Source: Xinhua Daily Telegraph
kingcraft
During the "May Day" holiday, Hu Hongxia, editor-in-chief of Shenzhen JingBao, and his wife, Yao Zhenghua, came to Suzhou and rushed to an old bookstore deep in Niujia Lane. Seeing Mr. Jiang Chengbo, a 96-year-old "treasurer", the husband and wife were quite excited. Because the last time they met was 14 years ago, when they bought a lot of books in this bookstore called "Literature Mountain House" and were recommended to buy a few ingots of emblem ink, which is still a fortunate thing.
When we met again, Mr. Jiang Chengbo still recognized the pair of "old customers". He still remembers that they didn't have enough money in their hands, and they ran to the bank to withdraw cash...
Hu Hongxia and his wife Yao Zhenghua are both "book lovers", not only collecting and writing books themselves, but also launching the influential "Shenzhen Reading Month Top Ten Good Books" selection activity. This time in Suzhou, in addition to reading books and interviewing book people, they returned to visit Jiang Chengbo. They bought mr. Jiang's two newly reprinted books and asked him to sign them. Hu Hongxia said that the 96-year-old is still opening a bookstore and keeping a bookstore, which is certainly not to be found in Shenzhen. Nowadays, there are many readers from other places who come to visit Mr. Jiang every day. Hu Hongxia sighed, I really can't imagine that Mr. Jiang has become an "internet celebrity".
Five generations of bookstore people, relay operation
The story of the Jiang family's book industry begins with Jiang Chengbo's great-grandfather Jiang Chunshan, a man from Huzhou, Zhejiang Province, who came to Suzhou because of the war and worked as a clerk in the Suzhou Zhangmen "Sweeping Leaf Mountain House" bookstore. The Jiang family has been good at ancient book research as early as the place of origin, so the younger generations are mostly engaged in this industry.
Saye Mountain House began in the Ming Dynasty during the Wanli Dynasty, located in Suzhou Zhangmen, the owner is Suzhou Dongting Mountain Wang clan Xi clan, the bookstore until the early Qing Dynasty is still prosperous business. Jiang Xingxi, the son of Jiang Chunshan, entered the bookstore business at the age of 13, first as an apprentice at the Old Book Shop in Bao'erqiao, Jiaxing. In the twenty-fifth year of Guangxu (1899), Jiang Xingxi came to Suzhou and decided to set up his own portal and found the "Literary Mountain House" bookstore. At this time, Suzhou was in the glory of the antique bookstore industry, which lasted until the early stage of the War of Resistance. The literary mountain house located at the mouth of Jiayufang Lane, Suzhou Hulong Street, has become famous in Jiangnan after two generations of operation.
Wuzhong has had many bibliophiles since ancient times, and the gathering and dispersion are impermanent, especially after experiencing various wars. The literary mountain house passed to Jiang Jinglan, the son of Jiang Xingxi, who was good at acquiring ancient books and received many books scattered by famous masters, such as Huang Pilie, Pan Zuyin, Mao Jin, Ye Changchi, Feng Guifen, Guan Ligeng, Xie Jiafu, Shen Bingcheng, Shan Zhen, Liu Zhisi and other famous masters.
Jiang Jinglan not only bought books and sold books, but also reprinted the collected book editions and published movable type books. For example, "Jiang's Juzhen Edition" has 4 episodes and 28 kinds. The original edition of this book is extremely precious, and it has to be photocopied and reprinted, thus becoming the unforgettable volume of many bibliophiles.
Jiang Chengbo was very interested in ancient books and old books, and had gone out with his grandfather and father many times to collect books. For the cultivation of books, Mr. Jiang Chengbo has cultivated a real skill, and at present, domestic book collectors and individual collectors are happy to turn to him when they encounter such "difficult and complicated diseases".
In the early 1950s, Jiang Chengbo began to participate in the compilation of his first book. The book, titled "Collection of Ming Carvings in the Literary Mountain House", is very small in number and caused a controversy after publication. Jiang Chengbo recalled that this book was inspired by the compilation of books by famous masters, especially the "Preliminary Compilation of Ming Dynasty Edition Engraving Catalogues" co-edited by Gu Tinglong and Pan Jingzheng. "I suppose it would be better if the fragments of the carved pages could be bound and explained?" Jiang Chengbo said.
At that time, Literature Mountain House had established a very good cooperative relationship with many famous artists, such as Zhang Taiyan, Li Gengen, Huang Bao, Ye Shengtao, Qian Mu, Gu Jiegang, Ah Ying, Zheng Zhenduo, Hu Sheng, etc. Jiang Chengbo visited Gu Jiegang at the Great China Book Bureau on North Sichuan Road in Shanghai and told him about the idea of publishing books in the bookstore. Gu Jiegang greatly appreciated it and expressed his willingness to write a preface to the book. Later, after the publication of this limited edition with Gu Tinglong's inscription and Gu Jiegang's foreword, most of them went into various libraries.
