Some scholars are often described as "writings and other bodies", but this does not apply to Mr. Gu Cheng (1934-2003.6). During his lifetime, the contemporary Historian of the Ming and Qing Dynasties published only two monographs, namely The History of the Peasants' War at the End of the Ming Dynasty and the History of the Southern Ming Dynasty. As his masterpiece, the History of the Southern Ming Dynasty, published 20 years ago (1997), can be called The masterpiece of Mr. Gu Cheng's "ten years of grinding a sword".
Academic ascetic
Mr. Gu Cheng was born on November 28, 1934, to an intellectual family in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province. Ranked sixth among siblings, the nickname "Little Six". His father, Gu Zuyin, served as an associate professor at National Chung Cheng University during the Republic of China. The scholar Xiang mendi provided Mr. Gu and his brothers and sisters with good academic potential, and among the experts who enjoyed special government allowances announced by the State Council in the future, the Gu family had three people, including Mr. Gu Cheng, on the list, which is also extremely rare in all of China.
Mr. Gu Cheng
In 1957, Mr. Gu Cheng was admitted to the History Department of Beijing Normal University. During his studies, he participated in the archival collation of the Archives Department of the Palace Museum (now the First Historical Archive of China) and the compilation of the general textbook "Modern History of the World" presided over by Mr. Zhou Liang. Because of his excellent completion of the task, he was also able to stay in the school to teach after graduation in 1961, and initially went to the "Chinese Historiography Group" presided over by Bai Shouyi, and was arranged to engage in the study of the history of Ming and Qing history, and since then he has formed an indissoluble relationship with the study of Ming history. In May 1978, Gu Cheng published an article entitled "Li Yan Questions" in Historical Research, which denied the records related to Li Yan one by one and explained the ins and outs of Li Yan's legend; this also became his founding work. Li Yanqi became a household name because of Guo Moruo's famous book "Three Hundred Years of Jiashen Festival", and also became an important role in Yao Xueyao's historical novel "Li Zicheng". However, when Mr. Gu studied the historical materials, he found that none of the historical materials of this peasant uprising general, who was said to be second only to Li Zicheng, could stand up, and a large number of reliable historical materials proved that Li Yan was completely a "Mr. Wuyou". Because of the novel viewpoint and well-founded arguments in this article, it has attracted widespread attention at home and abroad, and has also made Mr. Gu Cheng famous.
"Koshin Three Hundred Years Festival"
Behind the seemingly "blockbuster", Mr. Gu Cheng has been uncomplicated in his life, immersed in learning, and the average daily reading time is more than 10 hours. Gu Cheng himself said that from a young age, he rode his bicycle to the major libraries and archives in the city to read books and check materials. In order to save time, I nibbled on a dried steamed bun at noon to fill my hunger and did not return home until the museum closed. Whether it is the height of summer or the harsh winter, it never stops. In the cold winter moon, sometimes the wind roars, the snow flutters, and the hands holding the handlebars are frozen and numb, so they go to the fire in the street shop to bake. He went so many times that many library and archive managers knew him. In the evening, he sorted out the copied materials under the lamp, or wrote treatises. It is said that on the table in Gu Cheng's study were stacks of manuscript papers more than a foot high, which were all extracted from libraries and archives. He did not use the card to copy the information, saying that the card could not copy a few words, but replaced it with manuscript paper, and if one piece of manuscript paper was not enough, he would add two sheets, and he could completely copy a large paragraph of information. It is conceivable that in the era of no Internet and computers, it takes a lot of time and energy to copy word by word with a pen! Therefore, due to the long-term day and night rotation, the brain is highly excited, Mr. Gu Cheng fell ill with insomnia very early, at first it was until three or four o'clock at night to fall asleep, and later it was necessary to stay until the east was white to fall asleep, and he had to take sleeping pills to fall asleep. Over time, the biological clock is completely reversed, forming the habit of working at night and sleeping in the morning. Even the history department of Beijing Normal University knows this habit of Mr. Gu Cheng, and arranges his classes to come in the afternoon or evening so as not to affect his rest. Therefore, some people call Mr. Gu Cheng "an ascetic in academia", which is not an excessive evaluation.
