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Blank Spaces and Secret Histories: Questions of
Historiographic Epistemology in Medieval China
Jack W. Chen
The Journal of Asian Studies / Volume 69 / Issue 04 / November 2010, pp 1071 - 1091
DOI: 10.1017/S0021911810002883, Published online: 10 November 2010
Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0021911810002883
How to cite this article:
Jack W. Chen (2010). Blank Spaces and Secret Histories: Questions of Historiographic
Epistemology in Medieval China. The Journal of Asian Studies, 69, pp 1071-1091 doi:10.1017/
S0021911810002883
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Blank Spaces and Secret Histories: Questions of
Historiographic Epistemology in Medieval China
JACK W. CHEN
Historiography has long been concerned with the problem of determining stan-
dards for evidence. For traditional Chinese historians, it was Confucius who
provided the model for historical writing. As the attributed author of the
Springs and Autumns, Confucius demonstrated qualities of narratival restraint,
historical factuality, moral profundity, and a refusal to engage in idle specu-
lation. Of course, his model was not an easy one to emulate, and later historical
writings have drawn on both the factual records of the imperial court (which
were not always factual or free of ideological interests) and nonofficial
sources, such as private accounts, anecdotal literature, and hearsay. The
present essay focuses on this intersection between anecdotal sources and histor-
iography. This is precisely the point when historiography must reflect on its nar-
rative condition, as narrative has interests other than factuality or moral truth.
The author shows how the historiographic anxiety over unreliable sources has
often coexisted with a fascination with anecdotal stories and gossip.
HISTORY IS FULL OF gaps and aporias. To write history is to come up against thelimits of not only what can be known, but also what can be reliably known.
This is the epistemological condition of historiography, which must not only verify
the accuracy of archival documents, but also negotiate the use of oral traditions,
anecdotal literature, and hearsay with the end of resolving these gaps and aporias.
However, if the state archives and its documentary records represent one order
of epistemic certitude, then the anecdotal tale or item of gossip represents a very
different order of knowledge, one that issues from sources outside of the central
state’s sphere of control. Neither anecdote nor gossip belongs to the discursive
registers of the documents that serve as the state’s memory of itself; rather,
both are born in the networks that crisscross civil society.
As private, unofficial sources of information, such materials contest and com-
plicate the official historical narratives, serving, in Lionel Gossman’s words, as a
kind of “counter-history,” one that threatens to reveal the private scandals that
those in power would rather keep secret. As Gossman also reminds us, the
term “anecdote,” one of the key terms of the present essay, derives from the
JackW. Chen (jwchen@humnet.ucla.edu) is Assistant Professor in the Department of Asian Languages and Cul-
tures at the University of California, Los Angeles.
The Journal of Asian Studies Vol. 69, No. 4 (November) 2010: 1071–1091.
© The Association for Asian Studies, Inc., 2010 doi:10.1017/S0021911810002883
Greek anekdota, meaning “unpublished items” (2003, 152–53)—an etymology
that speaks to the genre’s shifting relationship between the spheres of private
and public, as well as to the workings of gossip. To be sure, no anecdote can
be truly “unpublished”; once it takes the form of anecdote, then it is already in
the public sphere, as a narrative that reproduces itself in the telling and retelling,
circulating along the gossiping networks of the social community.
For traditional China, the “unpublished” aspect of anecdote is a useful model
for examining the tension between public knowledge, which was articulated
along the vertical axes of state hegemonic power, and private knowledge,
which circulated along what might be considered the horizontal axes of societal
relationships and networks. Not surprisingly, the latter form occasioned moral
rebuke, as can be seen in the Analects, where Confucius says, “To hear it on
the roads and to pass it along in the streets is to abandon virtue” (Lunyu jishi,
35.1221). The problem is that the originating source of gossip is never named;
it is always something heard “on the road,” already in the process of circulation
from one’s mouth to another’s ear. In this way, gossip is, unlike the archivist’s
records, beyond the task of verification. Gossip could serve as a dangerous
weapon, as, for the victim of such talk, there could be no simple way to
answer misrepresentations or to justify oneself. With the tale always already in
circulation, gossip would seemingly be present everywhere within the social
networks.
Here, we might pause briefly to consider how anecdote and gossip might be
differentiated, as they often have overlapping meanings. Gossip, according to
Patricia Meyer Spacks, is a particular mode of talk, one that takes place “at the
intersection of the social and the individual,” “serving social purposes, defining
social opinion, embodying social power (the power of opinion), but issuing
from individual mouths and tracing psychic agendas” (1985, 8). It is not simply
a matter of idle talk, but operates at the heart of the social economy, delineating
the networks through which information and moral judgments are given and
received. Indeed, what many anthropological studies have emphasized is how
gossiping is integral to the formation and reinforcement of the community,
which relies on gossip to articulate social values and to perpetuate the relational
cohesion of its members (Gluckman 1963; Merry 1984). The networks along
which gossip travel are themselves created by gossip, for the purpose of gossip-
ing. This is another way of making anthropologist Robin Dunbar’s point concern-
ing the origins of human language: “Our much-vaunted capacity for language
seems to be used mainly for exchanging information on social matters; we
seem obsessed with gossiping about one another” (1998, 6–7). That is, gossip
cannot be reduced to the abandoning of virtue; rather, it is a form of social epis-
temology, a way of both knowing and belonging to community.
