“SCROUNGING FOR A SCHOOL” (“NAOGUAN”), A PLAY BY PU SONGLING

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Notes

2 Translation slightly modified from Li-Ching Chang and Victor H. Mair, “The Wall, A Folk Opera by Pu Songling,” CHINOPERL Papers 14 (1986): 98.

3 Pu Ruo 蒲箬, “A Biographical Sketch of My Late, Illustrious Father, Gentleman of the Willow Spring, Senior Licentiate of the Second Class, and Candidate for Prefectural Sub-Director of Schools under the Qing Dynasty” 清故顯考嵗進士, 候選儒學訓導柳泉公行述, in Lu Dahuang 路大荒, ed., Pu Songling ji 蒲松齡集 (Collected works of Pu Songling), 2 vols. (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1962), 2: 1808.

4 On the discourses surrounding the interpretation of Pu Songling’s works, especially his tales, see Judith T. Zeitlin, Historian of the Strange: Pu Songling and the Chinese Classical Tale (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993), pp. 15–42.

5 Zhang Yuan 張元, “Memorial for Master Pu of Willow Spring” (“Liuquan Pu xiansheng mubiao” 柳泉蒲先生墓表), in Lu Dahuang ed., Pu Songling ji, 2: 1805–806. The term liqu 俚曲 has been sometimes translated as “rustic songs” and sometimes as “folk operas.” Their number differs according to whether editors consider one among them as actually comprising two different works. Three of the works can be considered plays in that they contain stage directions and characters who speak and sing, despite the fact that instead of being broken into scenes or acts they are divided into “chapters” (hui 回). For an introduction to Pu Songling’s liqu and seventeenth-century Shandong literati interest in prosimetric forms, see Wilt L. Idema, “Prosimetric and Verse Narrative,” in Kang-I Sun Chang and Stephen Owen, eds., The Cambridge History of Chinese Literature, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 2: 358–62.

6 This postface (ba 跋) is appended to Pu Songling’s Popular Characters for Daily Use (Riyong suzi 日用俗字), and is reproduced in Sheng Wei 盛偉 ed., Pu Songling quanji 蒲松齡全集 (Complete works of Pu Songling), 3 vols. (Shanghai: Xuelin chuban she, 1998), 3: 2230. The exact content and nature of what Pu Lide was referring to remains under debate. Sheng Wei, ed., Pu Songling quanji, 3: 2421–37, includes eleven song-suites and songs from a collection of works attributed to Pu Songling at Keio University of more than seventy such items collected by Hirai Masao 平井雅尾 in Shandong in the 1930s to which Hirai gave the title Liaozhai xiaoqu 聊齋小曲 (Minor songs from Make-Do Studio). Sheng Wei discusses these texts and the problems associated with them in his collation notes to the ones he included (3: 2434–45) and his “Note After Editing” (“Bianding houji” 編訂後記); 3: 3465–66. Guan Dedong’s 關德棟 “Liaozhai suqu ouji” 聊齋俗曲偶記 (Incidental notes on the popular songs from Make-Do Studio), published on pages 73–82 of the first publication of his Quyi lunji 曲藝論集 (Collected articles on oral performing literature; Shanghai: Zhonghua shuju, 1958) and pages 76–85 of a later publication of the book (Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1983), contains a list of over seventy titles, including “Naoguan,” that Guan thought should be categorized as suqu 俗曲 (popular songs). Guan indicated that his list was based on one compiled by Hirai Masao.

7 See Allan Barr, “Four Schoolmasters: Educational Issues in Li Hai-kuan’s Lamp at the Crossroads” in Benjamin Elman and Alexander Woodside, eds., Education and Society in Late Imperial China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), pp. 50–75. Barr suggests that “in late imperial China there existed a stereotype of the schoolmaster that has much in common with the tragicomic image of the schoolteacher in eighteenth-century Germany, ‘a caricature of servility and impotence’” (p. 66). He discusses “Scrounging for a School” (which he translates as Begging to Teach) and another vernacular work by Pu in connection with the conditions and images of bottom-level schoolmasters in Qing society (pp. 65–69).