Library of Beijing Normal University
Ten years to sharpen a sword
However, in the contemporary academic community characterized by prolificness, Gu Cheng can be called a widowed scholar. It was not until 1982 that he published his first monograph, A History of the Peasants' War at the End of the Ming Dynasty. This is a masterpiece that shows the author's ability to govern history: the historical materials are almost exhausted, the research can be described as careful and detailed, and there is no one who is unsurpassed in the same kind of topic so far, so it has also won the second prize for outstanding achievements in philosophy and social sciences in Beijing. In the preface to the History of the Peasants' War at the End of the Ming Dynasty, Gu Cheng had a promise to the reader that he intended to write a history of the Southern Ming Dynasty as a companion to the History of the Peasants' War at the End of the Ming Dynasty. However, for more than 10 years, "only the stairs were heard, no one came down" was delayed until 1997, when the 770,000-word "History of the Southern Ming" was officially completed, and together with the "History of the Peasants' War at the End of the Ming Dynasty", it became the only two monographs published by Mr. Gu Cheng during his lifetime. It is a pity that the days are not left for many years, and the ascetic study of the monk for many years has finally damaged Mr. Gu Cheng's health. It is a pity that he passed away in the middle of his life, and his wish to complete the third masterpiece was really regrettable.
History of the Southern Ming Dynasty
This "History of the Southern Ming Dynasty" is really a painstaking work of Mr. Gu Cheng's ten (more) years of grinding a sword. Compared with the works on the history of the Southern Ming that had been published at that time, such as Xie Guozhen's "History of the Southern Ming" (1957), the American historian Stu Lin (1984), and Nan Bingwen's "History of the Southern Ming" (1992), Gu Cheng's "History of the Southern Ming" was far more than the collection of historical materials. This book directly cites more than 200 local chronicles, from the northeast and northwest to the southeast and southwest, and there are all kinds of county, prefectural, state, and provincial chronicles. The number of uncited but consulted local chronicles is several times greater than this number. For example, Mr. Gu Cheng stayed in Kunming, Yunnan For more than a month, he read the local chronicles and related classics in the Collection of Yunnan Museums and Provincial Libraries, and carefully read and excerpted more than 100 local chronicles, but only 23 of them were quoted in the "History of the Southern Ming Dynasty", which proves the huge amount of labor investment. Even in order to further be responsible for the reader, Mr. Gu Cheng reminded in the book that most of the historical materials cited were copied by his personal, although "after checking at the time of excerpting, striving for accuracy, I dare not say that there are absolutely no clerical errors."
In addition to local history, some precious historical materials were also discovered or cited by Mr. Gu Cheng in the library for the first time. Other ancient classics cited in the "History of the Southern Ming Dynasty" and more than 300 archival materials collected by the First Archives and various museums, many of which are rare at home and abroad, such as Liu Tongchun's "Heavenly Nianlu", Li Guoying's "Li Qinxiang Gongfu Governor Qin Shu Song Discussion", Liu Wuyuan's "Qiannan Song Discussion", Zhang Wangzhi's "Gongyuan Zhicao" and so on. Taking the "Heavenly Nianlu" written by the military general Liu Tongchun in the early Qing Dynasty found in the Rare Books special collection department of the Beijing Library as an example, it is not at all clear from the title that there is no connection with the history of the Southern Ming Dynasty, but this book actually records that in the fifth year of Shunzhi (1649), The Nanchang guards Jin Shenghuan and Wang Deren "opposed the Qing Dynasty and restored the Ming Dynasty", Liu Tongchun fled in disguise, reported to the Qing army, and the history of Nanchang City being slaughtered after the destruction of Nanchang City, and the book is accompanied by precious illustrations (that is, the cover of the "History of southern Ming"), including a true portrayal of the Qing army besieging the Nanchang Ming army. If it were not for Mr. Gu Cheng's careful search of historical materials, such an important document would probably still be lost in the library.