Anecdote, like gossip, is also embedded within particular communities of
knowledge. Anecdotes often relate to a person’s biography, focusing on an
episode in a well-known person’s life and serving as a representative narrative,
1072 Jack W. Chen
which captures some essential aspect of the person concerned. However, the
anecdote, unlike gossip, is a genre of discourse, not a discursive mode, because
it is the narrative form of anecdote that defines it. That is, if gossip is information
about a known person or persons that is divulged with a particular network, then
anecdote is the narrative form that gossip might take. Anecdote thus becomes the
literary vehicle of gossip, as its main interest is not the functional circulation of
social information, but the aesthetic pleasure that is taken both in telling and
in being told.
For historiography, the question of aesthetic pleasure raises a number of
troubling points, as the motivations of anecdote might not be born out of a
desire to tell the factual truth, but out of an interest in narrative. In traditional
China, because the writing of history was very much bound up with matters of
state ideology, theclaim to factuality was inextricable from the universalizing
claims of dynastic authority. Beginning with the Tang dynasty, the compilation
of official histories would become an effective instrument of political and cultural
reimagination, as they allowed the newly founded dynasty to narrate the course of
the past. Narrative style was mostly a secondary consideration, as narrative served
as a vehicle for the articulation of historical truth, not as an end in itself. Yet
where the official histories drew on anecdotal sources, one finds a complication
of historiographic ideology and the epistemological standards that governed the
state’s self-justifications—a complication that, moreover, calls attention to the
narrative fact of history. This constellation of historiography, epistemology, and
narrative form is what underlies the present study.
I will begin by discussing the historiographic arguments that sought to guar-
antee a completely factual history, whether through claims of absolute certainty
or by being modeled on the Confucian Classics. Then, I will provide a detailed
discussion of two separate examples that foreground the role of anecdotal
materials in the official histories. The first will involve a comparison of the biogra-
phies of the poet Meng Haoran (689–740) in the Jiu Tang shu (Old History of the
Tang) with the Xin Tang shu (New History of the Tang). The second will concern
the more complicated case of the poet-official Li Yi (748–ca. 829), who also has
biographies in both Tang histories but, more problematically, is the subject of a
Tang tale (chuanqi). I will conclude the essay with a discussion of this pseudo-
history, which serves both as an explanation of an aporetic moment in the official
biographies and as a commentary on the problem of anecdotal gossip in the offi-
cial record.
BLANK SPACES AND SAGELY INTENTIONS
Anxiety over the records of history and what might be known about the past
has a long history in China. The Analects contains one of the earliest statements
concerning historiography and the problem of sources:
Blank Spaces and Secret Histories 1073
The Master said: “I have previously encountered [the practice of] blank
spaces left by scribes, [which are like] those who had horses [they them-
selves could not drive] and so loaned them out to others to drive [and so
tame them]. But now, no one does this anymore!” (Lunyu jishi, 32.1112)
How this analogy works is far from self-evident. What Confucius is saying is that
the scribes (shi) of the past would have left lacunae just as they were and not
engaged in guesswork or speculation because they lacked the necessary knowl-
edge to correct the missing characters. In this way, the scribes were just like
horse owners who would let trained horsemen drive the untamed animals,
rather than attempting to drive them themselves, because the horse owners
lacked the necessary expertise. Historical knowledge is fragile, and in the texts
transmitted to the Zhou, it had already been contaminated by those charged
with its preservation. What the unfaithful scribe did was not to repair the frag-
mented records of history, but to erase knowledge of the fragmentation
through a fiction of restoration. The historical record would no longer be an auth-
entic trace of the past, and thus could never again promise epistemological
certainty.
Against the corrupting practices of the scribes, Confucius provided an
exemplary model for historiography, as he was traditionally considered the
author of the Chunqiu (Springs and Autumns). Though the Chunqiu was little
more than a chronological accounting of political events and portents, engaging
in neither narration nor characterization, it was nevertheless seen as containing
the moral judgments of Confucius through its selection of terminology and
arrangement of events (Ng and Wang 2005, 16–30; Watson 1958, 75–83). More-
over, whereas the silences of the ancient scribes signified a lack of knowledge, the
omissions of the Chunqiu were understood as acts of censure and censorship by
the historian. In this way, the full import of the historical work far exceeded its
legible text, positing a signified that could not be adequately represented by its
signifiers. To put it another way, the Chunqiu allowed for a potentially unending
production of meaning, because what was not recorded—the negative space of
the text—was infinite. Such a model of meaning production was only possible
because the Chunqiu was the work of a sage, and as such, it was to be read as
scripture first, and history second.
What is now called the history of historiography (shixueshi) was in early
China closely bound to the history of classical learning ( jingxueshi). Indeed, it
was the Classics that provided epistemological and moral stability (Hu 2003,
30–49) to other branches of learning. With the death of Confucius, who was
both the historical embodiment of classical learning and the exemplary historian,
the separation of historiography from the Classics would be inevitable. Even the
Shi ji (Records of the Historian), completed by the great historian Sima Qian
(145–ca. 86 BCE), would be open to criticism for not having been modeled on
the Classics.
1074 Jack W. Chen
On this point, the Northern Song statesman and scholar Ouyang Xiu (1007–
72) wrote that “[a]fter Confucius died, the contending strands of discourse again
arose, and the Zhou house fell increasingly into chaos and decline. Reaching the
Warring States Period, after Qin burned the books, the way of the sage-kings
came to an end.”Without a sage like Confucius to act as moral and epistemologi-
cal arbiter, there was an explosion of texts, each of which claimed to transmit the
secret teachings of Confucius’s disciples. Scholars based themselves on these
pretenders to sagely veracity, instead of on the correct foundations laid by Con-
fucius, and thus worsened a bad situation by proliferating heterodox theories.