Gu Jiegang said in the preface: "Suzhou literature mountain house is the leader of the book forest, Jiang Junjinglan and his Wenlang Chengbo accumulated generations of learning, several dynasties are like family treasures, every time they see it, they seek it as they wish, so that the ancient books will not be slightly depressed." In recent years, the family has hidden a large number of arguments. The books obtained by Jiang Jun have been repeatedly fragmented. Accumulated over the years, one hundred and sixty kinds of carvings can be clearly engraved. What exists is not complete, and it is a pity to abandon it. The meaning of Yang's "Leaving True Genealogy" of Master Guan Hai Tang is to live separately and pretend to be more than thirty people, so that the study of the plate scholars can obtain the examination mirror of the physical object. Not the first engraving, that is, the ink color of the paper, is also clear at a glance. Its use in the province of ancient literature is far beyond the reproduction of the "Liu Zhen Genealogy", and it is a new compilation of bibliographic science. It must be the book, and look at it in conjunction with the edition catalogue, and the Ming generation carved the source of books, such as referring to the palms of the hand. ”
However, after the publication of this book, it also caused controversy over the "destruction of cultural relics", for which the famous bibliophile Mr. Wei Li once wrote a special article mentioning: "Some people have also written articles criticizing the book, saying that using physical objects to make books is to destroy cultural relics ... Later, in the rare book library of the Tianjin Library, I saw the "First Compilation of the Literary Mountain House Ming Carving Collection", and I thought that the book was indeed very well compiled, and the book was also very beautiful. Li Guoqing, director of the Shan Headquarters, praised the usefulness of the book, saying that looking at this kind of physical book is far more real than looking at photos, but unfortunately no one can continue. ”
Since this book, Jiang Chengbo has strengthened his determination to continue the business of ancient books. After the Literary Mountain House was incorporated into the Suzhou Antique Bookstore, he was still conscientious and traveled around for the country to search for rare books. His daughter Jiang Juanjuan also entered the industry, collecting books and repairing books, becoming a new generation of successors to the Jiang family's ancient book industry.
Keep rare books and make the most of them
From March 16th to the end of April, the "Special Exhibition of Rare Ancient Books of Suzhou City" participated in by the National Library of China (National Center for the Protection of Ancient Books) was exhibited at the Suzhou Library, attracting book fans from all over the country to visit the exhibition, and Jiang Chengbott congratulated by phone.
Some of the precious rare books in the collection of Suzhou Library have a deep relationship with him. For example, a Song engraved copy of "Rong Zhai Essay" is now in the Suzhou Library. According to Jiang Chengbo, the book was received by chance in 1973 by a resident of Qianganzi Lane, Suzhou. The author of this book is the Song Dynasty Jinshi Hongmai, for the fifth year of Song Jiading (1212) Jiangxi Zhanggong County Zhai edition, the font is strict, the writing is exquisite. This book is circulated in an orderly manner, followed by the inscription of the bibliophile Miao Quansun, and there are many imprints in the book, during which it was once flowed in Japan and later returned to the Zhang clan of Nanxun, Zhejiang.
In the early years, Jiang Chengbo went from house to house, "rescuing" ancient books in waste recycling stations and waste paper piles, and some books became rare versions of libraries. Some ancient books have also been preserved in the National Library, such as a volume of Mao's manuscript "Plum Blossom Gong", a volume of "Scissor Collection", a copy of the Southern Song Dynasty shed copy of the Jiguge Shadow, Mao Jin, Mao Shu, and Wang Shizhong, which are the same collectors as the Song edition of "Rong Zhai Essays" in the Suzhou Library. At that time, the national map originally contained Weng Tonggong's old Tibetan Mao manuscripts, but these books that Jiang Chengbo had passed on had the Tibetan seals of Mao Jin and Mao Shu's father and son, as well as the Mao Shu hand school copy, which should be said to be better than the original collection. This book was also affirmed by Mr. Zhao Wanli, an old expert in national map philology, for which he also had a long conversation with Jiang Chengbo in Suzhou.
Also praised by Zhao Wanli was a book, namely Niu Shuyu's "Shuowen XinFu Kao", a handwritten manuscript, with a personal annotation from the Qing Dynasty bibliophile Gu Qianli between the brows. This book was collected in the Ye clan of Dongshan in Suzhou in the early days of the founding of New China, and later given to the Suzhou Municipal Cultural Management Commission. In the early spring of 1962, Zhao Wanli traveled from Beijing to Suzhou to identify this book as a rare local document, which is now in the Suzhou Museum.
