In the upheaval of the times, he consciously and wisely bid farewell to literature, handed over his entirety to a "cold" place of the times, the history museum, and began to pay attention to ancient Chinese costumes.
He was probably the first to pay attention to this field. He keenly discovered that ancient Chinese costumes were a "rich mine" with great academic research and practical value. When he found out that Japanese scholars had taken the lead, he was deeply humiliated and vowed to write a history of ancient Chinese clothing.
He did not expect that this seminal work, like a cork, would be tossed on the waves of the times for so long; to undergo such a harsh tempering in the mysterious historical rolling disk.
Premier Zhou Enlai arranged the mission
In the history museum, Shen Congwen is considered a "counter-activist", so not only is he not taken seriously, but he is often insulted and abused, and even blatantly "reprimanded", saying that he is "not doing his job", "uneasy about studying and working", and "not knowing what to do in a day". For a long time, he didn't even have an office space.
In an inspection after the "Anti-Rightism", he expressed his desire to "concentrate on touching silk and solidly engaging in the history of clothing for several years." In July 1959, he mentioned in a letter to his eldest brother Shen Yunlu that he hoped to "lay a foundation for the work of clothing history for the whole country." The following year, he wrote to his eldest brother that "a plan for a costume history is being drafted recently." This shows that this work, Shen Congwen officially began.
In the winter of 1978, Shen Congwen supplemented and finalized the study of ancient Chinese costumes at the Beijing Friendship Hotel
Before and after this, Shen Congwen drafted a catalogue of "Chinese Costume Materials" for the Light Industry Publishing House, using 600 to 700 kinds of images and stone carvings; he also wrote articles such as "Ancient Clothing Materials and Other Bits and Pieces of Life Seen from Cultural Relics", "Dressing and Dressing of the Ancients", "If We Re-enact "Qu Yuan" - On the Shaping of Character Images and How Costume Props Are Used in Ancient times and For the Present".
At that time, when leaders visited abroad, even Premier Zhou Enlai, the gift book brought by them was only a small copy of the Xinhua Dictionary. This is too out of proportion to the long-established Yangyang great power. In the winter of 1963, Zhou Enlai talked with the leaders of the Ministry of Culture about this matter, saying that common people have clothing history and clothing museums, and can we compile a catalogue of costumes from past dynasties and send them to people. Vice Minister of Culture Qi Yanming replied that Shen Congwen was studying.
At this point, the work has taken a major turn. The History Museum has established a leadership coordination system, and has allocated many people from the art group to Shen Congwen as assistants, and other relevant personnel have cooperated. At the beginning of 1964, this work was in full swing, and it was planned to publish the "Chinese Costume Materials" by October of that year as a gift to the fifteenth anniversary of the National Day.
Work is extremely intense. Shen Congwen wrote 6,000 words a day, and appropriately extended the literature, comprehensively analyzed the evidence, and made concise explanations. At the time, he had severe high blood pressure and heart disease. But he has accumulated a lot, and the leader "does not ask much" in order to catch up with the task, and he quickly completes the task. In July of that year, Kang Sheng titled the book "Selected Materials of Ancient Chinese Costumes" (referred to as "Costumes"), Guo Moruo made a preface, Shen Congwen wrote "Afterword", and the publishing house typed ten samples for review.
The History Museum organized a three-person team to revise the sample, but in fact only Shen Congwen could grasp the weight. At this time, Mao Zedong's instructions on "the emperor will rule the stage and the talented and beautiful people rule the stage" are being discussed in the society, and Shen Congwen is sensitive to the fact that the storm is brewing, "always worried about chaos in the future", and even "gave up the ideal of publishing early" in his heart. In September 1965, in a letter to Zhang Zhaohe, who participated in the "Four Qings", he envisioned simply deleting all the research texts and only producing a catalogue...
In a state of shock
Obsessed with "Costume Research"
When the storm struck as scheduled, Shen Congwen immediately became a "cow ghost snake god" and was repeatedly criticized for fighting.