Parallel to this process of intellectual decline was the rise of gossip-mongering
historians:
As for curiosity-loving gentlemen of broad learning, they set to work on
the abundant hearsay and so thought themselves the most accomplished.
Thus did they exhaustively compile all kinds of discourse, but from the
very start, they did not discriminate in what they selected, and only
feared leaving things out—such a work was Sima Qian’s Records of the
Historian. (“Diwang shici tu xu,” in Ouyang Xiu quanji, 41.591–92; cf.
Liu 1967, 101)
In this environment of standardless scholarship, Sima Qian’s failure lay in his
eagerness to compose as complete an account as he could, incorporating
legends, anecdotes, and other materials of doubtful veracity. In contrast,
Ouyang Xiu praises Confucius for his restraint, writing elsewhere that the sage
“did not exhaustively plumb what was difficult to clarify in the distant past,
thereby depending on what he could obtain and thus compiling the work”
(“Chunqiu huowen,” in Ouyang Xiu quanji, 18.310). The austerity of the
Chunqiu stands in stark contrast to the Shi ji, which purchased its comprehen-
siveness at the cost of evidential rigor.
EPISTEMOLOGICAL STABILITY AND THE STATE
It was during the Han that the argument for absolute fidelity to historical fact
was most forcefully articulated. Ban Gu (32–92 CE), in his Han shu (History of
the Han Dynasty), described what would perhaps become the most influential
image of historiography:
Kings of ancient times, in generation after generation, had scribal offi-
cials. The sovereign’s every act had to be written down. This was the
reason why he was cautious in word and deed and clarified his rule
and model. The scribe of the left recorded words; the scribe of the
right recorded events. Events were [the basis of] the Springs and
Autumns; words were [the basis of] the Esteemed Documents [Shang
Blank Spaces and Secret Histories 1075
shu]. Of rulers and kings,there were none who did not act in the same
way. (Han shu, 30.1715)
The Han shu passage presents the recording scribe as a moral counterweight to
the ruler who might lose himself in debauchery if not checked by the thought of
history’s moral judgment. Ban Gu refers to a fable of absolute documentation in
which the king’s words are recorded by the left-hand scribe, while the king’s
deeds are recorded by the right-hand scribe. This division between word and
deed, then, serves to explain the origins of the two historical works that achieved
scriptural status in the Han: the Chunqiu, which recorded events, and the Shang
shu, which preserved the speeches of ancient kings and worthies.
However, the promise of absolute factual certainty can only be made when
the writer is at the scene of the event, and this points to the difference
between the charge given to the king’s scribe and that given to the historian.1
If the role of the scribe is merely to write, filling the empty bamboo strips and
silk scrolls with the words and acts of another, then that of the historian is to
fill the empty rolls with the interpretation of evidence that he has collected
from reading documents in the archives. The scribe does not interpret, not
even to repair the occasional lacuna. However, because the past is itself lacuna,
the historian is bound to the work of evidentiary selection, evaluation, and
narrativization.
In this way, the work of the historian is rife with epistemological instability,
because he cannot possess the absolute certainty of Ban Gu’s scribes. For Liu
Xie (ca. 465–ca. 521), author of the literary treatise Wenxin diaolong (Literary
Mind and Carved Dragons), it was precisely this problem that informed his
chapter “Shi zhuan” (On Historical Accounts). There, Liu Xie argues that the his-
torian must base himself on canonical standards and a deep knowledge of the
hundred philosophers. Liu Xie imagines the historian as the noetic double of
the emperor: just as the emperor rules over the entire empire, the historian scru-
tinizes the documents of the entire empire from his office in the capital. All
recorded knowledge, past and present, is to pass before his eyes, so that the
resulting work might serve as a “mirror of Yin,” as a reflecting glass for the sover-
eign, by which the reasons behind the rise and fall of states could be understood
(Liu 1989, 16.602).
Still, the temporal distance between the original event and the writing of the
account, as well as between the writing of the account and its later reading, is
what underlies the epistemological problem of historical narrative. If absolute
factuality is no longer possible for the historian, who only learns about things
1Though the functions of “scribe” and “historian” are both encompassed by the term shi, I want to
make clear that I am not drawing a historical distinction between the two functions or arguing for a
historical evolution from one function to the other. The history of the term shi is rather compli-
cated, and much ink has been devoted to tracing its etymology and meaning (see Ng and Wang
2005, 2–9).
1076 Jack W. Chen
secondhand, then something else must guarantee that the writing of history does
not slip into fictionalization or personal opinion. It is here that Liu Xie appeals to
the model of the Classics and to the sagely Confucius, writing, “Thus, in establish-
ing moral principle and selecting words, one ought to rely on the Classics to
establish the standard; and in encouragement and admonition or approval and
disapproval, one should depend upon the Sage to keep to the fundamentals”
(16.604). If historiography was to be modeled on the Classics and the teachings
of Confucius, then the problem of subjectivity would be minimized.
