Appendix—Much Ado About Nothing

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Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Chuang Tzu and Watson (1968, 58), my emphasis.

2. As mentioned earlier, translation of ancient Chinese texts is extremely challenging. Relying on various translations partially redresses this. Presently, I use the 2014 Chinese/English Side-by-Side edition of the Zhuangzi (2014). The original text for this passage is also accessible online; the pertinent section cited above is available at the Chinese Text Project (Sturgeon 2014) at: http://ctext.org/zhuangzi/man-in-the-world-associated-with. I have correlated the original texts as per the Zhuangzi Yinde (A Concordance to Chuang Tzu), Harvard-Yenching Institute Sinological Index Series, Supplement no. 20 (Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, 1956) [洪業主編《莊子引得》, 哈佛燕京學社引得特刊第20號, 哈佛燕京學社引得編纂處], and the A Concordance to the Zhuangzi (莊子逐字索引), ed. D.C. Lau, Ho Che Wah and Chen Fong Ching. ICS series (Hong Kong: Commercial Press, 2000) [何志華, 劉殿爵, 陳方正 ‘莊子逐字索引’ (香港：商務印書館, 2000]. Locations of the textual references can also be determined using the Chinese Text Project website. When referencing the concordance, the letters and numerals correspond to the version, then book, page, and line, respectively. For example, ICS Zhuangzi (4/10/2) corresponds to the ICS version and concordance of the Zhuangzi and book 4, page 10, line 2. The original concordance for the cited passage in the Harvard-Yenching Zhuangzi Yinde comprises from 9/4/26 to 9/4/28; in the ICS Zhuangzi it goes from 4/10/1 to 4/10/3.

3. For translations of this passage that are not referenced in the main text presently, see Höchsmann, Guorong and Zhuangzi (2007, 103), Legge (1891), available online at http://nothingistic.org/library/chuangtzu/. See also Zhuangzi and Legge 2014.

4. All literal translations for all three characters and other Chinese characters, unless otherwise noted, are from The Concise English-Chinese and Chinese-English Dictionary (2004), edited by Martin H. Manser. These are also correlated with the online Chinese Dictionary, http://www.chinese-dictionary.org.

5. This consummate individual is also referred to as 至人, zhìrén, (from ‘most’ as an emphatic superlative in this context) (see Fraser 2014, 203). The Zhuangzi’s Chapter 5, which centers on the consummate individual, uses 真人, zhēnrén nine times. See Harvard-Yenching Zhuangzi Yinde: 15/6/4; ICS Zhuangzi 6/15/32 for the first time the term is used in said chapter. As Chuang-Tzu and Watson points out in a footnote (1968, 79), there is quite a bit of controversy as to the interpretation of ‘true man’ in the Zhuangzi, and the particular attributes associated with him in this chapter, some of which seem to be an addition by a Legalist philosopher (who would endow it with Confucian virtues rather than Daoist). Given the broader scope taken in essay 5, Zhuangzi—Playful Wanderer, and that presently zhēnrén is engaged as a referent for a holistic and enactive expert, these issues does not affect our account.

6. Billeter writes that this true person (homme vrai): ‘is the person who is not embarrassed by any conventions, who is not lessened, who is a totality, and is directed to the whole person’ (c’est l’homme qu’aucune convention n’embarrasse ni se diminue, qui est entier et qui s’adresse à l’homme entier’) (1994, 317, my translation).

7. Since this passage is rather straightforward, one source suffices. This hits close to home personally. Not even close to Hui Shi’s talents as debater or otherwise, this perennial running around in pursuit of … what? does capture this author's temperament and peripatetically hectic ways.

8. See also Ilundáin-Agurruza (2008).

9. Legge (1891) is the one exception, who translates it as ‘freedom.’ His decidedly Christian outlook influences his choice if words, at times instilling them with foreign connotations to the original Daoist context.

10. The original text, which uses 無, wu, is :三十輻, 共一轂, 當其無, 有車之用。埏埴以為器, 當其無, 有器之用。鑿戶牖以為室, 當其無, 有室之用。故有之以為利, 無之以為用。Available at http://ctext.org/dao-de-jing Accessed 20 December 2014 (my emphasis).

11. See The Online Liddell-Scott-Jones Greek-English Lexicon (2009).

12. See http://ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=虛 Accessed 18 December 2014.

13. Fraser’s penetrating chapter (2014) was unavailable until after essay 5, Zhuangzi—Playful Wanderer, had already been submitted, unfortunately too late to duly incorporate it. His main concern is to interpret the Zhuangzi in relation to Foucault’s ethics of self-cultivation. Nonetheless, there is a remarkable and congratulatory affinity between Fraser’s interpretation and this project’s understanding of the Zhuangzi and overall holistic framework.

14. Billeter’s very description belies the fact that riding a bicycle in the way he characterizes it is not how an expert would do it. Expert cyclists do not use the handlebars to stay upright or even turn; as speeds increase and there is momentum, they lean, handlebars straight, into the turn as a unit with the bicycle.