HOME AND IMAGINED STAGE IN DING YAOKANG’S HUAREN YOU (Ramblings with Magicians): THE COMMUNAL READING OF A SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY PLAY

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size

Notes

1 The original literal meaning of zaju is “variety show,” but that is more appropriate to earlier versions of the form in which a variety of unrelated acts were performed together on a program. In the Yuan (1279–1368) and early Ming (1368–1644) dynasties zaju were integrated plays typically comprised of four acts organized around song-suites using “northern” music and with rather stringent rules of composition and performance. Around the time that this genre declined as a performance art and instead began to be published widely in edited form as reading material, playwrights began to experiment with the genre by loosening the rules and incorporating elements from the main “southern” dramatic genre, chuanqi 傳奇 drama. In Ming and Qing writing on drama, the terms zaju and chuanqi are used loosely and sometimes interchangeably. We will see that the printed edition of Huaren you actually calls it a chuanqi play at the same time that its prefatory matter cautions that it is not a typical chuanqi.

2 The term huaren first appears in the “King Mu of Zhou” (“Zhou Muwang” 周穆王) chapter of Liezi 列子: “In the reign of King Mu of Zhou, a magician came from a kingdom in the far west” 周穆王時, 西極之國有化人來. See Yang Bojun 楊伯峻, ed., Liezi jishi 列子集釋 (Collected explications edition of Liezi; Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1979), juan 3, p. 90. The only English publication to treat the play, Wilt L. Idema, “‘Crossing the Sea in a Leaking Boat’: Three Plays by Ding Yaokang,” in Wilt L. Idema, Wai-yee Li, and Ellen Widmer, eds., Trauma and Transcendence in Early Qing Literature (Cambridge: Harvard University, 2006), pp. 387–426, translates the title as Ramblings with Magicians and I have followed that usage. But it is also possible to take the title as referring to the main character of the play as a huaren (transformed [i.e., enlightened] one), although, as we shall see, the process of his “enlightenment” is not a simple or straightforward one.

3 These include Cao Zhi 曹植 (192–232), Liu Zhen 劉禎 (?–217), Li Bo 李白 (701–762), and Du Fu 杜甫 (712–770).

4 These include the royal/imperial consorts/empresses Xishi 西施 (5th cent. B.C.), Zhao Feiyan 趙飛燕 (45–1 B.C.), and Zhang Lihua 張麗華 (560–589); women that Ding identifies as courtesans: Lu Mochou 盧莫愁 (6th cent. A.D.) and Xue Tao 薛濤 (768–831); one that he identifies as a talented maid of Wang Xianzhi 王獻之 (344–831): Taoye 桃葉; and Lingbo 凌波, who for a variety of reasons the reader does not get much information about in the play, but who might be a water nymph from Cao Zhi’s “Fu on the Goddess of the Luo River” (“Luoshen fu” 洛神賦).

5 These include Cheng Lian 成連, legendary qin-zither master from the Warring States period (475–221), and Zuo Ci 左慈 and Wang Yang 王陽 of the Later Han–Three Kingdoms period (25–265).

6 Only one: Kunlun nu 崑崙奴 (The Kunlun Slave) of the story of the same title from Pei Xing’s 裴鉶 (825–880) collection of tales titled Chuanqi 傳奇 (Transmission of the strange). Pei’s collection did not survive intact, but this and other stories from it were included in Taiping guangji 太平廣記 (Comprehensive records of the reign period Great Peace; 981).

7 Qu Yuan was a very important cultural figure in late imperial China. See He Guangtao 何光濤, “Yuan Ming Qing Qu Yuan xi kaolun” 元明清屈原戲考論 (On the Qu Yuan plays of the Yuan, Ming, and Qing; Ph.D. diss., Sichuan shifan daxue, 2012).

8 The image of the ocean being superseded by mulberry fields is an established metaphor for the vicissitudes of human affairs, especially change of dynastic rule.

9 Wang Ayling 王璦玲, “Luanli yu guishu—Qingchu wenren juzuojia zhi yishi bianqian yu kuajie xiangxiang” 亂離與歸屬—清初文人劇作家之意識變遷與跨界想像 (Diaspora and belonging—The transformation of consciousness and boundary-crossing imagination in early Qing literati plays), Wen yu zhe 文與哲 (Literature and philosophy) 14 (2009): 177–88.

10 Shi Ling argues that in Ramblings with Magicians< Ding projects his struggle to come to terms with the Manchu government: “The author is just using the absurd plot to expose the corrupt reality, in order to vent his indignation against matters of this world” 作者只是借荒誕的情節, 揭露現實的腐敗, 表示自己的憤世之情而已. See Shi Ling 石玲, “Ding Yaokang juzuo lun” 丁耀亢劇作論 (On Ding Yaokang’s plays), in Li Zengpo 李增坡, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu: Haixia liang’an Ding Yaokang xueshu yantaohui lunwen ji 丁耀亢硏究: 海峽兩岸丁耀亢學術研討會論文集 (Research on Ding Yaokang: Collection of papers from the cross-straits academic conference on Ding Yaokang; Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji, 1998), p. 223.

11 It becomes clear from the other signature of Gong Dingzi translated below that Huainan is the name of a poetry club.

12 “Preface to Ramblings with Magicians” (“Huayou xu” 化遊序), in Ramblings with Magicians, photo-reprint of the original edition in Guben xiqu congkan wu ji 古本戲曲叢刊五集 (Collected rare editions of Chinese drama, fifth series; Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1986), pp. 3a–b. The play is also available in a typeset version in Li Zengpo 李增坡, ed., Ding Yaokang quanji 丁耀亢全集 (Collected works of Ding Yaokang), 3 vols. (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji, 1999), hereafter Quanji, 1: 703–37, but citations of the play will be to the photo-reprint.

13 Carefree Ramblings consists of five sections: “Ramblings at Mt. Tai” (“Dai you” 岱遊); “Ramblings on the Sea” (“Hai you” 海遊); “Ramblings on the River” (“Jiang you” 江遊); “Ramblings in the Old Mountain” (“Gushan you” 故山遊); and “Ramblings in Wuling.” “Ramblings at Mt. Tai” is a collection of poems composed during the author’s visit to Mt. Tai with his friends in the second month of the autumn of the yihai year (1635). The poems in “Ramblings on the River” are from the spring and summer of the jimao year (1639), when the author traveled to the south in search of an alternative place to live. The poems in “Ramblings on the Sea” were written during the author’s flight to the sea in the following years: jimao (1639), renwu (1642), kuiwei (1643), jiashen (1644), and yiyou (1645). The poems in “Ramblings in the Old Mountain” span from the kuiyou year (1633) to the dinghai year (1647). They focus on the author’s life at his estate in the mountains.