8 See Shao Jizhi 邵吉志, Cong Zhiyi dao liqu—Pu Songling xinjie 從志異到俚曲—蒲松齡新解 (From Strange Tales to rustic songs—A new interpretation of Pu Songling; Jinan: Qi Lu shushe, 2008), pp. 1–2. The 1936 volume, edited by Lu Dahuang 路大荒 (1895–1972) and Zhao Tiaokuang 趙苕狂 (1892–1953), was entitled Liaozhai quanji 聊齋全集 (Complete works of Make-Do Studio) and published by Shijie shuju 世界書局 of Shanghai. I have borrowed Wilt Idema's translation of liqu as “rustic song” (see his “Prosimetric and Verse Narrative,” p. 358).

9 See, for example, Fujita Yūken 藤田祐賢, “Liaozhai suqu kao” 聊齋俗曲考 (A study of the popular songs of Make-Do Studio), Pu Songling yanjiu jikan 蒲松龄研究集刊 (Collected studies of Pu Songling) 4 (1984): 288 (this article was originally published in Geibun kenkyū 藝文研究 [Arts research] 18 [1967]).

10 See Zhou Yibai 周貽白, “Pu Songling de Liaozhai liqu” 蒲松齡的聊齋俚曲 (Rustic songs by Pu Songling), in Shen Xieyuan 沈燮元, ed., Zhou Yibai xiaoshuo xiqu lunji 周貽白小説戲曲論集 (Collected articles on fiction and drama by Zhou Yibai; Jinan: Qilu shushe, 1986), pp. 646–50.

11 For a brief review of the scholarship, see Shao Jizhi 邵吉志, “Liushi duo nian lai Pu Songling liqu yanjiu gaishu” 六十多年來蒲松齡俚曲研究概述 (Overview of studies of Pu Songling’s rustic songs in the last sixty years), printed as an appendix to his Cong Zhiyi dao liqu—Pu Songling xinjie, pp. 344–59. Two noteworthy recent monographs on the musical and performance aspects of the rustic songs include Chen Yuchen 陳玉琛, Liaozhai liqu 聊齋俚曲 (Rustic songs from Make-Do Studio; Jinan: Shandong wenyi, 2004) and Liu Xiaojing 劉曉靜, Sanbai nian yixiang—Pu Songling liqu yinyue yanjiu 三百年遺響—蒲松齡俚曲音樂研究 (Lingering sounds from three hundred years ago—Research on the music of rustic songs from Make-Do Studio; Shanghai: Sanlian shudian, 2002). Ji Genyin 紀根垠 includes an interesting chapter on Pu Songling’s rustic songs and plays and early liuzi opera (liuzi xi 柳子戲) versions in his Liuzi xi jianshi 柳子戲簡史 (A concise history of liuzi opera; Beijing: Zhongguo xiju, 1988), pp. 39–56; see also his “Liuquan jushi shi xiqu” 柳泉居士嗜戲曲 (The Gentleman of Willow Springs has a passion for drama), in Sun Bo 孫勃 et al., eds., Liaozhai shicui 聊齋拾粹 (Collected gems pertaining to Make-Do Studio; Jinan: Shandong wenyi,1990), pp. 170–77. On shared musical patterns between the rustic songs and baojuan texts, see Che Xilun 車錫輪, Zhongguo baojuan yanjiu 中國寶卷研究 (Studies of Chinese precious scrolls; Guilin: Guangxi shifan daxue, 2009), pp. 175–79. Additional book-length studies of Pu Songling’s vernacular works include Cai Zaomin 蔡造珉, Xiegui xieyao, citan cinue—Liaozhai liqu xinlun 寫鬼寫妖, 刺貪刺虐—聊齋俚曲新論 (Depicting ghosts and demons, satirizing greed and cruelty—A new interpretation of rustic songs from Make-Do Studio; Taipei: Wanjuan lou, 2003) and Feng Chuntian 馮春田, Liaozhai liqu yufa yanjiu 聊齋俚曲語法研究 (Research on the grammar of rustic songs from Make-Do Studio; Kaifeng: Henan daxue, 2003).

12 Lu Dahuang, ed., Pu Songling ji, “Bianding houji” 編訂後記 (Notes after editing), 2: 1817, already observed that “Kaoci jiuzhuan huolang’er” is not actually a play or a single work. Lu and Sheng Wei’s editions of Pu Songling’s works divide the piece into a play (“Weijiong” 闈窘 [Trouble during the examinations]), and an appended song-suite (“Nanlüdiao jiuzhuan huolang’er” 南吕調九轉貨郎兒 [Nine airs to the tune of ‘Huolang’er’ in the musical mode of Nanlü]).