Yet, while historiography might be based in the moral orthodoxy of scripture,
the epistemological problems of historical accounts remain. Later in the same
chapter, Liu Xie writes, “As for seeking and narrating the ages of the distant
past, the more distant the age, the more false reports.” He points to Gongyang
Gao, author of the catechisticChunqiu commentaryGongyang zhuan (Gongyang
Tradition), who states, “What is transmitted exists in variant texts,” and then to
Xunzi, who notes, “The distant past is inscribed [in detail], but the recent past
only sketched out.” The argument turns here to the distortions of history by
writers who rely on unreliable accounts to compose their works. It is the temporal
interval between the event and the writing of the account that worries Liu Xie, as
there is often little to verify the claims made by the oldest documents in the
archives. Gongyang Gao draws attention to the problem of textual corruption,
while the philosopher Xunzi notes that accounts of the past tend to be exhaus-
tively detailed, whereas recent histories rather more sparse. Liu Xie then writes,
Whenever the text is in doubt, then omit it; this is to honor credible
history. However, the vulgar all cherish the extraordinary and none of
them pay attention to facts and true principles. In transmitting hearsay,
they will want to embellish the matter; in inscribing the distant past,
they will want to be detailed in the particulars. Thus they discard the
everyday and take up the weird, boring and drilling to prop up conjec-
ture, [saying] “what the old histories do not have, my book will transmit!”
This is the source of error and fabulation, the great injury [literally,
“woodworm”] to transmitting accounts. (16.609; cf. Shih 1959, 83–94)
This, according to Liu Xie, is the result of an uncritical historiographic attitude,
one that not only admits doubtful material, but, even worse, actively delights in
the weird and in untenable hearsay. Indeed, one might consider this a particular
problem of narrative enjoyment, as it is the delight in the telling that leads the
corrupting historian to transmit what the old histories saw fit to omit.
Historiography’s dilemma is born of its reliance on narrative—which is to say,
on storytelling—insofar as narrative contains within it the elements of fictivity
and dramatic invention. To be sure, as Andrew H. Plaks has argued, “the distinc-
tion between truth-telling and fabrication fails to constitute a clear generic
demarcation in the Chinese context” (1977, 316), a point that has been taken
Blank Spaces and Secret Histories 1077
up and elaborated by others (cf. Lu 1994, 37–52). Still, it is precisely the seduc-
tion of fictive construction that worries Liu Xie, because it raises once more the
problems of evidential reliability and the historian’s selection of sources. It is bad
enough that anecdotal tales of the weird and strange enter into the historical
record; what is worse is how the enthusiastic historian strives to increase the
effects of such fantastic accounts by adding details that he can neither verify
nor confirm.
Once historiography became the province of the state, however, such ques-
tions could not remain unresolved, at least not on the level of official ideology.
The establishment of the Bureau of Historiography at the start of the Tang
was intended not only to ensure accuracy in the preparation of the dynastic his-
tories, but also to locate the activities of historians within the public sphere of the
imperial court (Hung 1960). According to the Tang liudian (Six Official Divisions
of the Tang), the historians “were neither to give empty praise nor to conceal
wickedness, but to make a straightforward record of affairs.” All omens, geo-
graphical demarcations, genealogical information, and other matters relating to
the court or empire were “to be based on the court diaries of activity and
repose and the records of contemporary governance, which are made into the
veritable records and thereafter set forth in the form of annals, for the
purpose of praise and censure” (Li 1992, 9.281; also in Jiu Tang shu, 43.1853;
cf. Twitchett 1992,13–14). The systematicity that the Tang liudian ascribes to
the compilation of history is an attempt to control the reliability and truthfulness
of the historical record, so that the final product—the official history—would be
based solely on the objective, contemporary accounts of the same dynasty. At the
same time, because it is from the perspective of the court diaries that the
accounts of the dynastic portents, geographic regions, and events are filtered,
the focus of the resulting history is firmly centered on those directly involved
in the operations of power. In this way, matters extraneous to the state’s interests
would not contaminate the official record of the age.
THE USES OF ANECDOTE
The description of the Bureau of Historiography was certainly no less ideal-
ized than the fable of the two recording scribes. Even in the Han shu, one finds
Ban Gu moderately tolerant of the inclusion of the scholastic tradition of “minor
talk” (xiaoshuo) among the other traditions. He first cites the judgment of Con-
fucius, who said, “Though it is a minor way [of learning], there surely is something
in it worth examining. But if one were to take it too far, I fear one might become
impeded, and it is for this reason that the gentleman does not engage in this.” Ban
Gu’s own position is somewhat more positive: “Though this may be the case, one
should not allow [such writings] to be obliterated. That which those of scant
knowledge in the villages arrived at can also be compiled and so not forgotten”
1078 Jack W. Chen
(Han shu, 30.1745; cf. Campany 1996, 132). What Ban Gu means by “minor talk”
is not “fiction,” but the sayings and miscellaneous anecdotes of the common folk
as collected and written down by others. There may be a folk wisdom of sorts to
be found here, and so he does not want to discard such works altogether, though
it is clear that he remains rather ambivalent.