14 “Preface to Carefree Ramblings” (“Xiaoyao you xu” 逍遙遊序), photo-reprint in Siku quanshu cunmu congshu 四庫全書存目叢書 (Collection of works mentioned but not included in the Imperial Quadripartite Library; Jinan: Qi Lu shushe, 1997), Vol. 235 of the ji 集 (belle-lettres) section, p. 8b. There is a typeset version in Quanji, 1: 629–702, but citations will be to the photo-reprint. Citations to Ding’s other poetry collections will also be to this volume of Siku quanshu cunmu congshu, hereafter Cunmu.

15 Carefree Ramblings, pp. 2/48a-b (references to the play will include the act number before the slash; elsewhere the number before the slash will be the juan or chapter number); Quanji, 1: 701.

16 For a short biography of Li Changke, see Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯 et al., eds., Zhongguo wenxuejia da cidian Qingdai juan 中國文學家大辭典清代卷 (Big dictionary of Chinese writers, Qing dynasty section; Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1996), p. 275.

17 The title of the collection draws upon Tao Qian’s 陶潛 (365–427) poem “Begging for Food” (“Qishi” 乞食).

18 The term “straw sandals” (qingxie 青鞋) refers to the recluse who distances himself from public service.

19 These are ten mythical isles where immortals were said to reside.

20 Carefree Ramblings, p. 2/49b and “Preface,” Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 2a–b.

21 The “Five Peaks” are the five sacred mountains (one each in the north, south, east, west, and center). Yingzhou is one of three islands (floating mountains, actually) supposed to be off the east coast of China where immortals dwelled.

22 “Cinnabar Hill” (Danqiu 丹丘) is a place where immortals were thought to dwell.

23 Carefree Ramblings, p. 2/49a.

24 Much study has been devoted to the deliverance play in terms of its structure. Li Huimian 李惠綿 divides the Buddhist deliverance play into two major types: one premised on the exterior power of the deliverer, and one on the protagonist’s own achievement of superior understanding. See Li Huimian, “Lunxi Yuandai Fojiao dutuo ju—Yi Fojiao ‘du’ yu ‘jietuo’ gainian wei quanshi guandian” 論析元代佛教度脫劇—以佛教 “度” 與 “解脫” 概念為詮釋觀點 (On the deliverance plays of the Yuan dynasty—Focusing on the concepts of du and jietuo in Buddhism), Foxue yanjiu zhongxin xuebao 佛學研究中心學報 (Journal of the Center for Research on Buddhism) 6 (2001): 276. Although the term dutuo originally comes from the Buddhist concept of delivering sentient beings from the bitterness of samsara, there are many explicitly Daoist deliverance plays. See Zhao Lingxia 趙玲霞, “Yi Quanzhen jiao ticai kan zongjiao ju zhong de ‘dutuo’ moshi” 以全真教題材看宗教劇中的 “度脫” 模式 (Looking at the dutuo model in religious plays according to Quanzhen material in them), Nanchang gaozhuan xuebao 南昌高專學報 (Journal of Nanchang Technical School) 2009·3: 50–51. For a discussion of the term dutuo, see Zhao Youmin 趙幼民, “Yuan zaju zhong de dutuo ju [shang]” 元雜劇中的度脫劇 (上) (Deliverance plays in Yuan drama [part 1]), in Wenxue pinglun diwuji 文學評論第五集 (Literary criticism volume 5; Taipei: Shuping shumu, 1978): p. 154. Wilt L. Idema, The Dramatic Oeuvre of Chu Yu-tun (1379–1439) (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1985), p. 63, has pointed out that the deliverance play was a thematic subgenre of Yuan and Ming zaju and central to the plot of such a play is “the conflict between the persistent deliverer and the reluctant convert.”

25 Xuanzhenzi is the religious name of Zhang Zhihe 張志和 (c. 730–c. 810), who abandoned his official career and became a Daoist recluse and is known both as a poet and a fisherman. He was not a native of Wuling 武陵 (near homophone for the Wuling where Ding Yaokang “rambled”). Cheng Lian’s reference to him as “the fisherman from Wuling” conflates Zhang Zhihe with the anonymous fisherman in Tao Qian’s “Taohua yuan ji” 桃花源記 (The story of the Peach Blossom Spring) who is able to find the utopia at the spring but not to return to it.

26 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 1/2b.

27 In many deliverance plays, the person the immortals have decided to deliver is someone who was previously a transcendant being but who succumbed to temptation and became ensnared by worldly desires (a “banished immortal”).

28 It is not clear why Ding Yaokang made the full, formal name of the play Huaren you ciqu. In common usage today ciqu 詞曲 refers to two kinds of poetry that used uneven line lengths (as opposed to shi 詩 poetry, which did not). It is possible Ding was using the term to highlight the fact that the play uses both southern songs (nanci 南詞) and northern tunes (beiqu 北曲). To speak of the arias as if they were the most important thing in a play was common enough. Li Yu’s 李漁 (1611–1680) favorite term for play writing, tianci 填詞, likewise stresses the arias over everything else.

29 “General Comments,” Ramblings with Magicians, separate pagination, pp. 1a–b.

30 Gong Dingzi’s preface is also a reproduction of his own handwriting, while Song Wan’s “Zongping” appears to be written in the same more standard-print style as the bulk of the play, only larger. The Qiu Chaicun comment to act 5 also seems to be written in that same style and not in his handwriting.

31 Ding Yaokang repeatedly mentioned his friendship with Lu Xuansheng in the years after the publication of Huaren you. For example, a 1652 poem written in response to a poem from Lu (included in the collection Lufang shicao 陸舫詩草 [Scribbles of poems from a Boat Stranded on the Land], Cunmu, p. 4/36a; Quanji 1: 159) mentions that they have been parted for six years. In the first of two poems for Lu in his posthumously printed Guishan cao 歸山草 (Scribbles after my return to the mountains), which includes poems composed from 1662 to 1666, he describes the two of them as “old friends” and recalls when they were together in Hailing (Cunmu, pp. 2/78b–79a; Quanji, 1: 494).

