigating and studying the construction traditions of ancient China, they will eventually influence the practice of the current architectural world and even formulate new rules. In the words of Liang Sicheng in the Preface to the Architectural Design Reference Atlas, even the best navigators need maps, and what he hopes to do with his colleagues in the China Construction Society is to "set their courses" for the architects. They're not going to design for architecture, they're going to design for the entire Chinese architectural community.
Therefore, in just five years, Liang Sicheng, Liu Dunzhen and others traveled from place to place, inspected 190 counties and cities, 2,738 buildings, and drew 1,898 surveys and mapping maps. Liang Sicheng focused on the investigation of ancient buildings in the suburbs of Beijing, Hebei and Shanxi, and participated in the renovation plan of Hangzhou Liuhe Pagoda and Qufu Confucius Temple. Although Liu Dunzhen was the director of the Literature Department, he did not give up fieldwork, initially focusing on the area around Beiping and Hebei, and later visiting Henan, Shandong, Jiangsu and Shaanxi. In addition, the two also worked together to formulate a restoration plan for the Wenyuan Pavilion and the Jingshan Wanchun Pavilion in the Forbidden City.
Liu Dunzhen, a pioneer in Chinese architectural historiography
III. The "Golden Age" of Displacement
In June 1937, Liang Sicheng and his party set off again and went to Shanxi for the fourth time to do a fieldwork. On July 15, they left the mountains, saw newspapers shipped from Taiyuan, and learned that the Japanese army had started war eight days ago, and that a full-scale war of resistance had broken out, and they were in the mountains, unaware.
Liu Dunzhen also inspected the field, and after the outbreak of war, he hurried back to Beiping from the Central Plains. A month later, the city where they lived also fell. The China Construction Society was forced to move south, and the sixty-six-year-old Zhu Qiju sent them away, choosing to stay in his hometown. In the next seven years, he will be forced to relocate again and again, refusing to cooperate with the Japanese and pseudo- and he will also guide the remaining old staff to provide support to Liang Sicheng, Liu Dunzhen and others in the far south in a difficult environment, rescue, sort out, and send research materials.
These young people, who have high hopes for Zhu Qiju, will usher in another kind of unpredictable fate.
Lin Huiyin recalled that they "walked all the railways in China for a while", "got on and off the boat 16 times, and entered and exited the hotel 12 times", and finally took Tianjin to Changsha. However, Changsha was not a place to stay for long, and they were pursued by the Japanese army and continued to move south. On the way, Lin Huiyin had pneumonia, which plagued her for the rest of her life. Fortunately, with many years of experience in fieldwork, she and Liang Sicheng cooperate tacitly, can quickly pack their luggage, take their young children, and leave at any time. They also carried a small box of alcohol cotton pads with them, took out a little before each meal, and disinfected the dishes. This scene made nine-year-old daughter Liang Zaibing unforgettable. She had never imagined that her mother, who was always smiling and talking in the living room, could be so calm and capable in the face of such a harsh environment.
In Hunan, Liu Dunzhen decided to return to his hometown to visit his relatives. But he could not tolerate his own stopping, and not long after returning to Xinning, he began to inspect nearby houses, ancestral halls and bridges. He was convinced that these fieldworks also had a special significance. His hometown is located in the southwest of Hunan, the geographical location is remote, not easy to be affected by foreign influences, and some ancient construction methods should not have been completely forgotten. He was particularly interested in the covered bridges that loomed between mountain streams and above the plains, surveyed and mapped the Jiangkou Bridge in his hometown, and wrote "China's Covered Bridge" a few years later, analyzing and summarizing the transmutation of ancient Chinese bridges.
Manuscript of Liu Dunzhen's "China's Covered Bridge"
After arriving in Kunming, the China Construction Society took refuge in the Xingguo Nunnery in the village of Maidi on the outskirts of the city. In the autumn of 1939, Liang Sicheng, Liu Dunzhen, Mo Zongjiang, Chen Mingda and others set out from Kunming again to sichuan and Xikang to investigate ancient architecture. In the Xingguo Nunnery, only the mothers are left to accompany the children.