13 Zaju is a theatrical genre that flourished in the Yuan dynasty with rather strict rules with regard to structure and the music used for its arias, but which came to cover a wide range of practice in the Ming (1368–1644) and Qing (1644–1911) dynasties. For descriptions of the three works as zaju and an overview of the larger context of dramatic composition among Shandong literati in the Qing, see, for example, Wang Chuanming 王傳明, “Qingdai Shandong gudian xiju yanjiu” 清代山東古典戲劇研究 (Research on classical drama in Shandong in the Qing dynasty; Ph.D. diss., Shandong shifan daxue, 2010). See also the article by Wang and Ning Lili 寧莉莉, “Zhuangyan de liyue, beiwei de shushi—Shixi Pu Songling Naoguan dui liyue wenhua de fanfeng” 莊嚴的禮樂, 卑微的塾師—試析蒲松齡鬧館對禮樂文化的反諷 (Stern and austere rites and music versus humble schoolmaster—An attempt at explicating the parody of the culture of rites and music in Pu Songling’s “Scrounging for a School”), Pu Songling yanjiu 2009·4: 71–85, which is devoted less to issues of genre than to analysis of the contents of the play as reflective of Pu’s own attitudes and conditions in rural society (this appears to be the only article to date that is focused on “Scrounging for a School”).

14 This is no doubt why Zhuang Yifu 莊一拂, Gudian xiqu cunmu huikao 古典戲曲存目彙考 (Collected research into the known repertoire of classical Chinese drama; Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1982), p. 728, lists the other two plays as zaju but not “Scrounging for a School.” Ji Genyin, Liuzi xi jianshi, pp. 40–41, discusses the mixing of northern and southern tune matrices in “Zhongmei qingshou” and “Weijiong” that was common in contemporary chuanqi 傳奇 drama and points out how the arias in “Scrounging for a School” are entirely different.

15 The stage directions present include those for entering and exiting the stage, and for singing (chang 唱) and speech (bai 白). There are, however, no specifications for movement (jie 介) as in the two other works.

16 Liu Jieping 劉階平, Liaozhai tongsu liqu xuanzhu 聊齋通俗戲曲選注 (Annotated selections of vernacular plays and songs from Make-Do Studio; Taipei: Taiwan zhonghua shuju, 1970).

17 See Pu Songling ji, 2: 1671–90. This glossary, with the traditional characters converted to simplified ones, was also included in Sheng Wei’s edition of Pu’s works.

18 Zou Zongliang 鄒宗良 and Pu Xianming 蒲先明, eds., Liaozhai liqu ji 聊齋俚曲集 (Collected rustic songs from Make-Do Studio; Beijing: Guoji wenhua, 1999).

19 Guan Dedong 關德棟, Liaozhai liqu xuan 聊齋俚曲選 (Selected rustic songs from Make-Do Studio; Jinan: Qi Lu shushe, 1980). The “Houji” 後記 (Postscript), dated 1979, p. 109, explains how a manuscript for the book was completed in 1963 by himself and Lu Dahuang but could not be published then, and how the 1980 version was prepared by Guan himself, Lu having died before the end of the Cultural Revolution. Guan also edited or co-edited a collection each of pre-modern prosimetric, dramatic, and vernacular short story adaptations of Pu Songling’s classical tales.

20 Lu Dahuang, “Bianding houji,” p. 1817. The manuscript collection is named “Liaozhai shiwen ji” 聊齋詩文集 (Poetry and prose from Make-Do Studio).

21 In his preface (p. 6), Guan relates that the base text for all five of the works in his annotated anthology come from Lu Dahuang’s 1962 Pu Songling ji. He says that he also consulted various manuscripts that he implies were not considered by Lu. Unfortunately, he does not give specifics about those manuscripts beyond saying that some of them were held by the Association for the Collation of Unpublished Works from Make-Do Studio (Liaozhai yizhu zhengli hui 聊齋遺著整理會) and the Institute of Literature at the Chinese Academy of Science (Zhongguo kexue yuan wenxue yanjiu suo 中國科學院文學研究所). He explains the decision not to include collation notes as a matter of avoiding inclusion of too much trivial matter.