What is particularly commendable is that while comprehensively and systematically excavating historical materials, Mr. Gu Cheng also conscientiously examined, defended and revised, and corrected many errors recorded in historical books. For example, the authoritative "Cihai" once recorded an eighteen-year-long (1646-1663) "Dingwu" era name, and it was owned by the "King of Han" of the Southern Ming Dynasty. According to this statement, the reign of this Han king is almost in line with the well-known Yong calendar year number of the last Southern Ming Emperor Zhu Youluo (reigned 1646-1662), and the historical records of this Dingwu regime are really very few, and it is Gu Cheng who uses many Southern Ming historical books and early Qing Dynasty archives to rank and examine, pointing out that "there is no Han Lord with the era name Of Dingwu at all", clarifying the rumors that the "Record of Crimes" written by the early Qing dynasty remnant Zha Jizuo is unreliable. The addition of a Han King Dingwu regime to the history of the Southern Ming Dynasty caused confusion to the study of the history of the Southern Ming Dynasty by later generations.
"Ci Hai"
It is difficult to buy "History of the Southern Ming Dynasty"
When the "History of the Southern Ming Dynasty" was published twenty years ago, it was a stone-shattering shock. It is hailed as a milestone in the study of the history of the Southern Ming Dynasty, and won the China National Book Award and the first prize of the Beijing Municipal Philosophy and Social Science Outstanding Achievement Award. Mr. He Lingxiu, an expert in the history of the Ming and Qing dynasties and who has enjoyed the special government allowance issued by the State Council since 1992, was impressed by it and commented that this "History of the Southern Ming Dynasty" is "of course not a work that fills in the gaps, but it represents the highest level reached so far in the study of the history of the Southern Ming Dynasty"; "Only Professor Gu Cheng has truly mastered the history of the Southern Ming Dynasty in a consistent and thorough manner." ”
He Lingxiu
Because the "History of southern Ming" breaks the traditional academic scope of the study of the history of the Southern Ming with the succession of the Hongguang Emperor as the upper limit and the defeat and fall of the Yongli Emperor as the lower limit, from the change of Jiashen in the seventeenth year of Chongzhen (1644) to the collapse of the famous thirteen anti-Qing bases in the third year of Kangxi (1664), "basically taking the remnants of the Dashun Army, the remnants of the Great Western Army, and the 'Haikou' Zheng Chenggong and other people's anti-Qing struggles as the main line, rather than centering on the rise and fall of several Zhu family imperial courts (Hongguang, Longwu, Lu Jianguo, Shaowu and Yongli) in the Southern Ming Dynasty." Naturally, it has also caused some controversy. Li Zhiting, the author of "The Great Biography of Wu Sangui," believes that this is "an unfair evaluation of many major issues in the history of the Ming and Qing dynasties, and a reversal of some of the consensus reached since the 1980s," "it is obviously incorrect to define the history of the Southern Ming Dynasty according to the beginning of the 'armed anti-Qing movement,'" and "it is just a reproduction of Xiao Yishan's theory of 'national revolution.'" ”
Nevertheless, as Mr. He Lingxiu said, "Any historian who deals with the history of the Southern Ming Dynasty, whether he is in favor of or against the views of this book (referring to Gu Cheng's "History of the Southern Ming"), cannot fail to read it, and even if he does not want to accept the historical facts it has sorted out, he cannot but accept it." Even Li Zhiting, whose ideas are completely contrary to Gu Cheng's, has to admit that "as a researcher of The History of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, I look at the History of the Southern Ming Dynasty and am impressed by its superb historical examination and meticulous argumentation."
What is even more intriguing is that the "History of the Southern Ming" is not only a model of academic excellence, widely praised by the academic circles at home and abroad, but also written in a simple and simple way, bringing readers with certain historical knowledge such as the author a pleasing pleasure and enlightening pleasure, and it is said that even the proofreaders of the printing plant's "History of the Southern Ming" are also relishing reading. Perhaps for this reason, the "History of the Southern Ming" published by the China Youth Publishing House in 1997 was quickly sold out on the market, and the old books were even speculated for hundreds of yuan on the Internet. It was not until 2011 (the eighth year after Mr. Gu Cheng's death) that Guangming Daily Publishing House republished this masterpiece of Mr. Gu Cheng, and the republished "History of southern Ming" included the "History of Me and Ming" written by Mr. Gu Cheng before his death, reviewing his decades of academic career, and attaching Mr. Gu's handwriting. What is quite intriguing is that the news headline of the "Publication Reference" at that time in the "News Broadcast" column reads: "Wei Dao" for true historiography, the new edition of the "History of the Southern Ming" was unveiled.
New Edition of the History of the Southern Ming Dynasty