32 Zhang Cichen was a provincial graduate (xiaolian 孝廉) from Wuling. His home, Orange Garden (Juyuan 橘園), was one of the gathering places of the local literati community of which Ding Yaokang was a member. For a poem that Ding wrote to Zhang (and another friend), see the “Ramblings in Wuling” section of Carefree Ramblings, p. 2/2a; Quanji, 1: 697.

33 Haishi is the hao 號 (sobriquet) of Qiu Shichang 丘石常 (zi Zilin 子廩, 1607–1661), who was from Ding Yaokang’s native place, Zhucheng, Shandong. For a brief biography of Qiu Shichang, see Qian Zhonglian et al., eds., Wenxuejia da cidian, pp. 122–23. Ding Yaokang maintained a close friendship with Qiu Shichang and his brother Qiu Yuchang 丘玉常 (zi Ziru 子如).

34 Chaicun is the hao of Qiu Zhiguang 丘志廣 (1595–1677), father of Qiu Shichang and Qiu Yuchang. In Ding Yaokang’s poetry collection Ting shan ting cao 聽山亭草 (Scribbles from the Pavilion where I Listen to the Mountains), which includes Ding Yaokang’s poems from 1667 to 1669, is a poem of parting that Ding wrote to Chaicun when the latter was 73 (Cunmu, p. 3/30a; Quanji, 1: 539).

35 In his prefatory remarks to “Jiangnan shiyu” 江南詩餘 (Ci poems composed in Jiangnan), a set of five ci (lyric songs) appended at the end of “Ramblings on the River” section in Carefree Ramblings, Ding Yaokang claimed that he himself does not know much about the prosody for such poems but that Zhong Yishi and another friend of his are well-versed in southern songs and northern tunes (ciqu: the same term appended at the end of the title of Huaren you). See Cunmu, p. 2/9a; Quanji, 1: 673.

36 Yushu is the zi of Song Wan, whose “General Comments” to Ramblings with Magicians has already been mentioned. For a biography, see Qian Zhonglian et al., eds., Wenxuejia da cidian, pp. 381–83.

37 Robert Darnton, “What is the History of Books?” Daedalus 111·3 (1982): 67, describes the life cycle of printed books as a “communication circuit that runs from the author to the publisher (if the bookseller does not assume that role), the printer, the shipper, the bookseller, and the reader.”

38 As opposed to the first play that Ding began but the second one that he finished and published, Ramblings with Red Pine (Chisong you 赤松遊; completed in 1649), which contains three prefatory pieces by Ding (see Quanji, 1: 804–807) and no comments from friends, Huaren you does not feature a prefatory piece in which Ding speaks to the reader as author.

39 Unfortunately, only one of Ding’s poems, the one that mentions the play in its title that has already been mentioned, bears directly on the play or its production and consumption. But Ding did write about other communal literary activities undertaken with his friends in Wuling. For example, there is a poem with this title: “The First Day after the Beginning of Autumn, [We] Gathered at Zhang Cichen’s Orange Hut Where We Played Chess and Read Together his New Song Composition ‘Song on the Green Bower’” 立秋一日, 集張詞臣橘菴對弈, 共閱新譜 “青樓曲,” in the “Ramblings in Wuling” section of Carefree Ramblings, Cunmu, p. 2/45b; Quanji, 1: 700. There is a case of a collective commentary on a work of fiction. Lü Xiong’s 呂熊 (c. 1640–c. 1722) Nüxian waishi 女仙外史 (Informal history of the female immortal; 1711), was published with comments from as many as 65 of the author’s friends. See David L. Rolston, “Formal Aspects of Fiction Criticism and Commentary in China,” in idem., ed., How to Read the Chinese Novel (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), pp. 68–69.

40 While costume plots were compiled for use in scripts for palace productions in the Ming and Qing dynasties, they did not tend to indicate which role-type a character belonged to. Play scripts preserved from the Qing palace and then the commercially produced collections of zhezi xi 折子戲 (extracted highlight scenes) that began to appear in the middle of the Qing dynasty might give details about costume the first time a character appeared but do not provide a separate costume plot. Printed editions produced primarily for reading after Ding Yaokang’s time can include lists of characters divided according to role-type and other considerations such as those found in Kong Shangren’s 孔尚任 (1648–1718) Peach Blossom Fan (Taohua shan 桃花扇; 1708) and the “Three Wives of Wu Wushan” commentary to Peony Pavilion (Wu Wushan sanfu heping Mudan ting 吳吳山三婦合評牡丹亭; 1694), but they do not mention costume. This being the case, for Ding Yaokang to include both role-type and costume in a separate prefatory list is quite unusual. On modern costume plots and a comparison of one example with two productions of the play it was compiled for, see Alexandra B. Bonds, Beijing Opera Costumes: The Visual Communication of Character and Culture (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2008), pp. 250–60 and 275–97.

41 For example, Cheng Lian is actually assigned to be performed by a jing 淨 actor in the play instead of a wai 外 actor, as in the “costume plot.” Although the jing actor originally played chiefly comic roles, over time the more comic characters were played by chou 丑 actors and the jing actors tended to play more serious characters of some stature who might be either morally upright or corrupt, and who tended to have something extreme about them. The wai is a secondary male role often used to play dignified characters of some social status.

42 Missing from this list are: the boatman who is supposed to be the fisherman from Wuling in disguise, the Fish-Intestine Swordsman (Yuchang jianshi 魚腸劍士), the giant turtle sprite (aojing 鰲精), King Fishbone (Yugu dawang 魚骨大王), and the Tibetan monk (Xifan seng 西番僧).