Qian Ying, the daughter of the bibliophile Ah Ying, is committed to the protection and promotion of Chinese Kunqu opera and Suzhou opera art, and when she edited the "Chronicle of Chinese Opera" (Jiangsu Volume), because of the lack of information at that time, she asked For Help jiang Chengbo, but she did not expect that the information in his hands was very rich, especially there were many rare historical materials from the Jiajing and Wanli years of the Ming Dynasty, as well as the Jiangnan opera materials of the late Ming Dynasty, which could be described as a great help. Jiang Chengbo also managed to find the opera relics and pictures from the Palace Museum and the Nanjing Museum, and took the initiative to help examine the mistakes of the same name of the ancient opera celebrities Li Rihua and Zhang Dafu, making the content compilation of the Jiangsu volume particularly accurate and plump. Qian Ying said that her father, Ah Ying, had established a deep friendship with Jiang Chengbo before his death, and after her father's 10,000 volumes of books were donated to the Wuhu Library, she had specially entrusted Mr. Jiang Chengbo to help sort out the bibliography. Jiang Chengbo has contributed to the collection of literature in cultural units such as Suzhou Museum, Xiqu Museum, Inscription Museum, Suzhou Library, etc. He always notifies public units as soon as he receives good books, hoping that they can stay in public cultural units and play their role in dissemination.
Jiang Chengbo still remembers the situation when he first received Song Ben. At that time, it was in a fishing rod shop on Renmin Road in Suzhou, consigned by a large family in Suzhou, and the book was called "Dong Lai Lu Tai Shi Anthology", which was published in the fourth year of Song Jiatai (1204). After he bought it, he quickly resold it to the Suzhou Cultural Management Association, which currently exists in the Suzhou Museum and has become a rare rare book in Suzhou's ancient books.
There are many similar things, such as the collection of books in Suzhou GuoyunLou. In 2012, the Song edition of "Splendid Valley of Ten Thousand Flowers" (partial) collected by Gu's GuoyunLou in Suzhou set a record of more than 200 million yuan on the auction floor. For this auction, Jiang Chengbo believes that some ancient books and rare books cannot be measured by monetary value, and he believes that they should be attributed to public cultural units, rather than displaying their value on the auction floor.
For another part of the Song edition, Mr. Jiang Chengbo recalled that in the early 1990s, he worked at the Suzhou Antique Bookstore. Liu Lin, then the main leader of Jiangsu Province, instructed: "We must leave the collection of books in Jiangsu", because the Books of the Gu Family's Collection of The Cloud Building were preserved by many people after the separation of the family, some of which were in the hands of the Gu Duhuang brothers in Suzhou, and the Nanjing Library had always wanted to buy them. Jiang Chengbo found Mr. Gu Duhuan, but the other party did not immediately agree. Later, Jiang Chengbo found Ms. Qian Ying to relay her opinions. Not long after, Gu Duhuan informed Jiang Chengbo to pick up the book, and the books of the Gu family in Shanghai were also transferred to the Nanjing Library, and the price was not high at that time. After the auction in 2012, Jiang Chengbo met Mr. Gu Duhuan by chance and said to him: "The thing I did at that time (giving the book to Nantu), now that I want to come, I am a little too unwilling to go." Gu Duhuan said: "If you don't have a boundary with me, the books will all be returned to Nantu, and you have not taken a penny from me." Jiang Chengbo said that it can be seen that the Gu Duhuang brothers all have patriotic feelings and are respected.
In addition to collecting precious books and historical materials for various units, Jiang Chengbo also paid attention to recording his own professional experience, and published books such as "Records of Ancient Inscribed Names and Scribes of Scriptures", "Jiangsu Movable Type Printing Books", and "Wumen Book Vendor Series", recording his own outline of ancient books, the rise and fall of Jiangnan bibliophiles, the biographies of Chinese bibliophiles, and the exchanges and correspondence with many famous bibliophiles. Now these books have been reprinted and sold well.
The bookstore is the eyebrow of the city
The literary mountain house was first opened by Jiang Xingxi with a loan of three hundred yuan, and the sale of books can only be said to be barely enough to survive, and the female relatives subsidize the family with embroidery. In the end, the literary mountain house opened a world in the Jiangnan region, and Xu Shichang also wrote a storefront plaque for the literary mountain house. Yang Shouqi, who used to run the Laiqingge Bookstore in Suzhou, recorded in the article "The Situation of Suzhou Bookstores Fifty Years Ago": "Until the Japanese invasion of China in 1937, only the literary mountain house of Jiangxingxi supported the old book industry in Suzhou. ”
In the face of war and social changes, the literary mountain house was once hidden and became part of the state-run bookstore, and Jiang Chengbo and his father both entered the Suzhou old bookstore to work. Later, Jiang Chengbo and his daughter worked in the antique bookstore for many years, collecting a large number of ancient books and rare books for the country, and providing precious historical materials for some research institutions and experts.