22 For the collation notes, see Sheng Wei, ed., Pu Songling quanji, 3: 2419–20. Only notes 4 and 15 record differences between Sheng’s and Guan’s versions. In the head note to the collation notes, Sheng mentions that the “Liaozhai Library” (“Ryōsai bunko” 聊齋文庫) at Keio University has a manuscript copy of the play in one fascicle, but it is not mentioned in any of the collation notes. A bangzi is a wooden sounding block used to keep time. There has been a long-standing tendency to translate bangzi opera as “clapper opera,” but the “clapper” (ban 板) and the bangzi are very distinct and should not be confused in this fashion.

23 The translation of the title is from Chang and Mair, “The Wall,” 98. “Qiangu kuai” is the title used by Guan Dedong in his Liaozhai liqu xuan. In the editions of Pu Songling’s works edited by Lu Dahuang and Sheng Wei, it appears under the title “Kuaiqu” 快曲. Instead of dialogue and arias spoken or sung by characters it features a narrator and storyteller phrases, and is divided into lian 聯 rather than scenes.

24 See the headnotes to the “Reference Materials” (“Cankao ziliao” 参考資料) section appended to his edition of the play, Liaozhai liqu xuan, p. 104. In this same reference material section, Guan reproduces the text of a woodblock edition produced by Taishantang 泰山堂 (pp. 105–108). On p. 104 he notes that on the title page of the edition the following text appears before the title of the play: “Seeking a School [He] Sighs to Himself; [A] Bangzi qiang [Opera]” (Mouguan zitan bangzi qiang 謀館自嘆梆子腔). In his version of the text of this woodblock edition, he added these characters in parentheses between the title of the play and its beginning (p. 105). Unlike “Scrounging for a School,” the villager is played by a jing 淨 (painted-face) actor. Its content basically resembles that of Pu Songling’s play, with the exception that substantial chunks are left out and it concludes quite quickly after the section on material for smoking (see the notes to the translation below).

25 Boris Riftin (Li Fuqing李福清) and Wang Changyou王長友, “Bangzi xi xijian banben shulu (xia)” 梆子戏稀見版本書录 (下) (A bibliographic record of rare bangzi opera editions [part three]), Jiuzhou xuelin 九州學林 (Chinese culture quarterly) 2·1 (Spring 2004): 201–202. The copy owned by one of the authors was produced by the Baowentang 寶文堂 in Beijing. A copy from the same publisher (probably from the same blocks) is included in Su wenxue congkan 俗文學叢刊 (published English title: Folk Literature: Materials in the Collection of the Institute of History and Philology), 500 vols. (Taibei: Xin wenfeng, 2001), 282: 381–98. There do not seem to be that many differences between the text of this edition and the Taishantang edition appended by Guan Dedong (the very last line in each, which identifies the publisher, is exactly the same except for the name of the publisher).

26 Some have objected that the title of the play, “Naoguan,” leads the reader to expect some kind of uproar or havoc taking place in a schoolroom, something on the order of what happens in scene seven of The Peony Pavilion (Mudan ting 牡丹亭; this scene is popularly known as “Naoxue” 鬧學). In fact, there is a play with the title “Naoguan” attributed to Pu Songling that describes such an incident. For more on that play, which has not been proven to have been written by Pu, see Pu Xizhang 蒲喜章 and Cao Juetian 曹厥田, “Liaozhai yizhu sanzhong” 聊齋佚著三種 (Three lost works by Pu Songling), Pu Songling yanjiu 蒲松齡研究 (Research on Pu Songling) 2007·4: 105–33 (see pp. 110–16 for the text of the play and p. 107 for comments on the perceived match or mismatch between play title and content in the case of the two plays).

27 Arthur Henderson Smith, Village Life in China: A Study in Sociology (New York: Fleming H. Revell, 1899), pp. 66–67.

28 Ibid., p. 67.

29 The major difference concerns the geographical setting of the play. In “Scrounging for a School” it is Shaanxi, but according to Smith (p. 67), it is Shandong. We will see below, in the notes to the translation, that a woodblock printing of an adaptation of the play puts the action in Shandong.