43 The prefatory piece is entitled “Xiaotai ou zhu cili shuze” 嘯台偶著詞例數則 (Several principles for play composition written at random at the Platform for Whistling) and the play it prefaced was Ramblings with Red Pine, which is a play about a historical figure. The prefatory piece is very often collected, along with another one (signed 1649) that Ding wrote for the play, in anthologies of traditional writing on drama. The play that Ding was commissioned to write for the court was also to be about an historical figure, Yang Jisheng 楊繼盛 (1516–1565). He completed the play in 1657 but it was rejected for imperial patronage because of its content rather than its craftsmanship or performability. He ended up publishing it on his own in 1659. On Ding’s play, and a play commissioned on the same topic that did receive imperial patronage, see Cheng Huaping 程華平, Ming Qing chuanqi biannian shigao 明清傳奇編年史稿 (A draft chronological history of chuanqi drama in the Ming and Qing; Jinan: Qi Lu shushe, 2008), pp. 284–87.

44 The title of the set of poems is “Wen Wang shangshu Juesi bingqi yue kan Huaren you ju ershou” 問王尚書覺斯病起約看化人遊劇二首 (Hearing that Minister Wang Juesi [Wang Duo 王鐸 (1592–1652)] has recovered from his illness, I set up an appointment to watch the play Ramblings with Magicians: Two poems) and they are included in the section collecting poems from 1648–1649 in Ding’s Lufang shi cao, Cunmu, pp. 1/41a–b; Quanji, 1: 49. Ding was in Beijing at the time.

45 Contrary to typical chuanqi practice, which presumed a small troupe with only one actor specializing in each role-type, in Ramblings with Magicians more than one character played by the same role-type actor appears on the stage at the very same time. When this happens, steps are often (but not always!) taken to distinguish such characters from each other in the stage directions by adding the character’s surname after the role-type name, or just using the character’s surname.

46 The first item of information given about the characters in the “costume plot” is actually the time period they lived in. The exceptions are He sheng, the two courtesans, Lingbo (for whom no information is given; under her name there is only a moding 墨丁 [a black space that is produced when the original woodblock is changed but no new text is inserted; see left side of fig. 1]), and the “mythological” characters. Before going on to speak of costume, etc., something is also typically said about what the person was famous for.

47 The exceptions are the two imperial consorts, Zhao Feiyan and Zhang Lihua, both played by tiedan 貼旦 (secondary female role) actors, both wearing heavy make-up (yanzhuang 艷妝) and embroidered palace robes (gong xiupao 宮綉袍); the two courtesans, Lu Mochou and Xue Tao, both played by xiaodan 小旦 (secondary female lead) actors, both wearing courtesan-style make-up (jizhuang 妓妝) and dancing garb (wuyi 舞衣/wushan 舞衫); and two of the poets, Du Fu and Liu Zhen, who both wear an edged soft scholar’s cap (jiaojin 角巾) and a plain robe (sufu 素服), but who are played by different role-type actors.

48 Jie 劫 (kalpa) can either refer to a very long period of time or the mass destruction that was thought to bring such a kalpa to an end.

49 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 3/19b. Zhang devotes the rest of his comment to the literati games played by the party on the boat.

50 Jing 精 are non-human creatures (or even things) that have attained powers such as the ability to appear as humans through self-cultivation.

51 See comments on this role-type in the footnotes above.

52 “Make-up and Costumes for the Characters,” Ramblings with Magicians, p. 2a. When the whale is first mentioned in the play itself, he is referred to as “General Whale” (Jing jiangjun 鯨將軍), p. 4/20b (at this point he is also said to be “good at swallowing boats” [shan neng tun zhou 善能吞舟]).

53 Lord Macartney, for example, described in detail a mechanical spouting whale that was for him the climax of a theatrical performance he was invited to witness by the Qianlong emperor (r. 1736–1795). Ye Xiaoqing, Ascendant Peace in the Four Seas: Drama and the Qing Imperial Court (Hong Kong: Chinese University of Hong Kong Press, 2012), pp. 88–92, describes how she found the script used that day and how it had been especially amended by the Qianlong emperor to refer to Macartney’s mission, and how the whole point, unbeknownst to Macartney, was that the sea route back home for him threatened by a huge sea tortoise had been pacified. The first part of the title of Ye’s book is the name of this play. For an old photo of a movable prop used in the palace to represent a huge fish that could hold several actors inside it, see Zhao Yang 趙楊, Qingdai gongting yanxi 清代宮廷演戲 (Palace theatrical performances in the Qing dynasty; Beijing: Zijin cheng, 1999), p. 16.

54 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 4/22a–b.

55 David Rolston, in a section entitled “Control of Punctuation by Commentators” in “Formal Aspects of Fiction Criticism and Commentary in China,” writes: “The marking of a text for reading and emphasis was called quandian 圈點 (adding circles and dots) …” (p. 47; original romanization changed to pinyin). This important tool used by commentators and editors has tended to be neglected because modern typeset editions only very rarely try to reproduce it. A project to produce a book with translations in English of representative selections from commentary editions of traditional Chinese fiction and drama that reflects the use of emphatic punctuation in the original is being compiled and edited by Stephen H. West and Xiaoqiao Ling.

56 The major exceptions come when an act begins with a lengthy section of dialogue, as for instance, the opening of Act 4, where both tear-drops and circles are used for punctuation and highlighting.

57 This kind of contrast works out differently in different parts of the play. For example, in Act 6, He sheng’s baffled spoken remarks are highlighted with dots, while his arias, which invite a doctrinal reading in light of Buddhist enlightenment, are highlighted with circles.

58 Neither gua 刮 (scrape) nor its homophone 颳 (blow) seems right here, but have the advantage of being in the right rhyme-category.

59 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 4/21b–22a. In the original, the interjection “Ya ya ya” is given in the same size characters as the aria text. In the first chapter of the Zhuangzi 莊子, “Carefree Rambling” (“Xiaoyao you” 逍遙遊), the story of how the huge kun fish transforms into the equally huge peng bird and flies from the northern sea to the southern sea is told twice, once at the very beginning and again in the middle. We have seen that one of Ding’s poetry collections shares the name of this chapter. In the entire chapter in the Zhuangzi, the word jia 駕 (chariot) does not appear. Perhaps it appears in the aria primarily because it belongs to the right rhyme-category.

60 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 4/24a.

61 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 4/22b. Song wang 宋王 (King of Song) is perhaps a mistake for Song Yu 宋玉 (c. 290–c. 223), to whom is attributed the classical accounts of King Xiang of Chu’s tryst with a goddess. That goddess does not appear in the party that rambles on the large boat in the play, but Lingbo is a somewhat similar figure.

62 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 4/24a.