Below the cliff, the raging river is constantly changing its name - Yangtze River, Tsing yi river, Min river, Jialing river... The water follows the mountain, and the forest is boundless. They look the same, except that the road stretches under your feet. From September 1939 to February 1940, they walked from autumn to spring.
In the spring of 1940, the fathers of the dusty servants finally returned to Kunming. In half a year, they inspected 31 cities and counties in Sichuan and Xikang, and 107 important ancient buildings, stone carvings and other cultural relics. Waiting for the mothers and children at the Xingguo Nunnery at the entrance of the village early, Liang Sicheng jumped off the rickshaw and immediately hugged Lin Huiyin. This scene stunned the children who were accustomed to rural life.
Liang Sicheng, who has mixed feelings, is still looking forward to the next inspection, but he does not know that the trip to Sichuan is the last time that the main members of the China Construction Society have traveled a long way to inspect ancient buildings.
An era is coming to an end.
The 28th issue of The Journal of Yenching, 1940, introduced the southwest fieldwork of the China Construction Society
One day in 1940, Liang Sicheng suddenly remembered the majestic dou arch of Foguang Temple. In the newspapers, he found a familiar name, Doucun, and it was said that the Chinese and Japanese armies were preparing to use Doucun as a base to launch offensive and counter-offensives. After three years, seeing this name again is like a lifetime. But fo guang temple, the fo guang temple he had in mind, was hidden there, hidden for more than a thousand years. But Liang Sicheng did not know whether the Foguang Temple could survive this artillery fire. He could only face the lines depicted in the drawings, nostalgic for the magnificent relics of the monument, and the ecstasy and endless sorrow that he had never faded.
In fact, even the set of drawings of the Foguang Temple they drew went through ups and downs to be preserved. It was first brought from Beiping to Tianjin and then from Tianjin to Beiping, and Zhu Qizhao asked the members to copy them, entrusted them to Shanghai, and mailed them from Shanghai to the southwest, before finally handing them over to Liang Sicheng.
The future of Fo guang temple is uncertain, and he himself is like a leaf of duckweed, with no place to live in the raging waves.
In the winter of 1940, the China Construction Society moved to Shangba in Lizhuang. The society recruited several young staff members, such as Lu Sheng, Wang Shixiang and Luo Zhewen, and seemed to have grown a little bigger. These people will become the Taishan Beidou of China's architectural and cultural relics circles for many years. Luo Zhewen was only sixteen years old when he was admitted to the China Construction Society as a trainee. Liu Dunzhen said to this curious young man that the China Construction Society is a pure academic group, and everyone is a reader and a scholar, not an official, not a yamen.
It was rainy in southern Sichuan, the room was always damp and dark, rats and snakes visited frequently, and bed bugs crawled over the bed in droves. Lin Hui, who was ill, received special preferential treatment and had a canvas bed, and everyone else could only sleep on a bare board and bamboo mat. Supplies are scarce and prices are still soaring. Every month, when you receive a salary, you have to buy rice and oil immediately, and if you delay it, they may become a pile of waste paper. Liu Dunzhen's family of five, Chinese New Year's Eve night's Chinese New Year's Eve meal only five small pieces of hemp cake, the only difference from usual is that on this special night, a few small candles temporarily replaced the tung oil lamp and inserted on a piece of radish. Liang Sicheng began to learn steamed steamed steamed buns, cooking, cooking, and pickling vegetables, while Lin Huiyin learned needlework, and every day he forced the sick body to sew up the children's clothes that were too small to wear.
There are many children living in Lizhuang, and the fathers will occasionally draw a few strokes on the small book to play with the children. Liang Sicheng painted a small painting, which is a delicate small bowl containing tomato egg soup. He wrote next to it: Wait until the victory of the war, drink such a bowl.