In such a situation, "Costume" could not be published at all. The publisher packed the manuscripts and plates into sacks and intended them to be disposed of as scraps. Shen Congwen's colleague Li Zhitan and others quickly rescued them after receiving the news. On November 1, 1969, the copied photos, manuscripts, and notepads were sent back, and "Costumes" was also among them. This gave Shen Congwen a glimmer of hope.
In September 1969, Zhang Zhaohe was sent to the "May Seventh Cadre School" in Xianning, Hubei Province, and soon after, the leaders of the History Museum talked to Shen Congwen and mobilized him to decentralize. On November 16, Shen Congwen sent a letter to the leaders of the museum, hoping that the leaders would not let him leave Beijing and let him continue to study clothing, which would make more sense. But it didn't work.
On November 18, the History Museum decided to let Shen Congwen and 18 other old, weak and sick people be sent to the "May 7 Cadre School" and leave Beijing before the end of the month. Shen Congwen's heart was very confused, and he had not slept for two nights. On November 22, he said in a letter to his youngest son, Shen Huyan: "A table of manuscripts seems very sad, and although it is allowed to be well preserved, I have probably no hope of having the opportunity to clean up all this again." It is more sad, that is, what is done in the past twenty years is equivalent to the completion of the work, in fact, there are many parts that young people can't do in twenty or thirty years, and it may never be done again. ”
Shen Congwen and Zhang Zhaohe in Xianning, Hubei Province" "May 7 Cadre School"
On November 30, Shen Congwen was accompanied by his eldest son Shen Longzhu on a southbound train. When he arrived at his destination, he "tossed and turned for about four hours" before he could barely settle down.
During the more than two years of the "May Seventh Cadre School" in Xianning, Shen Congwen's residence moved six places, which made him uncertain. The local area is humid and rainy, and the roof of his residence has holes, and after the heavy rain, the room becomes a river, and the cries of crickets, frogs and brocade snakes "echo with the frogs outside the window" and "form a new environment that has been rarely experienced in a lifetime". He was glad he didn't open the box to copy "Costumes", otherwise "it would be bad".
But work is like a colorful rainbow, forever hanging in Shen Congwen's sky, and in his family letters, he must talk about it almost every time.
On June 18, 1970, he wrote to Zhang Zhaohe: "... In particular, the 20,000-word description of the "Costume Materials" that the Prime Minister agreed to compile, and the nearly 2,000 images in the interior raised many new questions that had not been explained by people in the past, that is, it was quite useful just for identifying the era of old figure painting! ”
On July 16, 1970, in a letter to Zhang Zhaohe, he said: "I really can't forget the business of the past twenty years", "For example, the "Clothing Materials" explains that the corrected draft is about 20,000 words... It can break the mistakes and hypocrisy that have been formed by the imperial authority for thousands of years", "but there is no book to check the material here". However, he was not desperate, "I have neither books nor other materials at hand, so I can only memorize the omissions or superfluous points in the drawings, and write them down one by one with a note, ready to make up for them when I have the opportunity to do so in the future." ”
He also wrote to Wang Jingru, the leader of the historical museum in Beijing, asking to return to Beijing for medical treatment and continue the research on cultural relics. He instructed his eldest son, Shen Longzhu, who was in Beijing, to forward this letter. After Shen Longzhu forwarded the letter, he went to the interview for more than an hour. On July 26, 1970, Shen Longzhu wrote back to his father to inform Wang Jingru of his opinion: returning to Beijing for medical treatment can be proposed to the cadre school (Shen Longzhu believes that the possibility is very small); several cultural relics research materials, "have not yet been criticized" and cannot be overrated.
The disappointment and hard life made Shen Congwen, who was nearly seventy years old, aggravate his high blood pressure and heart disease. On the night of November 13, 1970, he had severe abdominal pain, and after turning the treatment, he was diagnosed with kidney stones, hypertension, and heart disease complications. After forty days in the hospital, he had a hard time taking care of himself.
In desperation, he wrote three more letters to the leaders of the Twenty-third Company of the Cadre School, asking for "permission to temporarily return to Beijing for treatment," "Although I am close to the end of my life, if I can make a slight improvement in my condition, I still hope that at another time, I can still learn a little bit of common sense in the cultural relics I have learned in the past twenty years" and "make a modest contribution."