63 The reference is probably to the passage in the “Discussion on Making All Things Equal” (“Qiwu lun” 齊物論) chapter of the Zhuangzi in which a figure claims that the “perfect man” cannot be burned or chilled, is beyond life and death and profit and loss, and not frightened by howling gales stirring the sea.

64 After he exits and before he returns there is a highlighted stage direction: “JING, playing the whale sprite, acts out secretly peeking” 凈扮鯨精暗窺科 (Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 4/21a–b).

65 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 4/21b.

66 The first thing He sheng says after being “swallowed” is “How dark the sky is!” 天好黑也.

67 The night of the last day of the year is when the monster Xi 夕 wanders around seeking its prey.

68 Ding Yaokang claimed that he was a reincarnation of an earlier figure surnamed Ding who transformed into a crane. “Wild Crane Ding” (Ding Yehe 丁野鶴) was one of his favorite pennames. On the cover page of the original woodblock edition of Ramblings with Magicians, the play is described as “The private play edition from Wild Crane Studio” (Yehe zhai chuanqi miben 野鶴齋傳奇秘本). In both Qiu’s comment and on the cover page, an alternate form for he 鶴 (隺) is used.

69 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 4/24a–b. The reference to ravines and boats will be addressed below.

70 On this term, see Heinrich Dumoulin, Zen Buddhism: A History, Volume Two: Japan (Bloomington, Indiana: World Wisdom, 2005), p. 382.

71 There was supposed to be an entrance to Hell at this place.

72 The association of breathing and music here is reminiscent of the description of the different pipings (lai 籟) produced by the air moving through the openings of Heaven, Earth, and Man at the beginning of the “Discussion on Making All Things Equal” chapter of the Zhuangzi.

73 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 4/22b–23a.

74 In the “The Great and Venerable Teacher” (“Da zongshi” 大宗師) chapter, the idea of hiding a boat in a ravine in order to keep it safe is ridiculed (a strong man will just come along in the night and carry it away). Guo Xiang comments: “As for strength that comes from not exerting strength, none is greater than that of change and transformation. … The world is completely new already, but you believe that you are [the same as in the] past. The boat daily changes, but you look at it as if it were [the same as the] old one. … Therefore the self of the past is no longer the self of today. The self and this moment both depart, how can one constantly hold on to the past?” 夫無力之力, 莫大於變化者也. … 世皆新矣, 而自以為故; 舟日易矣, 而視之若舊…. 故向者之我, 非復今我也. 我與今俱往, 豈常守故哉! See Guo Qingfan 郭慶藩 (1844–1896) comp., Zhuangzi jishi 莊子集釋 (Collected explications of Zhuangzi), Wang Xiaoyu 王孝魚, ed. (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1961), p. 243.

75 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 4/23b.

76 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 4/22b.

77 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 5/28b–29a.

78 The word for whale, jingju 鯨魚, contains two “fish” (yu 魚).

79 Idema, “Crossing the Sea in a Leaking Boat,” p. 416.

80 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 7/36a.

81 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 7/33a. Translation from Idema, “Crossing the Sea in a Leaking Boat,” p. 420.

82 Idema, “Crossing the Sea in a Leaking Boat,” p. 420, comments: “The first line, with its evocation of the brightness of the moon and an empire clad in white, may well suggest the notion of mourning for the Ming dynasty. The second line might then imply that after the destruction of the flood, the whole world now belongs to the Qing. …”

83 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 7/34a.

84 The human and heavenly realms are both parts of the six realms of existence (liudao 六道) in Buddhism.

85 This refers to the practice of inner alchemy (neidan 內丹) in order to restore pristine Oneness. See Fabrizio Pregadio, ed., The Encyclopedia of Taoism (London: Routledge, 2008), pp. 762–66.

86 This refers to the Buddhist view of the cosmos with Mt. Sumeru (Xumi shan 須彌山) at the center, and the rest of the world divided into four main continents: Pūrvideha 東勝神州, Jambudvipa 南瞻部洲, Apara-godāniya 西牛貨洲, and Uttara-Kuru 北俱盧洲.

87 This refers to the mythical diagram brought forth from the Yellow River (Hetu 河圖) mentioned in the “Commentary on the Appended Phrases” (“Xici zhuan” 繫辭傳) of the Book of Changes (Yijing 易經).

88 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 5/25a.

89 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 5/26a. At the end of Tao Qian’s preface to “Peach Blossom Spring” he says that after a certain person, there were none who asked after the ford (i.e., the way to the utopia found by the fisherman).

90 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 5/29b.

91 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 5/29b.

92 The prologue and all ten of the acts have four-character titles.

93 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 8/37b. Yusai 魚腮 (fish gill) is probably a pun on yu 欲 (desire) and se 色 (sex/form).

94 The well-known metaphor of the Samādhi of Oceanic Reflection (haiyin sanmei 海印三昧) well illustrates the Dharma world of totality. Fazang 法藏 (643–712), Huayan youxin fajie ji 華嚴遊心法界記 (Reflections on the Dharmadhātu; T45·646b–c), says: “It is like reflection of the four divisions [of a great army] on a vast ocean. Although the reflected images differ in kind, they appear simultaneously on [the surface of] the ocean in their proper order. Even though the appearance of the images is manifold, the water [that reflects them] remains undisturbed. The images are indistinguishable from the water, and yet [the water] is calm and clear; the water is indistinguishable from the images, and yet [the images] are multifarious …” 猶如大海現四兵像, 像類各差, 頓現前後. 然即像形非一, 水竟不殊, 像即水而湛然, 水即像而繁雜. … The translation is from Peter Gregory, Tsung-mi and the Sinification of Buddhism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), p. 155. For more on the metaphor, see Garma C. Chang, The Buddhist Teaching of Totality: The Philosophy of Hwa Yen Buddhism (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1971), pp. 124–26, and on the Huayan 華嚴 philosophy of totality, see Kengo Araki 荒木見悟, Fojiao yu rujiao 佛教與儒教 (Buddhism and Confucianism), Liao Zhaoheng 廖肇亨, tr. and annot. (Taipei: Lianjing chuban shiye, 2008), Chapter 1, pp. 9–92.

95 For details, see Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 9/38a–b.

96 This refers to compassion in the Buddhist sense, and reinforces the Buddhist message discussed above.

97 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 9/42a.