30 Ji Genyin, Liuzi xi jianshi, pp. 40–44, is the main source for the information presented in this paragraph.

31 Burton Watson, tr., The Analects of Confucius (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 17.

32 See the last part of the opening passage of “The Doctrine of the Mean” (“Zhongyong” 中庸), “While there are no stirrings of pleasure, anger, sorrow, or joy, the mind may be said to be in the state of Equilibrium. When those feelings have been stirred, and they act in their due degree, there ensues what may be called the state of Harmony. This Equilibrium is the great root from which grow all the human actings in the world, and this Harmony is the universal path which they all should pursue. Let the states of equilibrium and harmony exist in perfection, and a happy order will prevail throughout heaven and earth, and all things will be nourished and flourish.” 喜怒哀樂之未發, 謂之中; 發而皆中節, 謂之和; 中也者, 天下之大本也; 和也者, 天下之達道也. 致中和, 天地位焉, 萬物育焉. Translation and Chinese text from James Legge, tr., The Chinese Classics, 5 vols. (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1960), 1: 384–85.

33 Pu did enjoy relative prosperity during the years that he worked as a tutor for the Bi family (1679–1709).

34 Ning Lili and Wang Chuanming, “Zhuangyan de liyue,” p. 79, for example, interpret the figure of Mr. Harmony as a self-portrait of Pu Songling, even while acknowledging that Pu was never reduced to such circumstances.

35 I am presently at work on a paper on this series of rhymes on subjects of village life, tentatively titled “Popular Characters for Daily Use and the World of Pu Songling.”

36 The texts for “Pedant,” “Fleeing,” and “Trouble” can be found in Sheng Wei, ed., Pu Songling quanji, pp. 3343–48, 3337–42, and 2401–105, respectively. An annotated version of the first of these appears in Guan Dedong, ed., Liaozhai liqu xuan, pp. 9–18. Allan Barr, “Educational Issues,” p. 67, discusses “Pedant” (which he translates as The Pedant’s Lament) and also provides the titles of several additional works on educational themes (see p. 74, notes 51 and 52).

37 As noted in the introduction, this translation follows the version of the play in Guan Dedong, ed., Liaozhai liqu xuan, and makes use of Guan’s detailed annotations. The version of the play in Sheng Wei, ed., Pu Songling quanji, as well as the bangzi version of the play appended to Guan’s version have been consulted and will occasionally be mentioned in the footnotes. My translation of the title of the play was influenced by Chang and Mair, “The Wall,” p. 98, where it is rendered “Scrounging for Students.” In the translation, the Western convention of using paragraphing and characters’ names to make clear who is speaking is followed (in Guan’s version, paragraphing is not used to indicate changes in who is speaking, and the characters are referred to in the stage directions by their role-type only). Prose dialogue is indented one step, recited poetry is indented two steps, and sung verse is indented three steps (in Guan’s version, dialogue, including spoken verse, is indented one step, but line breaks are used before and after spoken verse to set it off; aria text is not indented but is printed in a slightly larger font). In the translation, stage directions are italicized and placed in parentheses (in Guan’s version, they are placed in rounded brackets). Throughout the translation, I have consulted James Legge’s translations in The Chinese Classics and cited him where I have quoted him at length; elsewhere I have also borrowed phrases and short lines of his in my translations in the footnotes and in the main body of the text, where they have sometimes been modified to fit the context of the play.

38 Wu Yuchang is a Lecturer in Folklore at the School of the Humanities at Wenzhou University and a Visiting Scholar to the University of Pennsylvania in the 2012–2013 academic year. A Shandong native, she provided valuable assistance in the preparation of this translation’s initial draft.

39 Wai 外 (lit. “extra”) actors specialize in secondary male roles that have some measure of dignity to them.

40 This poetic couplet is not treated as poetry in Guan’s version.

41 It is in front of this phrase that Sheng Wei’s version inserts bangzi qiang (see introduction), which he treats as a stage direction.

42 “This culture of ours” (siwen 斯文) refers to Confucian-style learning. It most famously appears in Analects 9·5, in which Confucius, in great distress, affirms the value of what he has been teaching. The translation for the term here follows that of Peter Bol, who used it as the main title of his 1992 book. Guan Dedong glosses siwen in the context of the play as denoting men of learning (p. 100).

