Recently, the Ming Dynasty's vernacular short story collection "Three Words" has attracted the enthusiastic attention of readers. Today we will tell you what kind of book is "Three Words"? Why is it worth reading? What are the "three words" reading books suitable for readers to read by Zhonghua Bookstore?
1
What is the Book of "Three Words"?
"Three Words" is the abbreviation of the three vernacular short story collections "Yu Shi Mingyan" (a book of "Ancient and Modern Novels"), "Warning World Tongyan" and "Awakening The Hengyan" compiled by the Ming Dynasty writer Feng Menglong (1574-1646) at the end of the Ming Dynasty.
"Three Words, Yu Shi MingYan"
《Three Words and Police Sergeant》
"Three Words: Awakening to the Everlasting Word"
Feng Menglong, also spelled Youlong, is a native of Suzhou, Jiangsu Province. He has little talent, and together with his brothers Feng Menggui and Feng Mengxiong is known as the "Three Fengs of Wuxia", although his lifelong career is not a successful career, but he has made great achievements in the adaptation and creation of popular literary works such as opera, folk songs, and novels. For example, the "Chronicle of the States of the Eastern Zhou Dynasty", which is the most widely circulated and influential popular historical interpretation besides the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, is the commentary book of the "New Chronicle of the States" edited by Feng Menglong.
Chronicles of the States of the Eastern Zhou Dynasty (Top 10 Best-Selling Classical Novels in China)
Judging from the title of the "Three Sayings", "Yu Shi", "Warning The World", and "Awakening the World", it can be seen that the purpose of its compilation is to educate the world, because the author realizes that for ordinary people, even classic works such as the "Filial Piety Sutra" and "Analects" that have been recited from childhood are probably not as touching and profound as novels.
The Analects (Chinese Classics Collection)
In the preface to Cautionary Tales, the author gives an example of the novel's important role in sensitizing people's hearts. It is said that a child hurt his finger while cooking, but he did not cry out in pain, someone asked him why, the child said: "I just heard from the Xuanmiao Temple that "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" came back, the storyteller said that Guan Yunchang scraped bones to cure poison, and still talked and laughed freely, how can I cry out in pain? The author further pointed out that the novel can make a child suddenly have the courage to scrape the bones and heal the poison, and by extension, tell the story of loyalty and filial piety, which naturally can also stimulate people's loyalty and filial piety.
Romance of the Three Kingdoms (Four Masterpieces of Chinese Literature)
The author's explanation of the novel function of "the queen mother sells melons, sells herself and boasts" may indeed be out of the Confucian-style indoctrination on the one hand, and on the other hand, it is also through echoing the supplementary education to make the "not into the flow" of the novelist's words into the mainstream.
Today, the author's advocacy of this kind of enlightenment is probably not what we pay attention to. So, for today's readers, is the "three words" still worth reading?
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Why is "Three Words" worth reading?
The answer, of course, is yes. To put it simply, there are at least two reasons: First, there are many wonderful life stories in the "Three Words" that are worth savoring; second, there are many wonderful famous sayings and aphorisms in the "Three Words" that deserve our deep consideration.
The "Three Sayings" are each forty, for a total of one hundred and twenty stories. Of course, these stories are not all created by Feng Menglong himself, and many of them are based on previous stories. For example, the first article of the "Cautionary Tale", "Yu Boya Wrestling Qin Xie Zhiyin", tells the story of Yu Boya and Zhong Zi period high mountain flowing water encountering Zhiyin, and there is this story in "Liezi". There are also some stories written based on the history of the Ming Dynasty at that time, such as the last article of the "Yu Shi Mingyan", "Shen Xiaoxia Meets the Teacher Table", which tells the story of the rape of yan song's father and son persecuting the Shen Lian family.
Three Complete Books of "Liezi"
[Yuan] Wang Zhenpeng's "Boya Drum and Qintu", beijing palace museum collection
There are many stories in the "Three Sayings" that we are still familiar with today. For example, the "White Lady Yongzhen Leifeng Pagoda" in the "Cautionary Tale" is the legend of the white snake in the Ming Dynasty, but many plots are different from the legends we are familiar with. For example, in this story, XiaoQing is called "Qingqing", not a green snake, but a green fish in the West Lake that has been cultivating for thousands of years. "Tang Xieyuan's Smile on Marriage" tells the story of Tang Bohu dotting Qiu Xiang that we are familiar with. In addition, stories such as "Wang Anshi Three Difficulties Su Bachelor" and "Su Xiaomei Three Difficulties Groom" are also familiar to everyone.
