Theatricality in the moonlit garden: Qi Biaojia’s (1602–1645) garden of Mount Yu and his midnight suicide

Abstract

This paper examines the Garden of Mount Yu in the late Ming Dynasty, owned by the prestigious scholar-official and drama critic Qi Biaojia. As seen in his literature on Mount Yu, Qi had projected his theatrical sensitivity onto his viewing of the garden, imagining the emotional interactions between his ‘theatrical self’ and the garden, which emerged again on the night of his martyrdom upon Ming’s collapse. In both circumstances, the alienation of a ‘theatrical self’ enabled Qi to immerse himself in the imagined theatrics while apprehending their illusory quality. This paper takes the nocturnal obscurity and mutability of temporal stages as opposites of daytime normality and demonstrates the obsession with theatricality and its manipulation in seventeenth-century China. Such obsession, when examined in the context of the Ming-Qing transition, reflects a philosophy of living in the post-conquest world, wherein the significance of a garden was highlighted.

Keywords:

• Chinese garden
• reality and illusions, political martyrdom
• theatricality

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. For a comprehensive overview of the Ming-Qing transition, see Frederic E, Wakeman, The Great Enterprise: The Manchu Reconstruction of Imperial Order in Seventeenth-Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), vol. 1, chap. 1–8. Wakeman discusses the transition from the battles in the northern frontier to the resistance movement in the Jiangnan region, the most developed area in China where Qi Biaojia’s hometown Shaoxing is located.

2. An official record in early Qing, ‘Imperial-ordered Record of the Martyrs of the Preceding Dynasty’, recorded that more than 3,883 Ming loyalists died for the country after Ming’s fall in 1644. Most martyrs were civil service officials and influential literati. Their death should not be understood as merely personal choices, but also following the indoctrination of Confucian loyalty that a decent man cannot serve two dynasties. For more information about the choices of literati during the Ming-Qing transition, see Frederic, Wakeman, ‘Romantics, Stoics, and Martyrs in Seventeenth-Century China’, The Journal of Asian Studies, 43/4, 1984, pp. 631–665.

3. Wang Siren, ‘The Chronicle of Duke Qi Zhongmin’, reprinted and annotated in Qi Biaojia, Qi Biaojia riji (Diaries of Qi Biaojia) (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 2016), pp. 845–934. Wang was Qi Biaojia’s fellow Shaoxing native. After the downfall of his hometown, he decided to starve himself to death. As a close friend of Qi, he had visited the Garden of Mount Yu many times and had contributed to the literature of the garden.

4. According to Cao Shujuan’s study, the Chorography of Mount Yu was first mentioned in Qi Biaojia’s diary by mid-1637 and had been revised by Qi several times, so the contents of different editions are quite different. For a comprehensive study of all editions and contents, see Cao Shujuan, Liubian zhong de shuxie: Qi Biaojia yu yushan yuanlin lunshu (Writing in Turmoil: Qi Biaojia’s Discourse on Mount Yu) (Taipei: Liren shuju, 2006), pp. 93–152.

5. The Chinese texts of the ‘Notes’ quoted in this chapter all refer to the modern reproduction of this edition in the appendix of Zhao Haiyan’s book; see Zhao Haiyan, Yushanzhu yanjiu (A Study on ‘Notes on Mount Yu’) (Hefei: Anhui jiaoyu chubanshe, 2016), pp. 336–393. The English translation is modified from Duncan Campbell, ‘“Footnotes to Allegory Mountain”: Introduction and Translation’, Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes, 19.3–4, 1999, pp. 243–271. Duncan translated the Chinese character yu as ‘allegory’ and the garden’s name as ‘Allegory Mountain’, but I chose not to translate it since yu itself has such an important and complex notion for understanding the garden that it should not be simplified by the translation.

6. The balustrade theatre refers to the commercial theatre built amidst marketplaces, brothel districts, and other urban environments with active commerce and heavy traffic. For the development of private theatres in the late Ming, see He Yuming, Productive space: Performance Texts in the Late Ming. Ph. D. Dissertation (Berkeley: University of California, 2003), pp. 29–49.

7. Wang Jide was an accomplished writer of several literary genres, including drama. His Principles of Lyric Drama is a comprehensive theoretical book of drama aesthetics. See Wang Jide, ‘On Qü’s Being Blessed or Cursed’, Qülu (Principles of Lyric Drama) (Zhihai congshu edition), vol. 4: pp. 35a-36b.