98 Buddhist teachings are typically compared to showers of flower petals.

99 The Fusang tree is where the sun is believed to rise. See Yuan Ke 袁珂, annot., Shanhai jing jiaozhu 山海經校注 (The Classic of Mountains and Seas collated and annotated; Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1980), p. 260.

100 The term “illusory ants” most certainly refers to the ant kingdom in Li Gongzuo’s 李公佐 (770?–850?) “The Prefect of Nanke” (“Nanke taishou zhuan” 南柯太守傳).

101 In the “King Mu of Zhou” chapter of the Liezi, a man selling firewood from Zheng hides a deer underneath banana leaves. Later, failing to locate the spot where he hid the deer, he believes the event happened in a dream and goes home talking to himself about the event. Another person, who overhears his account, follows his words and finds the deer. This second person then cannot decide whether the man selling firewood had a dream that is real, or if he dreamt of the firewood seller who dreams about the deer. Later the man selling firewood has another dream about the place where he hid the deer, and also a dream about the second man getting the deer. He then seeks out the second person and the two ask others to judge the case. The first judgment, that the two are to split the deer, is not accepted; the second judgment is that it is impossible to decide what was dreamed and what was not. See Yang Bojun, ed., Liezi jishi, pp. 3/107–108.

102 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 1/3a–b.

103 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 1/4b. The sentence about not finding this kind of person in the world today is highlighted with circles.

104 That Zhu Mu 朱穆 wrote a work with this title is mentioned in his biography in chapter 43 of Fan Ye’s 范曄 (398–445) Hou Hanshu 後漢書 (History of the Later Han dynasty), but it did not survive intact as a separate work. It is most widely known through a later work, Liu Jun’s 劉峻 (462–521) “Guang Juejiao lun” 廣絕交論 (Expansion of A Treatise on Severing Acquaintanceship). The topic was popular at the time. Ji Kang’s 嵇康 (223–263) “Yu Shan Juyuan juejiao shu” 與山巨源絕交書 (Letter to sever acquaintanceship with Shan Juyuan [Shan Tao 山濤]) is well known.

105 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 1/7b.

106 The mysterious sea is located in the north. This is where the yin and yang forces converge. See the “Precepts on Geomorphs” (“Zhuixing xun” 墜形訓) chapter in He Ning 何寧, ed., Huainan zi jishi 淮南子集釋 (Collected explications of the Huainan zi; Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1998), p. 4/377.

107 Yingzhou 瀛洲, along with the more famous Penglai 蓬萊, was an island in the sea thought to be the home of immortals.

108 According to the “Questions of [King] Tang” (“Tang wen” 湯問) chapter in the Liezi, the mountainous islands in the sea where the immortals lived (these include Yingzhou and Penglai) were floating up and sinking and huge sea turtles were enlisted to support them with their heads. But a giant hooked three of them on his fishing pole and took them away, resulting in the loss of two of the mountainous islands. See Yang Bojun, ed., Liezi jishi, pp. 5/152–54.

109 In the biography of Zhang Zhihe, the emperor bequeathed him a servant lad and a maid, whom Zhihe made husband and wife. The wife’s name is Qiaoqing. See Zhang’s biography in chapter 196 of Ouyang Xiu 歐陽修 (1007–1072) and Song Qi’s 宋祁 (998–1061) New History of the Tang (Xin Tangshu 新唐書).

110 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 1/6b.

111 The “banishment” (zhe 謫) typically happens when an immortal gets distracted by worldly pleasures and desires and is incarnated in the mortal world. The concept comes up in the play most explicitly when Taoye and Lingbo first appear, pp. 2/8a–b.

112 Zhao Ye’s 趙曄 (fl. first cent. A.D.), Annals of Wu and Yue (Wu Yue chunqiu 吳越春秋; Jinan: Qi Lu shushe, 2000), p. 84, identifies her as the daughter of a woodcutter in the Ninglou Mountains.

113 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 2/9a.

114 Annals of Wu and Yue does not provide any account of what happened to Xishi in the end. Later versions of how she ended her days vary but a popular one had it that she sailed away on the lakes with her lover, Fan Li 范蠡.

115 Hede was Zhao Feiyan’s younger sister, who became an imperial consort.

116 Feiyan means, literally, “Flying Swallow.” The children’s ditty (tongyao 童謠) Xishi refers to and believed to have revealed the true deeds of Zhao Feiyan and her sister can be found in the “Treatise on the Five Phases” (“Wuxing zhi” 五行志) chapter of Ban Gu’s 班固 (32–92) History of the Han (Hanshu 漢書).

117 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 2/9a.

118 The Palace of Eternal Joy (Changle gong 長樂宮) was constructed at the Han court in Chang’an.

119 Yelang was an ancient state that was wiped out at the end of the Western Han dynasty (206 B.C.–9 A.D.).

120 Cancong 蚕叢, as his name might suggest, is associated with the invention of raising silkworms for silk, but more importantly for this context, in Li Bo’s poem, “The Road to Shu is Difficult” (“Shu dao nan” 蜀道難), he is named in the first stanza as one of the founders of the ancient state of Shu.

121 According to a popular anecdote, when Li Bo was in attendance at the palace and was drunk, he got away with making the chief eunuch Gao Lishi 高力士 take off his boots and Prize Consort Yang (Yang guifei 楊貴妃) hold the inkstone for him so that he could write a poem for the emperor. In the scene in Wu Shimei’s 吳世美 (fl. 1573) chuanqi play, Story of the Startled Goose (Jing hong ji 驚鴻記), that enacts the anecdote and was performed as a zhezi xi under the title “Li Bo Writes while Drunk” (Taibo zui xie 太白醉寫), Li Bo manages to get Gao Lishi to both take off his boots and grind ink for him,

122 The Boliang terrace (Boliang tai 柏梁臺) was constructed at the court of the Emperor Wu of the Western Han (r. 140–87). On it stood a bronze statue in the form of an immortal holding a plate to collect heavenly dew (this is the “golden immortal” mentioned in the last line of the aria). See the basic annals of Emperor Wu chapter of Sima Qian’s 司馬遷 (c. 145–86) Records of the Historian (Shiji 史記).

123 Zhaoling is the mausoleum built for Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty 唐太宗 (r. 626–649). It was not completed until 734.

124 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 2/10b–11a.