By contrast, the Tang historian Liu Zhiji (661–721) takes a much more posi-
tive view of anecdote. Liu Zhiji helped to compile and revise veritable records for
four reigns (Pulleyblank 1961, 136–41; Twitchett 1992, 128–37). He is best
remembered as the author of the encyclopedic work Shi tong (Historiography
Comprehended). In the chapter entitled “Zashu” (Miscellaneous Accounts),
Liu Zhiji argues for the inclusion of anecdotal materials, gossip, and other unof-
ficial forms of historical writing. He writes that “‘unofficial records’ and ‘trivial
talk’ themselves formed a scholastic tradition” and “these can be consulted and
circulated alongside the official histories” (Shitong tongshi, 10.34.273). This is,
to be sure, a departure from the historiographic ideals articulated both by Con-
fucius and by the Tang bureaucratic code that defined the historian’s official
duties. Nevertheless, the model of historiographic inclusiveness described by
Liu Zhiji was a truer description of official historical writing than the fantasy of
absolute factuality. Anecdotes of uncertain reliability often found their way into
the dynastic records of both earlier and later periods, not only so that the histori-
cal record would be more complete, but also for less rationalizable motives, such
as the historian’s personal interests or even a fascination with particular figures
and stories.
Scholars have noted how, in the Northern Song (960–1127), the collection
and publication of anecdotal material became widespread among the literary
elite. Of particular importance was the pronounced interest in “notebook jot-
tings” (biji), which had a discernable effect on the historical works compiled in
the Song (see Hargett 2002, 560–65; Lee 1991, 197–220; Lee 2002). This devel-
opment has particular significance when one compares the two dynastic histories
of the Tang. As the Qing historian Zhao Yi (1727–1814) wrote, “In the age of
chaos in the Five Dynasties, because no one recorded and transmitted the uncol-
lected hearsay and bygone matters of the Tang, and because no one collected and
preserved the fragmented chapters and old volumes, even though edicts were
issued to seek out and purchase them, what was obtained was not much”
(1984, 17.358). Zhao’s explanation for why the Jiu Tang shu used less anecdotal
material than the Xin Tang shu is largely sociopolitical, rather than historio-
graphic. For Zhao Yi, it is not that the historians of the Five Dynasties period
rejected anecdotes and gossip, but that there was little available for them to use.
The Song historians, by contrast, had the luxury of time and social stability,
and so were able to embark on large and small-scale scholarly projects, which
greatly increased the amount of materials from which historians could draw
(cf. Zhang 1999). What Zhao Yi does not discuss, however, is the interval of
the two centuries between the end of the Tang and the reign of Song Renzong
Blank Spaces and Secret Histories 1079
(r. 1022–63), and what this means for the reliability of such evidence. If such
records were not already part of the Tang and Five Dynasties historical record,
they would have survived into the Song in the form of scattered anecdotes in frag-
ments and private accounts, or, more problematically, by means of oral trans-
mission and cultural memory. Therefore, their appearance in the official
history of the Tang would implicitly argue for the acceptance of transmitted
gossip without corroborating archival evidence.
The historians given charge of the Xin Tang shu were Song Qi (998–1061)
and Ouyang Xiu—who, as we have seen, was an admirer of the Chunqiu. Song
Qi had initiated work on the Xin Tang shu but could not complete it; he was
responsible for many of the biographical chapters. Ouyang Xiu was then sum-
moned to complete the history, writing the other chapters (Egan 1984, 76;
Hao 2006, 33–37; Huang, 1985; Liu 1967, 106). Even though the two historians
sought to improve on the Jiu Tang shu, the resulting work was considered inferior
by contemporaries such as Sima Guang (1019–86) and Wu Zhen (fl. eleventh
century) (Liu 1967, 108; Yang 1961, 54). Wu Zhen made a particular point of
citing how the Song compilers “overly sought out ‘minor talk’ but did not
make careful selections” (1966, 2).
This issue is manifest in the Xin Tang shu’s biography of the poet Meng
Haoran, which is several times the length of the poet’s biography found in the
Jiu Tang shu. Both of these are found in the group biographies of Tang literary
men.2 As the account from the Jiu Tang shu is short, I will quote it in full:
Meng Haoran was a recluse on Deer Gate Mountain, and amused
himself with his poetry. At the age of forty, he traveled to the capital,
and as he did not place in the examinations, he returned to Xiangyang.
When Zhang Jiuling oversaw Jingzhou, he posted Meng as one of his
retinue so Meng could compose poems with him; however, Meng died
before becoming successful. (Jiu Tang shu, 190b.5050)
The Xin Tang shu begins with some of the same details, but, interestingly, it notes
that Meng’s style-name was “Haoran” and that, as a young man, “he loved
[upholding] principle and righteousness, and delighted in rescuing people
from difficulties.” What then follows are four distinct anecdotes from Meng’s
life (and afterlife):
Once he composed a poem in the Imperial Academy; everyone in attend-
ance sighed with admiration, and no one dared to dispute him. Zhang
Jiuling and Wang Wei praised him in elegant terms. Wang Wei privately
invited him to the inner offices [of the Hanlin Academy]; suddenly,
Emperor Xuanzong arrived, and Haoran hid under a bed. Wang Wei
told the truth to the emperor, and the emperor, delighted, said, “We
2On group biographies, see Hans H. Frankel (1962, 65–83).
1080 Jack W. Chen
have heard of this person but never met him; why should he be fearful
and hide?” He commanded Haoran to come out. The emperor asked
him for a poem. Haoran repeatedly thanked him and personallychanted something he had written; when he reached the line, “Not
being talented, the wise ruler rejects me,” the emperor said, “As you
have not sought a position, We have never rejected you why should
you slander me?” So, the emperor had him sent back.