This is the taste that Liang Sicheng misses the most, and it was already a luxury in that era. His weight had fallen to forty-seven kilograms, and his back was more hunched than before. Fortunately, those ancient buildings scattered in the mountains, exquisite stone carvings, escaped the invasion of thousands of years of time, great beauty is speechless, the world is independent, and there are still wisps of comfort.
Liu Dunzhen was busy sorting out the "Survey Of Ancient Buildings in Southwest China". From July 1940 to December 1941, on behalf of the China Construction Society, he cooperated with the Preparatory Office of the Central Museum to visit 44 counties in Yunnan, Sichuan and Xikang, and investigated more than 180 ancient buildings and ancillary art relics. He knew that what he saw was only a dime, only "one-tenth of Yunnan, one-fifth of Sichuan, and one-nineteenth of Xikang."
Liang Sicheng began to write the "History of Chinese Architecture", Mo Zongjiang was responsible for drawing illustrations, Lu Sheng helped collect the literature of the Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties, and Lin Huiyin, who was ill, in addition to collecting and writing the literature of liao and Song, also proofread and supplemented all the manuscripts of the "History of Chinese Architecture". Sclerosis of the spinal tissue has always plagued Liang Sicheng, who had to wear a vest made of steel to work. To relieve pressure on his spine, he pressed a vase against his jaw as a fulcrum to support the weight of his head. He laughed and declared that this would make the line straighter.
They worked until late at night every day, under the dim oil lamp, secretly battling fate. Writing makes them briefly forget the misery of reality and return to those legendary golden ages again and again. Many years later, one will find that the era pioneered by Liang Sicheng, Lin Huiyin and Liu Dunzhen was also the golden age of China.
Writings of Liang Sicheng and Liu Dunzhen
For four or fifteen years, the blue wisps of the road have come to an end
In the autumn of 1943, Liu Dunzhen resigned to his colleagues in the society.
He decided to return to the Department of Architecture at National Central University, which had been absent for eleven years. On the eve of leaving, he had a long conversation with Liang Sicheng. The two met because of the China Construction Society and worked together for eleven years. At the beginning of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the board of directors of Sino-British Gengjian said that even if the members of the China Construction Society were scattered everywhere due to the war, as long as Liang Sicheng and Liu Dunzhen were together, the board of directors was willing to recognize the existence of the society. They survived the most difficult years, but they could not escape in the end.
An important reason for Liu Dunzhen's departure is that the China Construction Society has lost its financial resources. Despite Fairbank's efforts to secure five thousand dollars in sponsorship from the Harvard Yenching Society, it was to no avail. Members of the society could not receive salaries and their lives were precarious. Liu Dunzhen has done accounting for the Construction Society, and he is well aware of the difficulties involved.
After leaving Lizhuang, Liu Dunzhen went to Shapingba, Chongqing, where he became head of the Department of Architecture at Central University the following year. He finally changed from a dusty inspector to a Confucian scholar who "wore a long shirt and held a teacup, slowly walked into the classroom, and spoke like a number of family treasures." However, his livelihood did not improve much, and in order to maintain his life, he was forced to sell the "Ciyuan" that he had treasured for many years, and even so, he could not save his young daughter, who was killed by meningitis.
Chen Mingda also left Lizhuang at the same time and went to the Southwest Highway Bureau. The War of Resistance brought him a fatal spiritual blow. His mother and sister who remained in Beiping died one after another, his fiancée died in the underground anti-Japanese activities, and his underage younger siblings suddenly disappeared again. The only thing that could comfort him was the wine in the cup and Du Fu's poem , "The flames last for three months, and the family letter arrives at ten thousand gold." He anesthetized himself with endless work, and drank and cried after work. Fate is uncertain, disasters ensue, but "Building the French Style" is still his only spiritual pillar. He forced himself to stay in a small room every day, hand-copying the entire "Construction of the French Style" and all the hand-drawn architectural drawings. After leaving the China Construction Society, he did not give up the exploration of the corresponding county wooden pagoda and the "Construction French" big wooden work. For the rest of his life, he studied and annotated the Construction of the French.