8. Zhao Suwen, Qi Biaojia yanjiu (Studies on Qi Biaojia) (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 2011), pp. 138–206. Zhao has a comprehensive study of the plays Qi Biaojia watched and recorded in his personal diary, with a brief introduction to the plays.

9. Taking the year 1637 as an example, after the Hall was accomplished in the fourth month, such banquets were recorded in Qi, Qi Biaojia riji, pp. 264, 276, 293.

10. Ibid., p. 591. The Belvedere of Complete Pleasure was built after the painting was finished and, therefore could not be found in Painting of Mount Yu. Instead, I marked the Belvedere of Distance to show the multi-storeyed structure of a belvedere.

11. Ibid., p. 730.

12. Cao, Liubian zhong de shuxie, pp. 281–291.

13. The collection of songs is compiled in ‘Yushan youyin’ (Verses of Visiting Mount Yu), Yushan Zhu (Chongzhen edition, Shanghai Museum), pp. 32a-33a.

14. Ibid. The three extracts are respectively from the song by Zhang Dai, Zhang Hong, and Wang Siren.

15. Qi, ‘Yushan zhu’, p. 349.

16. Ibid., p. 347–48. The site name is alluded to the couplets ‘the clouds, unthinking, leave the peaks; the birds, tired of flying, know it is time to return’ in Tao Qian’s ‘The Prose-poem of Returning Home’, a famous poem advocating retiring from public life and returning to rustic simplicity.

17. Duncan Campbell, ‘Qi Biaojia’s “Footnotes to Allegory Mountain”’, pp. 243–271. Extracts with ‘the Master of the Garden’ are on pp. 248, 251, 252, 256, 259, and 262.

18. Qi, ‘Yushan zhu’, p. 341.

19. Ibid., p. 360.

20. Su Shi (1037–1101) was one of China’s greatest poets and essayists, who was also an accomplished painter, calligrapher, and public official.

21. Wang Wei (701–761) was one of the most famous men of arts and letters during the Tang dynasty, known as a model of humanistic education as expressed in poetry, music, and painting.

22. Zhang Dai, ‘Ba Yushan zhu’ (Postscript of ‘Notes on Mount Yu), Langhuan wenji (Literary Collection in Langhuan) (Changsha: Yuelu shushe,1985), pp. 210–211.

23. This passage is originally from the session of ‘Acting and Training’ in Li Yu’s Xianqing ouji (Idle feelings in casual expressions). The quotation refers to the modern reproduction in Li Yu, Li Yu quanji (Complete Works of Li Yu) (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 1991), p. 71.

24. Jiao Xun, Ju shuo (Discourse on Dramas) (Shanghai: Gudian wenxue chubanshe, 1957), p. 128.

25. This story is recorded in Zhang Dafu, Meihua caotang bitan (Notes from the Plum Blossom Thatched Hall) (Shanghai: Shanghai zazhi gongsi, 1936), pp. 51–52. This line by Shao Maoqi is only mentioned in Zhang’s essay.

26. Ibid., pp. 288, 293.

27. Qi, ‘Yushan zhu’, p. 338. The ‘Kingdom of Glazed Glass’ refers to the pure land of the Medicine Buddha, the Vaidūryanirbhāsā.

28. Dardess, ‘A Ming Landscape’, p. 363.

29. For a chronicle study on this aesthetics tradition and its specific influence on landscapes and gardens, see Zou Hui, ‘Jing (景): A Phenomenological Reflection on Chinese Landscape and Qing (情)’, Journal of Chinese Philosophy, 35.2, 2008, pp. 353–68.

30. Dardess, ‘A Ming Landscape’, p. 357.

31. Ibid., p. 15. My translation of this passage is based on Vlopp, Worldly Stage, pp. 75–76.

32. Li Wai-yee, ‘The Late-Ming Moment’, Enchantment and Disenchantment: Love and Illusion in Chinese Literature (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), p. 47.

33. Dardess, ‘A Ming Landscape’, p. 363.

34. Qi, Qi Biaojia riji, p. 275.

35. Qi, ‘Yushan zhu’, p. 339. The Book of Changes is an ancient Chinese divination text and is among the oldest of the Chinese classics. With more than two and a half millennia’s worth of commentary and interpretation, the book is an influential text providing inspiration to religion, philosophy, literature, and art. For the connections between Qi’s interest in this book and his writing of ‘Notes’, see Cao, Liubian zhong de shuxie, pp. 157–159.