43 The phrase cheng shuguan 成書館 (“set up a school”) denotes, for all practical purposes, “to hire a teacher.” A family may hire a tutor for as few as one or two children, though in some cases he may be responsible for an entire village’s children. The shuguan 書館 (a more commonly used term is sishu 私塾), as the site of instruction, can be at the residence of the host family or a borrowed space, such as a temple.

44 See the introduction for the allusion to Analects 1·12 and the puns involved in the names of the two characters in the play. Mr. Harmony’s courtesy name, Youzhi 由之, can be construed as “Let It Be.” This phrase also occurs in Analects 1·12 , where it means “follow it.”

45 There was no Taiyang County. “Taiyang” 邰陽 is perhaps a mistake for “Heyang” 郃陽 (presently known as 合陽). Heyang County lies approximately 150 kilometers to the northeast of Xi'an, the capital of Shaanxi province. The name of his village, Tongdi (lit. “same place”) is probably meant to be allegorical rather than realistic. In the bangzi version of the play appended by Guan, Mr. Harmony’s native place is in Shandong, but the name of his prefecture, county, and village are all unambiguously allegorical. In that version he remains within the province in his wandering, but the exact name of the place he has come to is not mentioned (p. 105).

46 The name of the studio, Hange 漢閣 (“Han Pavilion”) alludes to the writer and scholar Yang Xiong 揚雄 (53 B.C.–18 A.D.) and the Han imperial library, Tianlu Ge 天祿閣, where he once worked.

47 Luochuan County lies approximately 100 kilometers to the northwest of Heyang County and less than 200 kilometers to the north of Xi'an.

48 The first of these items is used to keep paper flat when doing calligraphy, and the second to discipline pupils.

49 It is common to preface an emotional aria with an exclamation of this sort.

50 The appended bangzi version of the play has the cobbler patch shoes rather than socks (p. 105).

51 In the corresponding line in the appended bangzi version the topic has been changed from craftsmen to merchants (p. 105). There is also no fatty meat.

52 Each line of the arias breaks into three parts, with a caesura after the third and sixth characters. For an attempt to reproduce this kind of structure more directly in English translation, by breaking each line into three parts, see Wilt L. Idema, tr., “Fourth Sister Zhang Creates Havoc in the Eastern Capital,” CHINOPERL Papers 31 (2012): 37–112.

53 Chou 丑 actors specialize in comic and/or low-class roles. The stage directions do not indicate exactly when Mr. Civility enters the stage (in comparison to the appended bangzi version, p. 105).

54 In the appended bangzi version of the play his surname is more realistically written as 李 instead of 禮 (“civility”).

55 Mr. Civility’s courtesy name, Weimei 為美, also occurs in Analects 1·12. It can be construed as “Being Truly Excellent.” In the appended bangzi version, a large section of text following Mr. Civility’s self-introduction is not reflected. The two do not begin to correspond again until Mr. Civility explains to Mr. Harmony the dishes for the four seasons. The Baowentang version reproduced in Su wenxue congkan is more complete.

56 The numbers in the original are thirteen and ten, but these have been adjusted downward because children were considered to be a year old at birth.

57 See Mencius 3B.10, in which Chen Zhong is praised to Mencius as a man of self-denying purity but Mencius is not very impressed.

58 For a reference to what happened to Confucius in Chen and the quote he is supposed to have said at that time that is the source of the language used in this line, see Analects 15·2: “The gentleman remains resolute in poverty, while the petty man in poverty gives himself up to unbridled license” 君子固窮, 小人窮斯濫矣.

59 The quoted text is what Confucius said when his favorite disciple, Yan Hui 顏回, died (see Analects 11·9). The quoted lines follow the translation of James Legge, The Chinese Classics, 1: 239.

60 In other words, Mr. Civility is thinking about hiring a teacher for his children. See note 49 above.

61 Mencius replied with the quoted words when asked if he had already attained sagehood (2A.2).

62 Although it is not easy to reflect this in English translation, Mr. Harmony has a great fondness for using literary Chinese grammatical particles when he speaks. In this respect, his speech resembles that of Kong Yiji 孔乙己, the eponymous hero of one of Lu Xun’s 魯迅 (1881–1936) stories.