There are only four members left in the China Construction Society.
In 1944, Liang Sicheng revived the "Construction Society" that had been suspended for more than seven years. In the dimly lit house, they arranged the papers, copied and drew them on medicinal paper, and then printed them on clay paper with lithographs, folded and bound themselves, and published two issues of the collection. In his republishment, Liang Sicheng described the efforts made by his colleagues: "During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, we saw increasingly difficulties in material matters, and only under the condition of being overstretched, we conducted a little field investigation in the southwest rear", and this "one-point field investigation" actually included "more than ten counties between Kunming and Dali in Yunnan, about thirty counties along the Jialing River Basin and minjiang river basin in Sichuan, and about thirty counties along the Sichuan-Shaanxi Highway, as well as the two counties of Ya'an Lushan in Xikang", and the relics they searched for included temples, offices, guild halls, shrines, temples, castles, bridges, residences, gardens, Steles, arches, pagodas, buildings, tombs, cliff tombs, coupon tombs, sculptures, cliff statues, murals, and so on. In his re-publication remarks, Liang Sicheng tirelessly expressed his gratitude to the major institutions for their support to the China Construction Society during the War of Resistance. After the completion of these two issues, the Journal of the Construction Society was permanently suspended.
In 1945, Liang Sicheng took the remaining members of the China Construction Society and set off for Tsinghua. The China Construction Society has existed for fifteen years and has quietly ended since then. Eight of these fifteen years have been spent in war, displacement and extreme embarrassment.
Then, the two leaders of the China Construction Society, one south and one north, presided over the Department of Architecture of Tsinghua University and the Department of Architecture of Nanjing Institute of Technology, respectively. No matter how much there is a lot of opinion outside, they still maintain friendly relations. Liu Dunzhen will also send his students to Tsinghua for Liang Sicheng's guidance. Once, Liang Sicheng wrote a preface to the History of Ancient Chinese Architecture, and when he learned that Liu Dunzhen had also written one, he quietly put away his own article and never showed it until his death.
In 1955, Lin Hui died of illness before the storm came. Many years later, people remember liang Sicheng and Lin Huiyin's home in Beiping Beizongbu Hutong, remember "our wife's living room", remember all kinds of gossip and emotional undercurrents, but most of them do not remember, there are many times, Lin Huiyin and Liang Sicheng did not stay in that comfortable living room, but preferred to go to the wilderness and mountain villages, handing themselves over to the remains of ancient buildings, to those long-lost time.
Liang Sicheng stayed in the human world. He spent the second half of his life writing reviews. Liu Dunzhen's fate is no luckier than Liang Sicheng's. In the winter of 1959, when Liu Dunzhen visited India as a member of a Chinese delegation, the chief administrator of a guest house asked him curiously if he had ever participated in the 25,000-mile Long March. Of course, this Indian administrator did not know that Liu Dunzhen and Liang Sicheng had traveled far more than 25,000 miles in their investigation of ancient Chinese architecture. However, these past events are no longer mentioned.
On April 30, 1968, Liu Dunzhen died of illness. Four years later, Liang Sicheng closed his eyes alone. ( Author 丨 Zhang Quan Editor 丨 Wu Youren)
This article is excerpted from "Masters in the Wilderness", written by Zhang Quan, produced by Folio, and published by Guangxi Normal University Press in 2022. The original text is long and abridged. Size headings are the result of editing. Authorized by the publisher.
About author:Quan Zhang, graduated from the Department of Chinese of Fudan University, former editor-in-chief of Life Monthly, winner of the Asian Publishing Industry Association (SOPA) 2008, 2010 and 2013 Asian Excellence in Journalism Awards. His major works include "City Ruin: A Record of the Sixteen Cities of the Late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China", "Interviews with Chinese Civilization", and "Dunhuang: Everyone Is Called" (co-authored).