After much effort, in February 1972, Shen Congwen, a seventy-year-old man, was finally allowed to return to Beijing for medical treatment.
Cut and compressed, cone heartache
After returning to Beijing, Shen Congwen stayed in Beijing in a constant way of renewing his leave. He "bought a lot of old books in less than a week and filled a small room." The occupied house could not be returned, and he could not take care of it, working alone in the hut, modifying and deleting "Costumes". He described, "For the convenience of my work, I disassembled many of the more expensive catalogues, and as far as possible classified nails and pasted them on the four walls," and "led five thin iron wires vertically and horizontally, and hung the proposed images on them separately." As a result, "in less than two months, the walls of the room were almost completely occupied by some strange images."
In late April, the leaders of the History Museum asked Shen Congwen to compress the manuscript from 200,000 words to 50,000 words.
Shen Congwen (a standing man) teaches ancient silk fabrics at the Museum of Chinese History
On May 7, 1973, Shen Congwen finally handed over the revised draft to the museum. He was confident in himself, "I can probably expect to see this big new book printed!" He naively thought that after the book was published, it would attract praise at home and abroad, and he would continue to compile ten to twelve volumes.
The manuscript was handed over, and Shen Congwen was still thinking about revising and supplementing. But since then, the manuscript has not been heard. Shen Congwen requested that the manuscript be returned. What he never expected, this was a long and poignant process.
Perhaps to show solemnity, or perhaps it was difficult for the leadership to see, Shen Congwen pleaded with a letter. On November 20 of that year, he wrote to Yang Zhenya, director of the History Museum, and Chen Qiao, deputy director of the Museum, almost in a pleading tone, saying, "I hope that the two leaders can seek truth from facts and let me rush to work for the country," and "Let me use my slightly different learning method to complete the history of clothing as soon as possible."
In December 1973 and February of the following year, he wrote separate letters to the leaders to request drafts in order to reprint and supplement the drawings. On August 14, 1974, Shen Congwen's eye disease became serious, and his sense of urgency led him to write to Deputy Curator Chen Qiao again, asking for the manuscript to be returned. On August 20, he wrote to his colleagues Chen Dazhang and Li Zhitan, asking them to help retrieve the manuscript.
After fifteen months of begging, pleading, and waiting, in late August 1974, the Museum of History finally returned the manuscript, informing him that no one could be selected to assist him in his work. Shen Congwen had no choice but to "fight alone."
He felt this book
"The possibility of scrapping in an instant
It's obvious"
In the autumn and winter, Shen Congwen's eyesight improved and he accelerated the pace of work. In order to supplement the drawings, he specially asked for the help of his "little friend" Wang Jie, who worked at the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Wang Yu was responsible for taking pictures of the target data to enlarge, and Shen Congwen took these photos to Rong Baozhai and the Academy of Arts and Crafts to seek solutions for drawing drawings.
In late January 1975, Professor Yang Qianru of Chinese Min University met Wang Yarong in the library and introduced her to help Shen Congwen paint. After political review and business assessment, the history museum decided to hire Wang Yarong. Wang Yarong was transferred from the original unit, but was told that he could not be Shen Congwen's assistant, but was divided into another place to copy the painting. Wang Yarong felt that "the old man (referring to Shen Congwen) could not be chilled" and decided to refuse, so he became a "hanging figure". Losing a job unit, becoming an "idle person", and having no income was very frightening in that era. But Wang Yarong has no complaints or regrets and fully serves Mr. Shen, whom she reveres. Although Shen Congwen funded her twenty yuan a month, he was still anxious because he was worried about her future. Later, with the help of Wang Yu, after many twists and turns, Wang Yarong was transferred to the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
Shen Congwen (left), Wang Yi (center), and Wang Yarong (right) discuss the problems encountered in the work
This story has been brushed over in Wang Yarong's pen and in many other texts. A girl with such a chivalrous heart can be said to be "righteous and thin clouds", which is a brilliant memory in contemporary academic history.