125 Both men and women wore such pendants but they later became particularly associated with women.

126 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 2/13a–b. In his comments he also points out how rich Wang Yang is (he comes on stage with a gold ingot right before the aria translated above), how he deprecates Li Bo and Du Fu for being so poor, how he is portrayed with a painted face (hualian 花臉; used in the “Costume Plot” for characters portrayed by chou actors or the related fujing 副凈 [second jing] like Wang Yang), but concedes that people such as Li and Du are “such as will never die” (si bu de de 死不得的).

127 In the case of the act-closing quatrains for Acts 1, 3, 8, and 9, the separate lines in the quatrains are assigned to different characters on stage to recite, but this is not the case for Act 4. Even when the lines are assigned, it is probable that they were not necessarily to be delivered “in character.”

128 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 4/23b–24a.

129 The title of the tune matrix (qupai 曲牌) to which the aria is sung, “Crying to August Heaven” (“Ku huangtian” 哭皇天), is not auspicious.

130 He sheng could be referring here to either external or internal Daoist alchemy. In the former, cinnabar was refined to produce elixirs containing mercury that were ingested, and in the latter cinnabar functioned as a metaphor.

131 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 4/23a–b.

132 The phrases “hills and valleys” (ling gu 陵谷) and “oceans and mulberry [fields]” (hai sang 海桑) were often linked together because both are used to talk of enormous changes as one of the pair is transformed into the other (and back again).

133 Instead of killing He sheng, the sword disintegrates into lotus petals, proof enough of He sheng’s achievements in self-cultivation that the assassin kneels to bow to him.

134 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 5/26a.

135 Huaxu 華胥 is a kingdom that the Yellow Emperor visits in a dream in the Liezi. The kingdom needs no ruler, as everything develops along its own natural course; nor are its people subject to aberrant desires. See “The Yellow Emperor” (“Huangdi” 黃帝) chapter, Yang Bojun, ed., Liezi jishi, p. 2/41.

136 Ding Yaokang makes use in the play of an anecdote called “The Pleasure in the Orange” (“Ju zhong zhi le” 橘中之樂) in Niu Sengru’s 牛僧儒 (779–847) Records of the Hidden and the Strange (Youguai lu 幽怪錄). In it, the four hoary old men from Mt. Shang 商山 (famous recluses brought in to speak up for the heir apparent during the reign of the founding emperor of the Han dynasty) are found in two big oranges immersed in a chess game. After they finish, one of them sighs: “The pleasure within the orange is no less than that on Mt. Shang. I just resent that [the oranges] cannot keep their roots deep and stems solid, allowing some fool to take them off” 橘中之樂, 不減商山. 恨不能深根固蒂, 為愚人摘下耳. The story was included in Zeng Zao 曾慥 (d. 1155 or 1164), Categorized Tales (Leishuo 類說), SKQS edition, p. 11/12b. Ding Yaokang used the anecdote to talk about the realm of immortality. For examples, see his Words from the Pavilion for Inquiring of Heaven (Wentian ting fangyan 問天亭放言), reproduced in Xuxiu Siku quanshu 續修四庫全書 (Continuation of the Imperial Quadripartite Library), 1800 vols. (Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1994–2002), vol. 1176, pp. 4a and 7a.

137 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 5/29a.

138 Yang Bojun, ed., Liezi jishi, pp. 2/42–43; translation from A. C. Graham, The Book of Liezi: A Classic of the Tao (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), pp. 34–35 (original romanization changed to pinyin).

139 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 6/30a–b.

140 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 6/31b.

141 This refers to the legendary figure Ding Lingwei 丁令威 that Ding Yaokang felt such an affinity with that one of his literary names, Ding Yehe, refers to him. Ding Lingwei was an official in the Han dynasty who raises cranes but in A Sequel to In Search of Spirits (Soushen houji 搜神後記), it is said that he went off to study the Daoist arts on a mountain, transformed into a crane, and flew back to his home in Liao. Speaking as a crane, he is supposed to have said, “the city walls are the same, but the people have all changed” 城郭如故人民非. See the SKQS edition, p. 1/1a.

142 The first poem of the set known as “The Nineteen Old Poems” (Gushi shijiu shou 古詩十九首), has this line: “The bird from Yue builds its nest on the southern branch” 越鳥巢南枝; nanzhi 南枝 (southern branch) came to denote a home to which birds return.

143 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 7/33b.

144 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 8/37a.

145 Idema, “Crossing the Sea in a Leaking Boat,” pp. 418–21, translates a sequence from this act (the whale sprite produces, bit by bit, a poem that is criticized by Li Bo, who in turn produces a poem on an assigned topic that is actually by Su Shi 蘇軾 [1036–1101]), and then asks what Ding Yaokang was up to.

146 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 9/42b.

147 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 9/42a.

148 At the beginning of the act, after his stage-settling poem (dingchang shi 定場詩), he says “Under Master Cheng Lian’s orders I leased the ocean-crossing iron boat to He sheng for him to ramble afar in. Now the fruit of the Way has been completely brought to fruition in him, and he is to return to the islands of the immortals. It is just about time for him to return the original boat and to send him to pace the void” 俺奉仙師成連之命, 曾將渡海鉄舡賃與何生遠遊, 今道果完成, 將還仙島, 正好交還原舡, 使他凌虛而去. Ramblings with Magicians, p. 10/43a.

149 Everyone is presently on the boat. Presumably the stage direction means that they are to mime out traveling on the boat. In the translation of this stage direction, “various characters” is used to translate zhong 眾. Zhong is a character that occurs over 40 times in the play, occurring both in the dialogue and the stage directions, both as a noun (in the stage directions) and as a modifier (in the dialogue). This is surely because the cast for the play is so big and because so many characters are played by the same role-type actor on stage at the same time. In Act 10 there are several stage directions in which zhong appears after a role-type name and where the meaning must be that “all of the characters played by this kind of role-type actor” perform such and such an action together. It is not clear how inclusive each instance of zhong in the stage directions is supposed to be. One doubts, for instance, among the characters that are played by mo actors, that Qu Yuan figures in Act 10 in the zhong that enters the stage after He sheng. Likewise, in the translation below there is a stage direction that says that the various characters disembark from the boat, but before too long we find out that He sheng was not among them.