The Investigation Commissioner Han Chaozong agreed to accompany
Haoran to the capital, wanting to recommend him at court. It happened
that an old friend arrived, and Haoran had great fun drinking heavily with
him. Someone said, “You andMaster Han have an appointment.”Haoran
sneered, saying, “I’m already drinking; why bother worry about other
things?” In the end, he didn’t go. Chaozong was furious and took his
leave, but Haoran didn’t regret it. When Zhang Jiuling was in charge
of Jingzhou, he posted Haoran nearby in the administration, but
Haoran quit. At the end of the Kaiyuan reign [713–41], he grew sick
from an abscess and died.
Afterwards, Fan Ze became a military commissioner, and at that time,
Haoran’s funerary stele was in disrepair. Fu Zai petitioned Ze with a
memorandum, saying, “Regarding the deceased retired scholar Meng
Haoran, his literary style had a surpassing beauty. It has been a long
time since the year he died. His descendents have fizzled out and the
grave mounds are in ruins. I have long grieved for that man, and when
traveling on those roads I have felt sorrow. The previous official
wanted to rebuild it with a great tomb, and when the gentry of the
entire province heard the tidings, they were stirred to action.
However, presently, [the province is] hard-pressed by military affairs
externally and busy with distinguished guests internally; this uses up
the income, and moreover, there is not any leisure. If there happen to
be people who are interested in this matter, let them carry out the old
intention of the official.” Ze then recarved a stele south of Phoenix
Forest Mountain and bestowed honors upon the grave.
At the beginning, when Wang Wei passed through Yingzhou, he drew
a likeness of Haoran on the prefect’s pavilion; because of this, it was
called “Haoran Pavilion.” In the middle of the Xiantong reign [860–
73], Prefect Zheng Xian said that a worthy’s personal name should not
be used to indicate [the building] and changed the sign to read “Meng
Pavilion.” (Xin Tang shu, 203.5779–80; cf. Frankel 1981; Kroll 1981,
13–18)
It is clear that the Xin Tang shu is operating under a different set of historio-
graphic principles than the Jiu Tang shu, which regarded Meng Haoran as a
famed poet without political accomplishments. In the Song dynasty retelling,
anecdotal narratives do not merely supplement the original biography; they trans-
form it in such a way that Meng Haoran’s life, death, and afterlife are epitomized
Blank Spaces and Secret Histories 1081
through anecdote. This is the basic structure of the text: (1) Meng Haoran is
introduced and leaves for the capital at the advanced age of forty; (2) he and
his more successful friend Wang Wei encounter the emperor, with disastrous
results; (3) he rejects the help of Han Chaozong, finds employment under
Zhang Jiuling, and dies; (4) his funerary stele is repaired by Fan Ze; and (5) a
story is related to explain why a certain pavilion bears Meng’s name.
While the anecdotes are told in a chronological fashion, there is little sense of
emplotment between the episodes. If this is the narrative of a person’s life and
career, it is one that is told only in fragments, as if by imperfect memory.
More troubling is the striking inconsistency of his name, “Haoran,” which is
first identified as a style-name (zi), but, at the end, as his personal name
(ming). Nevertheless, one is able to see aspects of Meng Haoran’s personality
that would otherwise have been neglected in a more standard biography. In
the best known of the anecdotes, Meng’s hiding under the bed and Wang
Wei’s blurting of the truth portray a human moment of anxiety, duty, and tragico-
medy. The usual purposes of state historiography are suspended, even while the
main actors consist of figures of interest to the writing of imperial history—that is,
an emperor, a leading official, and a recluse. What the Song version preserves are
the traces of a departed social world, rather than of narratives of political
significance.
It is precisely on this point that the account raises a pressing question of evi-
dential reliability. One might well ask who transmitted this story, as the details
would only have been known to Wang Wei, the Emperor Xuanzong, and Meng
himself. No one else is mentioned in the anecdote, and so, despite the dynastic
history’s inherent claim to epistemic certainty, there is no verifiable source for the
anecdotes. Indeed, this information belongs not so much to the realm of history
as it does to that of gossip, to an oral culture of storytelling that survived through
the emerging Song interest in collecting and preserving such materials.
SECRET HISTORIES AND SOCIAL NETWORKS
If Song Qi and Ouyang Xiu included doubtful information in Meng Haoran’s
biography, they would be more cautious with regard to the life of the poet and
official Li Yi (748–ca. 829), who has biographies in the two Tang histories and
serves as the subject of a Tang pseudo-historical tale by Jiang Fang (fl. 806–
25). As the two official biographies are quite similar, I will only quote the Jiu
Tang shu version, adding details from the Xin Tang shu where relevant:
Li Yi was a descendant in the clan of Li Kui, prime minister at the time of
the court of Emperor Suzong [r. 756–62]. He attained the rank of the
“presented scholar” and excelled at composing songs and poetry. At
the end of the Zhenyuan Period [785–804], he was the equal in fame
1082 Jack W. Chen
of his clansman Li He [790–816]. Every time he composed a piece, he
would be sent bribes by musicians of the Imperial Music Academy,
who sought to obtain them to sing as lyrics in court ceremonies. His
“Song of the Soldier” and “Setting Out Early” were painted on standing
screens by enthusiasts. The lines, “Before Huile Peak, sand is as if snow /
Outside of Shouxiang City, the moon seems like frost,” were lyrics sung
by the entire world. However, in his youth, Li Yi suffered from mental
imbalance and was much given to suspicion and jealousy, locking up
his wife and concubines and treating them with excessive cruelty. How
he scattered ashes [on the floor] and bolted the doors was known
[wen] throughout the age, and thus people of the time called morbid jea-
lousy “Li Yi’s sickness.” Because of this, for a long time he was not
selected for posting, while his peers all held prestigious offices. Yi was
discontent and traveled north to the region north of the Yellow River,
where Liu Ji of Youzhou installed him as an attendant. He often gave
Ji poems, and among them, there was the following line: “I do not
climb towers for gazing upon the capital.”