Movie "Tang Bohu Dian Qiu Xiang"
Due to the twists and turns of the storyline in "Three Words", the delicate description, "the extreme imitation of the world's human feelings, the preparation of the tragedy and joy of the clutch", with high artistic achievements, so some works have also been selected for primary and secondary school Language textbooks. For example, "Du Shiniang's Angry Sinking Treasure Chest" has created a glorious female image, which has been praised by literary historians as "the most accomplished work in the Ming Dynasty's pseudo-script".
However, the wonderful story of "three words" can only be experienced by opening it and reading it carefully, which is limited to space and can only be pointed out.
There is a way that "all things are insightful and learned, and human feelings are practiced is an article", and "Three Words" also mentions a large number of famous sayings and aphorisms that understand the world's human feelings when telling wonderful stories. Many of them are still used in our daily lives today, such as "people cannot be disguised, and the sea is invincible", "people's hearts are not enough to swallow elephants", "it is better to believe that they have, not to believe in their absence", "to have the heart of a villain, to live in the belly of a gentleman", "to meet thousands of miles, not to meet on the other side", "good things do not go out, evil things do thousands of miles", many of which are found in the "Augmentation of The Sages".
Three Complete Editions of "Augmenting the Sage Text"
In short, reading the "Three Words" will not only make you feel familiar, but also make you have a lot of new experiences. Since the "three words" are so good, what version should we read?
3
"Three Words" reading recommended
"Three Words" is an ancient vernacular novel, if we just look at the story, then read the version of our "Top Ten Best-Selling Classical Novels in China".
"Yu Shi Mingyan"
Cautionary Tales
"Awakening to the Everlasting Word"
However, there are many poems quoted in the "Three Sayings", and many historical allusions are also involved in the writing, and if you want to understand it more thoroughly, it is necessary to read the "Three Words" of our "Chinese Classic Novel Annotation Series".
Here are a few examples of how comments are necessary. For example, the twenty-first volume of the "Yu Shi Mingyan" "Lin'an Li Qian Po Liu Hair Traces" tells the story of Qian Bao, the king of Wuyue in the fifth generation, because there were many strange things in the family when he was born, his father wanted to drown him, and a neighbor's mother-in-law surnamed Wang persuaded him to stay, so his nickname was "Qian Po Liu". Later, Qian Wei returned to his hometown and wrote a poem, one of which was called "Three Festivals of Returning home to hang brocade clothes". What does the "three verses" mean here?
Some commentaries say that "in the ancient system, the emperor summoned his subordinates to use three sections", and some commentaries said that "the Tang and Song dynasties were divided into three sections". And our author, according to the "New Five Dynasties History" and Wang Mingsheng's "Seventeen Histories of Shangyu", pointed out: "Three sections: refers to Qian Wei during the Tang Dynasty, who was already serving as the envoy of the Zhen Navy and the envoy of the Zhendong Army, and after entering Liang, he was also the envoy of the Huainan Festival. (Commentary on the Explicit Sayings of the Yu Dynasty, p. 338) It can be seen that the "three stanzas" here refer to the positions of the three knotted envoys.
History of the New Five Dynasties (Revised Edition of the Twenty-Four Histories of the Dian school book)
Another example is the twenty-first volume of the "Cautionary Tales", "Zhao Taizu Sends Jingniang thousands of miles", when Zhao Kuangyin refused to give Jingniang a promise: "I am a sitting Andhem Liu Xia Hui, how can you learn from Wu Mengzi who indulges in depravity." "Here Yanagisita Hui, everyone is more familiar." So who is "Wu Mengzi"? Some commentaries say "Wu Mengzi: Wife of Duke Lu Zhaogong in the Spring and Autumn Period." This is good, so why is it said that she is "indulgent and disrespectful", and why does Zhao Kuangyin use her as an example to admonish Jingniang?
The annotation in our book goes like this: "Wu Mengzi: Wife of Duke Lu Zhaogong in the Spring and Autumn Period." Her ancestor was Taibo, the son of King Tai of Zhou, and Duke Lu Zhao was a descendant of Duke Dan of Zhou, both with the surname Ji. The ancients tabooed intermarriage with the same surname, believing that it was an indecent act. Zhao Kuangyin and Zhao Jingniang not only have the same surname, but also are brothers and sisters, and Zhao Kuangyin uses the story of Wu Mengzi to reject Zhao Jingniang's love. (Commentary on the Cautionary Tales, p. 313) With this annotation, we can understand the meaning here.
From the above two examples, it can be seen that in order to truly understand the "three words", it is necessary to read the commentary.
"Mortals Moved Their Hearts - Xiong Taixing Says "Three Words""
(Co-ordinator: Lu Quan; Editor: Bai Xinhui)