150 This refers to a story on Zuo Ci in Biographies of Immortals (Shenxian zhuan 神仙傳). In this story, Zuo Ci incurs rancor from Cao Cao 曹操 (155–220) with his uncanny magical power. During a drinking banquet with Cao, Zuo Ci sends the wine cup flying in the air like a bird, catching everyone’s attention so that he is able to slip away unnoticed.

151 The term tihu 醍醐 is a metaphor for the highest level of Buddhist teachings.

152 Mountains and waters, spoken of together in a number of different formulations, were used to signify the imperial state.

153 To “turn your head back” (huitou 回頭) is an important phrase in Buddhism. For instance, it is part of the well-known saying, “The sea of bitterness is without bounds, but once you turn your head [are enlightened] you are on the [far] shore” 苦海無邊, 回頭是岸.

154 Qiu 秋 (autumn ) is a sorrowful time because the vegetation is dying and also because of its orthographic connection with chou 愁 (sorrow).

155 A common metaphor for eloquent speech is to speak of the words as lotuses produced from the tongue. With regard to the mention of “brocade zithers,” it is possible that the reader is also meant to think of Li Shangyin’s 李商隱 (813?–858) famous poem, “The Brocade Zither” (“Jinse” 錦瑟), which is about loss.

156 This song was taken to represent very elite and refined vocal music that was difficult for ordinary people to understand.

157 This was a place where immortals were thought to dwell.

158 Samadhi (Ch. sanmei 三昧), refers to the cessation of distraction and the fixation of the mind.

159 “Ornamented pole” (huabiao 華表) contains a reference to Ding Yaokang himself, because he was also known as Huabiao ren 華表人 (Man of the ornamented pole). This is how he signed one of the prefatory pieces to his Chisong you (see Quanji, 1: 805).

160 Ramblings with Magicians, pp. 10/45a–b.

161 I have not been able to identify who Hai’an is. The characters, if read literally, mean “sea shore,” and might have been picked especially to append to the comments at the end of the play because they will call to mind crossing the “sea” of bitterness to reach the other “shore.” The calligraphy does not clearly resemble that of any of the other comments at the ends of the acts (the prologue has no comments and the very brief Act 8 only has an unsigned two-character comment, Jian miao 簡妙 [Wonderful in its conciseness!]).

162 On the first page after the paratextual material in Ramblings with Magicians, which is the first page of the prologue, the authorship of the play is attributed to Yehang jushi 野航居士 (The layman who travels through the wilderness). Yehang is also the courtesy name of He sheng, as we learn when he first introduces himself in Act 1 (also, in the prologue he is referred to as He Yehang).

163 The puppet (kuilei 傀儡) features prominently in Buddhist scriptures as a metaphor for the illusory nature of the myriad things. The intrinsically pure mind is compared to the craftsman who pulls the strings of the puppet to give performances that are ultimately illusory. It is also a stock metaphor for human life in drama. For a detailed discussion of the puppet as a motif in Buddhist scripture, see Liao Zhaoheng 廖肇亨, “Chanmen shuo xi: Yige fojiao wenhuashi guandian de changshi” 禪門說戲: 一個佛教文化史觀點的嘗試 (Speaking of plays in Chan Buddhism: An experiment from the point of view of the cultural history of Buddhism), in idem., Zhong bian, shi Chan, meng xi: Mingmo Qingchu Fojiao wenhua lunshu de chengxian yu kaizhan 中邊·詩禪·夢戲: 明末清初佛教文化論述的呈現與開展 (Center and periphery, poetry and Chan, dreams and plays: The emergence and development of Buddhist cultural discourse in the late Ming and early Qing; Taipei: Yunchen, 2008), pp. 337–42.

164 Hai’an seems to be using the famous couplet in Wang Changling’s 王昌齡 (c. 690–c. 756) “Seeing off Xin Jian from Hibiscus Tower” (“Furong lou song Xin Jian” 芙蓉樓送辛漸): “If friends or relatives in Luoyang ask after me, / My heart is as pure as a piece of ice in a jade-white vase” 洛陽親友如相問, 一片冰心在玉壺.

165 The phrase “carrying a long wooden pole with one” (ganmu suishen 竿木隨身) comes from a gong’an 公案 story involving a conversation between Mazu Daoyi 馬祖道一 (709–788) and Deng Yinfeng 鄧隱峰: “Deng Yinfeng bid farewell to the Master. The Master asked: ‘Where are you going?’ [Deng] said: ‘I’m going to Shitou’s place.’ The Master said: ‘The route to Shitou’s place is slippery.’ [Deng] replied: ‘I will carry a wooden pole with me, so I can put on a show as the opportunity arises.’ He thereupon left.” 鄧隱峰辭師, 師曰: “甚麼處去?” 曰: “石頭去.” 師曰: “石頭路滑.” 曰: “竿木隨身, 逢場作戲.” 便去. See Wudeng huiyuan 五燈會元 (Collection of five Transmissions of the Lamp; Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1982), p. 3/142.

166 Ramblings with Magicians, p. 10/46a.

167 Wujin Chuandeng 無盡傳燈 (1554–1628), the Tiantai master who was credited for revitalizing the tradition in the late Ming, writes the following about the Buddha Nature to distinguish the Tiantai school from other Buddhist traditions in late Ming: “What the Tiantai teaching refers to as the [Buddha] Nature inherently entails both good and evil. It is only when it comes to [the practices of] cultivation that good and evil are divided. … Other schools only recognize that the [Buddha] Nature entails good without realizing that it also entails evil. … Consequently [we have] established the perfected principles to debunk the biased teachings” 蓋臺宗之言性也, 則善惡具; 言修也, 而後生善惡分. …他宗但知性具善而不知性具惡. … 故立圓理以破偏宗. See Chen Jian 陳堅, Fannao ji puti: Tiantai xing’e sixiang yanjiu 煩惱即菩提: 天臺性惡思想研究 (Afflictions are identical to Bodhi: A study on the notion that the Buddha Nature entails evil in the Tiantai School; Beijing: Zongjiao wenhua, 2007), p. 287. On the debates on the Buddha nature within the Tiantai school, see Brook Ziporyn, Evil and/or/as the Good: Omnicentrism, Intersubjectivity, and Value Paradox in Tiantai Buddhist Thought (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000), pp. 218–39.