63 In Mencius 7A.40, Mencius lists five ways in which the superior man teaches others. The quoted text is the first of these. The translation is modified from James Legge (The Chinese Classics, 2: 473) to fit the new context Mr. Harmony has put it in.

64 The highest graduates of the final examination were given positions in this academy, where they drafted official documents.

65 The text in quotes comes from Analects 13·10, in which Confucius goes on to say that if he was employed the government “would be perfected in three years” (san nian you cheng 三年有成), which happens to be the same words Mr. Harmony used in the promise he made to Mr. Civility right before this aria.

66 The text in quotes is spoken by a disciple of Confucius in Analects 19·3. The translation is from James Legge (The Chinese Classics, 1: 340).

67 The quoted text is spoken by Confucius in Analects 15·32.

68 The quoted text is spoken by Mencius in Mencius 6A.14.

69 The quoted text is spoken by Confucius in Analects 2·12.

70 The quoted text is spoken by Confucius in praise of his favorite disciple in Analects 6·11 (in the play, the text before the ellipsis, which is yi dan shi, yi piao yin 一箪食, 一瓢饮 in the received version, is given as yi dan yi shi, piao yin 一箪一食, 瓢饮). The translation is modified from that of James Legge (The Chinese Classics, 1: 188).

71 The quoted text is Confucius’ final comment after discussing seven famous recluses in Analects 18·8. In that context Confucius is saying that he is not categorically for or against any of their choices.

72 Alfalfa (muxu 苜蓿) was mostly used to feed livestock.

73 Night blindness. There were more vulgar ways to refer to the condition than Mr. Harmony uses.

74 Guan Dedong (p. 103, n. 57) cautions the reader that this claim is not to be relied on.

75 Guan Dedong (p. 97) would include these two words in the previous sentence, but that ignores the pattern that has been set up in Mr. Harmony’s previous comments after each line of Mr. Civility’s aria.

76 Guan Dedong (p. 103, n. 59) thinks that Mr. Harmony is making use of a description of Confucius in Analects 10·8, but there is the problem that that paragraph does not quote any sage and only the first five characters are the same between it and the play (the second of these five characters, shu, has a grass radical in the play [疏 vs. 蔬]). A greater overlap can be found between this sentence and a comment about the way Duke Ping of Jin (r. 557–532) treated Hai Tang 亥唐, a commoner, when the latter hosted him, in Mencius 5B.3. Mencius can perhaps be referred to as a sage, but he is certainly not talking about himself in that passage.

77 The quoted text comes from a statement by Mencius in Mencius 6A.17. The internal quotation is from poem number 247 in the Mao 毛 recension of The Book of Odes (Shijing 詩經). The translation follows that of James Legge (The Chinese Classics, 2: 420).

78 In northern China, people slept on earthen or brick raised platforms, or kangs, that could be heated by burning fuel under/inside them.

79 The quote comes from Analects 10·6, which describes how “the superior man” (junzi 君子), surely a reference to Confucius here, insisted on a “sleeping dress” (qinyi 寢衣) half as long as his body.

80 The quote comes from a quotation from Confucius found in Analects 7·16. Prior to speaking of using his arm as his pillow, Confucius also mentions eating coarse rice and only drinking water.

81 The quoted text appears in an anecdote about one of Confucius’ disciples, Zengzi 曾子, related by Mencius in Mencius 4B.31, where it is used in a very different fashion than by Mr. Harmony. This quotation and the ones preceding it are modified from James Legge’s translations in The Chinese Classics.

82 The quoted text is a statement made by Mencius in Mencius 2B.13 when asked if he is discontented. Mencius explains that every five hundred years people are born who can truly establish good government, more than seven hundred years has passed since the last batch, he is the only person who could do it (but has not been given the opportunity to do it), so how could he not be dissatisfied? Mr. Harmony clearly intends the quote to mean the opposite of what it originally meant, so I have translated accordingly.

83 The word Mr. Civility uses to speak of “tuition,” shuxiu 束脩, is a classical one and literally means “a bundle of strips of dried meat.” The same term is used by Mr. Harmony below but translated more literally there since it is part of a quotation from a time when the term was not used metaphorically.