Emperor Xianzong [r. 805–20] had long heard of Li Yi’s reputation and
summoned him back from Hebei, employing him as the Vice-Director of
the Palace Library and appointing him as a scholar in the Academy of
Scholarly Worthies. Li Yi viewed himself as being both talented and well-
connected. Many were those whom he insulted, and could not be toler-
ated by the others. A remonstrance official cited the line from his
Youzhou poem, and Li Yi was demoted in rank and removed from his
post. Soon afterwards, he was again employed in the Palace Library,
transferred to serve as Advisor to the Crown Prince and the Supervisor
to the Academy of Scholarly Worthies, and promoted to Cavalier
Attendant-in-Ordinary on the Right. At the outset of the Dahe reign
[826–40], he retired from his position as Minister of Rites and died.
(137.3771–72)
In the Xin Tang shu, Li Yi’s biography is found in the collective biographies of
literary figures. The details are mostly the same, with two exceptions. First,
whereas the Jiu Tang shu quotesthe offending lines from Li Yi’s poem, the
Xin Tang shu merely notes that, “Once he gave [Liu] Ji a poem, the language
of which was filled with resentment.” Second, the Xin Tang shu ends with the
comment, “At the time, there was also Li Yi, the Crown Prince’s son by concu-
bine, and thus the world spoke of ‘Literary Li Yi’ in order to differentiate the
two” (203.5784–85).
Unlike the biographies of Meng Haoran, the two accounts of Li Yi cover
roughly the same ground. There are several moments in both accounts when
the narratives seem about to engage in the recounting of anecdote or gossip,
including the suggestive mention of “Li Yi’s sickness.” However, the historians
do not allow themselves to be distracted from the overall narrative of Li Yi’s pol-
itical career, and indeed, they only include the brief mention to explain his slow
Blank Spaces and Secret Histories 1083
promotion, and not to relate an interesting tale. It is the third account of Li Yi, the
chuanqi entitled “Huo Xiaoyu zhuan” (Account of Huo Xiaoyu), that fills in the
untold story of Li Yi’s morbid jealousy and cruelty toward women. It is this nar-
rative that also serves as an unexpected commentary on the very epistemological
mode that official history cannot recognize, as the source of the knowledge is
neither the archival memory of the state, nor the public sphere of official
career and reputation.
The narrative of “Huo Xiaoyu” begins with the historical setting of the tale,
recounting that, in the Dali period (766–79), there was a Mr. Li Yi who went
to the capital of Chang’an to await examination by the Ministry of Personnel.
The narrative follows a common romance plot in which a talented young man
(often awaiting the capital examinations) falls in love with a beautiful woman
(sometimes a courtesan) but breaks her heart once he has achieved success in
the examinations. The social disparity between the male and female protagonists
is important to the culture of romance, as the relationship is not one that can lead
to a socially sanctioned marriage. In “Huo Xiaoyu,” Li Yi seeks out a suitable lover
among the famous courtesans, but he cannot find one to help him while away the
time before he wins a government position. He engages a procuress named Miss
Bao the Eleventh to help him, and she identifies as the perfect match: “the
youngest daughter of the former Prince Huo, named ‘Xiaoyu’” (Li Fang 1961,
487.4006). Huo Xiaoyu is a true demimondaine, one who is actually born into
the ambiguous social space between the worlds of the elite and of servitude:
no less than the daughter of a maidservant and the fourteenth son of the founding
emperor Tang Gaozu (r. 618–26).3
What locates this narrative firmly in the register of gossip is its insistence on
the social community and the acquaintanceship or social recognition of persons
within that community. Like Li Yi, Xiaoyu is seeking a love match. When she is
told of Li Yi by Miss Bao, it turns out that she has already heard of the young
student’s fame and talent. When Li Yi goes to her house to meet her, even the
maid charged with receiving him recognizes him. Furthermore, it turns out
that Xiaoyu is fond of reciting Li Yi’s poetry. Stephen Owen notes that this
story “belongs to a minority of fictional romances in which report of the other
precedes the encounter”—more common, as he notes, are those stories in
which the lovers meet by accident (1996, 136). However, it is also clear that
the veracity of the report must be confirmed in the eventual encounter, that evi-
dence must substantiate the claim. Hence, Xiaoyu’s mother, Jingchi, must first
look Li Yi over, saying to him, “Previously I have heard that you, Master Li the
Tenth, was possessed of refined talent and bearing; now that I have seen the ele-
gance of your appearance and manner, I realize that the reputation hides no
worthless person” (Li 1961, 487.4007). Even as the tale relates a narrative that
3There may be some problems with this genealogy as noted in Li Jianguo (1993, 452).
1084 Jack W. Chen
cannot be found in the annals of the dynasty, it nevertheless tropes on the epis-
temological expectations of historiography, ensuring that the hearsay of repu-
tation is confirmed by some performance of proof, however conventional or
even ironic.