After entering the new century, Jiang Chengbo, who was already a rare year, decided to restore his old bookstore. Because of the heavy burden on his children and the grandchildren's college, he only wanted to increase his income to supplement the family. However, when taking the name of the store, it encountered a problem, because the literary mountain house had been merged into the old bookstore and could not be used, so it first took "Wenyu Mountain House" (Suzhou dialect homophone) as the name of the store, and then restored the original name. The site of the store was also finally fixed in the niujia lane in the ancient city area, opposite the former residence of the famous book collector Pan Shien (Zhuangyuan Museum). The store is not large, only more than 20 square meters, three or four rows of bookshelves, ancient books, contemporary books in the same room.
After years of operation by Jiang Chengbo, the new literary mountain house has gradually gained some fame in the industry. Jiang Chengbo sat in the bookstore, and whenever there were visitors who asked about the history of Suzhou or the book people's books, he always explained enthusiastically, including many celebrity anecdotes of the old book industry. For example, the historian Qian Mu once hid in the coupling garden to write the "Examination of Historical Geographical Names", and when he encountered the content to be quoted, he directly dug down the line-bound book and pasted it on the manuscript; for example, the famous scholar Gu Jiegang asked others to buy old books together, always asking others to choose first, and then the rest were all packed and bought...
Jiang Chengbo has a big book stored in his stomach, and he strives to introduce people to the legend of books and people in Suzhou Mandarin, and he enjoys it tirelessly. He also has a cute move, that is, to grab a handful of brown rice every day and feed it to the sparrows, a kind habit that has been adhered to for more than twenty years. He once compared the bookstore to the eyebrows of a city, saying that for a person, the eyebrows do not seem to be important, but without it, the facial features are boring to look at. Therefore, a city cannot live without bookstores, which may be the reason why he insists on opening stores.
In the industry for 80 years, Shusu has become an "Internet celebrity"
Today, Jiang Chengbo, who is 96 years old, has no obstacles to communicating with people except that his eyesight is not as good as before. Sometimes he sat alone at the table in the shop, silently collecting fragments of ancient books; sometimes he would sit in the doorway and look at the ever-changing surrounding buildings and streetscapes.
Readers from all over the world flocked to the audience. Some time ago, Mr. Jiang insisted on the deeds of the old bookstore on the foreign language newspaper, looking at his photos in the bookstore are surrounded by English sentences, Mr. Jiang like a child asked the young people to translate it. Later, this English report entered the English test paper of high school, which suddenly attracted the attention of many young people to the grandfather and the bookstore.
In April this year, university student reporters from the University Student Online Newspaper came to the Literature Mountain House to conduct social research. "This bookstore was handed down from my ancestors, and it has been passed down to me for the third generation, and it has been 122 years now." Jiang Chengbo once again patiently told his story with the bookstore, "I have been collecting ancient books, and after collecting them, I will repair, rebind, and then collect them." I've been doing this for a long time..." The students listened with relish, and seemed to be looking for a reason for an elderly man to stick to a traditional bookstore from the perspective of a new generation.
In recent years, many media have come to report the story of Jiang Chengbo's adherence to the long-established bookstore, and some emerging short video platforms and live broadcast platforms have also come to him to record programs, and people say that Mr. Jiang has become an Internet celebrity. Jiang Chengbo always smiled indifferently. When asked about the income of the bookstore, he said with some excitement that my most difficult time has passed, "I retired several thousand a month, and recently it has risen again, my children also have retirement security, and my grandchildren have worked and started a family. Now it's the best! "When the old man sells books, he will always intimately wipe a little bit of a little bit on the discount, if it is a regular customer who comes to repair ancient books, he only symbolically collects some labor costs."
The Literary Mountain House, in the bustling center of Suzhou, although it seems a little lonely, there are still three or four old bookstores around, and its existence is, to some extent, a landscape.
After Returning to Shenzhen with Jiang Chengbo's thick books, Hu Hongxia and his wife were still excited, and Hu Hongxia wrote a special article to record the reunion:
Fourteen years ago, I bought the first paperback signature version at the Suzhou Literature Mountain House. At that time, Mr. Jiang Chengbo was eighty-two, full of red light, calm and relaxed, sitting in front of a wall of line-bound books, quietly watching the traffic in the alley, like a high-ranking person who had left behind. This time, I hurriedly re-crossed the mountain house, and saw that Mr. Jiang's face did not add many traces of the flow of time. Talking about the world's personnel is still so far-sighted, talking about what is seen in front of you, the news is still so well-informed, the only thing that has not changed much is that a mouthful of "SuPu" is still easy to hear and understand. When he signed every book I bought, he wrote "Old Man Nine-Six." When he wrote these words, he must have been indifferent and happy.