Wang Yu and Wang Yarong went to Shen Congwen's house on time every day after work to "work overtime". Most of the three or four hundred small paintings in the book "Costumes" were completed in this period.
In January 1976, with the help of Wang Yi and Wang Yarong, the new draft of "Costumes" was completed. Shen Congwen began to proofread. But he still has no confidence in whether it can be published: "The possibility of scrapping in an instant is very obvious." ”
After rectifying the chaos, "Costumes" received attention again, and Qi Yanming asked about it many times. Shen Congwen lit up hope again.
When the Tangshan earthquake hit Beijing in 1976, Shen Congwen's family took refuge in Suzhou. In February 1977, Shen Congwen was worried about work and returned to Beijing alone. His physical strength was severely reduced, and he said that he was "idle and old.". But the work remains intense. On May 12, Shen Congwen wrote to his family in Suzhou that at 7:30 p.m., he "felt that the ground was moving gently" and that "only then did he make up his mind, and tonight he must temporarily put down the clean-up of the 20,000-word explanatory draft that was resting on the table and pressed on his heart"; he also said, "It is often when [the manuscript] sees that his brain feels heavy and heavy, and then he lies on the bed to rest for a while and returns to the table to look at it." Getting up from muddy exhaustion and letting life stretch as hard as possible is the "brute force" of a seventy-five-year-old man.
Shen Congwen's physical condition deteriorated, "the alarm bells rang frequently", and his sense of urgency became stronger and stronger. In August, he wrote to Deng Yingchao to reflect on various difficulties. At the beginning of October, when he learned that Wang Was going to work outside, he immediately wrote to him hoping to meet: "There are some things that should be told to you, and it is related to the immature miscellaneous manuscripts that I have dealt with since then." He seemed to be going to make a final account. On November 18, he said in a letter to his cousin Dai Siwen, "Can I still see the "Costume Materials" printed... It's hard to estimate", "My work may be coming to an end", "In the eyes of some people, I may be close to a 'dead man'".
The poignant story behind these words may be obliterated forever. However, the difficulties in the revision and publication of the book "Costumes" are obvious, and the workload is huge, and Shen Congwen's own efforts or only rely on the amateur contributions of Wang Yu and Wang Yarong are of no avail.
Hu Qiaomu intervened
According to Wang Yarong's recollection, when she was transferred to the Academy of Social Sciences, she met Mr. Liu Yangyao, secretary general of the Academy of Social Sciences, and because of her "boasting" with Wang, since 1975, Liu Yangyao gradually understood the significance of Shen Congwen's research and the work dilemma, so she officially reflected to Hu Qiaomu, who was then the president of the Academy of Social Sciences. In April 1978, under the arrangement of Hu Qiaomu, Shen Congwen was transferred from the History Museum to the Institute of History of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. However, due to the initial break of "turmoil" and other reasons, clothing research can not be carried out normally.
In August, Shen Congwen wrote to his brother-in-law Zhang Yuhe and his wife, saying that in the Academy of Social Sciences, "traditional historiography and archaeology are still in line" and that "Costumes" is still useful in museum work, and once you leave the museum, the work is not considered 'research', and the materials are not easy to handle." The impression may be inexplicable."
In mid-September, Shen Congwen said in a reply to a teacher friend's letter: "I am going to finish my work, but because my residence is too narrow, the materials cannot be concentrated, and I am almost helpless, waiting for a studio to have a way." Although the "priority" is allowed in the courtyard, in fact this priority is not easy to translate into concrete. ”
On September 13, in a hurry, Shen Congwen wrote to Hu Qiaomu, asking: First, he hoped to adjust the housing and have a larger studio to carry out the work; second, he transferred Wang Yi and Wang Yarong to assist in the work.
From October 6, possibly with the intervention of Hu Qiaomu, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences made an exception and rented two large suites for Shen Congwen to make temporary studios at the Friendship Hotel in the western suburbs of Beijing. With the cooperation of Wang Yi, Wang Yarong, Li Hong and several other assistants, Shen Congwen began to do the final draft of "Costumes". Due to the huge workload, Hu Ji, a graduate student in the history department of Peking University who works in the Inner Mongolia coal mine, was also seconded to assist in proofreading the documents. Shen Congwen's wife Zhang Zhaohe and his niece Shen Chaohui also fought together.