36. Li Wai-yee, ‘Gardens and Illusions from Late Ming to Early Qing’. Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 72.2, 2012, p. 334.

37. The chronicle is reprinted and annotated in the appendix of Qi Biaojia, Qi Biaojia riji (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 2016), vol. 3, pp. 845–934. Quotation on p. 891.

38. Ibid.

39. Zhu Yizun, Jingzhiju shihua (Remarks on Poetry from Jingzhiju) (Hangzhou: Fuli shanfang, 1819), vol. 12, pp. 14b-15a. Huang Daozhou is a calligrapher, scholar, and official. He was killed by the Manchu army for his refusal to surrender.

40. Chen Zhenhui, Shanyang lu (Records of Shanyang), reprinted (Taipei: Xin wenfeng chuban gongsi, 1988), p. 707.

41. The association of drama and human life prevailed in 17^th-century China, not only in dramas and fiction but also in other literary works. See Yingzhi Zhao. Realm of Shadows and Dreams: Theatrical and Fictional Lyricism in Early Qing Literature, Ph. D Thesis (Harvard University, 2014), pp. 116–120. Zhao has several examples in early Qing literature to develop her argument on the influence of theatrical culture on the metaphor of life and its interpretation.

42. Zhida, Guiyuan jing (Mirror of the Return to the Origin). CBETA: http://tripitaka.cbeta.org/B18n0097_002. Thus far, scholars have found no record of Zhida outside of the Guiyuan jing. For the contemporary study on Guiyuan jing, see Wang Mengxiao, ‘Building a Pure Land Lineage: A Study of Zhida’s Play Guiyuan jing and a Translation of its Three Paratexts’, Journal of Chinese Buddhist Studies 33, 2020, p. 3, fn. 3.

43. Juelang, Tianjie juelang chanshi quanlu (Complete Works of Master Juelang), vol. 25: pp. 24–25. Buddhist monks using the metaphor of life as a play to enlighten listeners has appeared since the Song Dynasty and was developed in late Ming, under the reinvention of Chan Buddhism and the prosperity of dramas. See Liao Zhaoheng, ‘Chanmen shuoxi: yige fojiao wenhuashi guandian de changshi’ (Discoursing dramas with Buddhist thoughts: an attempt from the perspective of Buddhism cultural history), Hanxue yanjiu (Chinese Studies), 17, 1999, p. 277.

44. Wang, ‘Qi Zhongmingong nianpu’, p. 892. The Belvedere of Plums is not seen in figure 1. Actually, there are diverse versions of the spot where Qi’s body was found in records of his death. According to my investigation of these versions, I assume that the spot should be somewhere around Willow Pathway, as marked in figure 1 here.

45. On July 21, 1645, the regent Dorgon issued an edict ordering all Han men to shave their foreheads and braid the rest of their hair into a queue identical to those worn by the Manchus. People resisted the order and the Qing struck back with deadly force, massacring all who refused to obey. It was seven days prior to Qi’s suicide, so Qi may not have heard about it. The authors writing on his death, however, must have known and struggled with the order.

46. Richard Vinograd, Boundaries of the Self: Chinese Portraits, 1600–1900 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), pp. 31–33. Liu Shi-Yee further articulates the theatricality of Chen’s figure painting with more of Chen’s works in Liu, ‘The World’s a Stage: The Theatricality of Chen Hongshou’s Figure Painting’, Ars Orientalis 35, 2008, pp. 155–191. Chen Hongshou excelled in painting and calligraphy. He gave a brief but vigorous new life and dignity to the art of figure painting.

47. Volpp, Worldly stage, p. 17.

48. Wang Siren, ‘You Yushan ji’ (Account of visiting Mount Yu), Chorography of Mount Yu. Quoted from the secondary source, Zhao, Yushan zhu yanjiu, p. 296.

49. Wang Shimei’s annotation on Zhang Dai, ‘Yushan ming’ (Inscriptions on Mount Yu). Ibid.

50. Chen Qiyuan, ‘Yushan wen’ (Inquiring about Mount Yu). Ibid.

51. Qi, Qi Biaojia riji, p. 824.

52. Ibid., p. 384.

53. John Minford, ‘The Chinese Garden: Death of a Symbol’, Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes,18/3, 1998, p. 260.