84 The quote is spoken by Confucius in Analects 3·7, in a rather different context.

85 The actual unit given is fen 分: “Eight fen will count as one qian 錢 [ten fen].” One fen is approximately half a gram.

86 This is a form of paper money in circulation at the time.

87 The traditional lunar calendar was shorter than the solar calendar of 365 days. The shortfall was made up by periodically adding intercalary months. The corresponding line in the appended bangzi version only says that a year has twelve months (p. 106).

88 A euphemism for going to the toilet is used here.

89 The quotation was spoken by Confucius in Analects 7·7. The translation is from James Legge (The Chinese Classics, 1: 197), with slight modification.

90 In the appended bangzi version of the play, the temple is a nunnery and they are looking for a nun to live in it and strike stone chimes as patrons burn incense (p. 107). In the version described by Arthur Smith, Village Life, p. 68, the place is described, notably, as already inhabited, and the schoolmaster is “cautioned not to allow his morals to be contaminated by the nuns whose reputation is so proverbially bad.”

91 The quoted lines reproduce a comment by Confucius at the end of Analects 9·6, but in that context they refer to whether a man such as himself should have many abilities.

92 In the lunar calendar, these two days were the new moon and the full moon, respectively.

93 Confucius is described as once playing (striking) musical stone chimes while in the State of Wei in Analects 14·39, but for his own pleasure.

94 The quoted text appears in Mencius 1A.7. Mencius is trying to persuade a ruler that his not ruling as a true king is not a matter of being unable but of being unwilling.

95 This quote comes from Analects 14·42, when Confucius’ disciple Zilu 子路 is asking his master what constitutes a gentleman and responds to what Confucius initially says on the subject.

96 Mr. Civility is quoting a statement made by Confucius to Zilu after the former has paid a call on a woman, Nanzi. See Analects, 6·26. The translation is from James Legge (The Chinese Classics, 1: 193).

97 Mr. Civility here breaks into the colloquial for the first time, using sha 啥 instead of more formal ways to say “anything.”

98 This quote is one of a number of desirable actions listed by Confucius in Analects 9·16. It is not used as an injunction there.

99 The quoted text appears in Analects 10·8, which like the quote from 10·6 above, literally describes the actions of a gentleman but in context is surely descriptive of Confucius himself. As with the quote in the immediately preceding sentence of the play, this one is also not injunctive in the original.

100 In the original of this sentence Mr. Civility appears to be claiming that he has accumulated this material for smoking for Mr. Harmony, which goes against the fact that he has just met him. I have translated the line in the light of how the bangzi version of the play appended by Guan Dedong handles the claim (Mr. Civility says explicitly there that he has been collecting the material ever since he got the idea of hiring a schoolmaster for his children, pp. 107–108).

101 I have not been able to identify in any detail all of the material for smoking mentioned in this aria but information on most of them can conveniently be found in Zhongguo yancao baike zhishi 中國煙草百科知識 (An encyclopedia of knowledge about Chinese materials for smoking; Beijing: Zhongguo qinggongye, 1992). Tobacco itself came to China in the 16^th century but by the mid-17^th century was a well-established commodity with widespread cultivation. In a text attributed to Pu Songling, Jiazheng waibian 家政外編 (External matters of household government), there is detailed instruction on growing tobacco and processing it for smoking (see Sheng Wei, ed., Pu Songling quanji, 3: 2244–45). For more on the history of tobacco in Ming and Qing China, see Carol Benedict, Golden-Silk Smoke: A History of Tobacco in China, 1550–2010 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011).

102 Guan Dedong’s version indicates that there are three characters missing here. “Those who are not scholars” (bu du shu 不讀書) is just a guess as to what is missing. Sheng Wei’s version (p. 3: 2418) also indicates that three characters are missing. Neither the bangzi version appended by Guan Dedong nor the Baowentang one includes this aria.

103 The same phrase (put on airs and affect manners), with the substitution of a synonym for the first character, is used earlier in the play by Mr. Civility to complain about the local degree holders.

104 This refers to the way Confucius traveled from state to state looking for a patron. Lu was his home state and Qi was a neighboring state.

105 For making fertilizer.

106 Although not labeled as such, these last four lines make up a quatrain. This last line makes abundantly clear that Mr. Harmony is aware of how much he is being exploited by Mr. Civility.