In 1978, the Institute of History of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences established the Institute of Ancient Chinese Costumes, and Wang Yi and Wang Yarong became Mr. Shen's assistants
After three months of continuous intense work, Shen Congwen "rushed to work day and night" and "was so busy that he was dizzy", made major revisions and supplements to the manuscript, added many new cultural relics materials, newly painted and illustrated 150 pieces, and increased the explanatory text to 250,000 words.
On January 10, 1979, the manuscript was finally completed and renamed "Research on Ancient Chinese Costumes". When the news came out, foreign publishing houses rushed to negotiate and were willing to pay the highest remuneration, but Shen Congwen refused. At the History Museum, Shen Congwen worked here for thirty years, his work was rarely supported, and he also suffered many humiliations, and the work was "extremely harsh in environment and conditions" (Zhang Xinxin), and when Shen Congwen left, the unit also behaved quite desperately, saying that he was "not a major talent" and "left if he wanted to go". At this time, the unit asked for a signature. Shen Congwen lost his temper and said, "If you sign your name, then I will not sign it."
In May 1979, he wrote to his youngest son and wife: "It was said that it could be proofread in March, but now it is nearly June, and there is no news", "Maybe until I die, I will not be able to publish it.". In November of the same year, he wrote again, saying, "This book has been shelved for sixteen years, and it is so exhausting that I am tired of mentioning it."
Tossing and waiting, for nearly a year, Shen Congwen lost patience.
On January 15, 1980, Shen Congwen, who had no choice, handed the manuscript to the Scientific Research Bureau of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and finally decided to hand it over to the Hong Kong Commercial Press for publication. As soon as the library got the manuscript, the editor-in-chief Li Zuze arrived in Beijing as soon as possible and visited Shen Congwen in Xiaoyang Yibin Hutong to discuss the details of publication. There was only one wicker chair in the hut, and the host and guest gave way to each other and did not want to sit alone. It was a snowy day, and the two men stood in the courtyard talking freely, letting the snow fall on them.
In September 1981, the hardcover edition of "Studies on Ancient Chinese Costumes" with 250,000 words and 700 images was officially published. From the Yin Shang to the Ming and Qing dynasties, this book uses the cultural relics and documents unearthed in the past to make extensive and refined explorations of the costume system and costume technology of various dynasties for more than 3,000 years, puts forward many unique insights, and has important reference value for literary and historical research, ancient text interpretation, historical painting creation, historical drama performance and costume design. As soon as the book was printed, the Hong Kong Commercial Press sent someone to Beijing to deliver the book to the Shen family.
This year, Shen Congwen was seventy-nine years old.
The accident of history
Seventeen years have elapsed since 1964; twenty-one years since the drafting of the catalogue of Chinese Costume Materials in 1960; and shen Congwen wrote the book in the mid-1950s.
The first edition had three hundred specially signed copies, priced at HK$800, and was sold out before it was published. After the book came out, it was quickly valued at home and abroad, and europeans and Americans negotiated and published in English, French and German translations. There are pirated copies in Taiwan. China has given it as a national gift to the Emperor of Japan, the Queen of England, and the President of the United States.
Shen Congwen's work of supplementing and continuing ten volumes of the book continued.
Eleven years later, the Hong Kong Commercial Press published the first edition of an updated edition, completed by Shen Congwen's most powerful assistant, Wang Huibao. At this time, shen Congwen had been dead for four years.
Nearly thirty years later, the "Chinese Modern Academic Masterpieces Series" edited by the Commercial Press, which includes chinese and overseas Chinese academic masterpieces from the late Qing Dynasty to the late 1980s, can be said to be an academic review of the Chinese nation, and "Research on Ancient Chinese Costumes" is listed among them. History is a big net, and the mesh is big. However, if the impossible is done, it is destined to be remembered.
Source: Magazine of All Walks of Life, Issue 2, 2021
Author: Chen Xin