The narrative then proceeds to the scene of love making. After they enjoy
one another, Huo begins to weep with the knowledge that a love match like
this cannot last, that eventually Li Yi will cast her aside and move on to a respect-
able marriage. Li Yi pledges that he will never leave her, asking to commit his
vows to silk and brush. She immediately stops weeping and produces the necess-
ary articles, whereupon he makes conventional vows of fidelity. The story relates,
“Each line was suffused with his sincerity and ardor, and those who heard it were
moved” (487.4008). More remarkable than Li Yi’s vows is how, even in this most
private of scenes, there is the presence of a social community, one that judges and
reacts to the actions of the protagonists (Owen 1996, 142).
Once Li Yi passes the higher examination, Xiaoyu says to him, “Because of my
lord’s reputation for talent and status, there are many people who admire you,
and those who desire to enter into a marriage alliance with you certainly will
be numerous.” Pressing in on the fragile space of romance is the normative
power of society: Li Yi cannot remain attached to a courtesan forever, despite
his vow to Xiaoyu, but will have to accept his posting and enter into marriage.
She asks him to spend eight more years with her, at the end of which time she
will enter a nunnery and leave the social world behind. This is a possible
closure for the narrative and the ending desired by Xiaoyu, though it is not to be.
As Xiaoyu feared, Li leaves her to attempt to raise money for his impending
wedding to the high-ranking Lu family, betraying his vow to return to her by a
particular date. The narrative notes that Li Yi, “through silence and withholding
news from her, he wanted to end her hopes.” Xiaoyu is not to be deterred, though
she finds little success: “Since the student missed the appointed date, Xiaoyu
repeatedly sought tidings and information, but the baseless rumors and false
reports were different from day to day” (Li 1961, 487.4008). Indeed, Xiaoyu
uses up all of her wealth, pawning her remaining possessions in the hope of
discovering his whereabouts, and wasting away from grief. However, the social
networks that she can buy into are no longer the social networks within which
Li Yi now resides, as he has closed those avenues to her. That is, gossip fails to
bring news of her faithless lover because he is no longer a part of her social
community.
Nevertheless, her expenditure of wealth leads to her own recognition within
her community. A jade worker identifies a jade hairpin that Xiaoyu’s maidservant
is attempting to pawn for her mistress, exclaiming that it is one that he once made
for “the youngest daughter of Prince Huo.” The maidservant then recounts the
story to the jade worker, who leads her to the manor of Princess Yanxian, to
whom the story is recounted a second time. The recognition of the hairpin
leads to Xiaoyu’s recognition by the social community, and once the community
Blank Spaces and Secret Histories 1085
comes together to support Huo Xiaoyu, she is resituated within the social net-
works of the Tang capital.
Li Yi now returns to the capital and, hoping to avoid Huo Xiaoyu, finds lod-
gings in an obscure corner of the city. Li’s cousin, who owes a past debt of grati-
tude to Huo Xiaoyu, reports Li Yi’s return to Xiaoyu. She then begs “family and
friends all over” to find a way to bring her lover back, but Li Yi, knowing Xiaoyu’s
condition, refuses all entreaties. The impasse is broken by the community: “From
this point, in Chang’an there were those who knew of the matter. Gentlemenof
fashion were all moved by the depth of Xiaoyu’s feelings. Fellows of unbridled
heroism were all enraged by the scholar’s heartless conduct.” Just as the
unnamed community admired Li Yi’s pledge of love and Princess Yanxian was
moved by Xiaoyu’s plight, now an entire audience of heroes emerges to take
the side of Xiaoyu against Li Yi.
It is also with this emergence of the new community that Xiaoyu’s and Li Yi’s
social networks once again converge. While Wei Xiaqing, one of Li Yi’s close
friends, is attempting to persuade Li to visit Xiaoyu, “suddenly there came up
one such unbridled hero; he was garbed in a light yellow linen shirt and
clasped under his arm a pellet-bow” (487.4009). The man approaches Li Yi
and greets him, inviting him to his home. Of course, it is actually to Xiaoyu’s
home that the party repairs, where she appears and confronts Li Yi. The scene
that follows includes the social community as a literal audience, sobbing before
Xiaoyu’s heartbroken demeanor. More surprising is the feast set before all by
the man in the yellow shirt, as if understanding that Xiaoyu’s death scene is
dinner theater (Owen 1996, 142). Xiaoyu dies, of course, but not before swearing
to visit a terrible vengeance upon Li Yi as a ghost who will forever deny him con-
nubial happiness.
Throughout the narrative of “Huo Xiaoyu,” the author has underlined the sig-
nificance of the social network for the events recounted, looking not only to how
the community functions as audience, but also how it directly intervenes at criti-
cal junctures. Dynastic histories, by contrast, are supposed to transcend the par-
ticularities of the social network, as its perspective is that of the state, which
claims to represent the whole, if not in the individual biographical accounts,
then in the aggregate of all the chapters. Nevertheless, the passing mention of
“Li Yi’s sickness” hints at the faint presence of a community, of a network, that
remembers knowledge that the official accounts feel compelled to leave aside.
Such a community, to be sure, had long ceased to exist by the time that the bio-
graphies were composed, leaving the only surviving contemporary account a
Tang chuanqi whose coda leaves the sociality of the romance narrative for the
uncanny realm of the ghost story.
After his marriage to Miss Lu, Li Yi wakes to hear a man outside, calling out
to her, as if for a secret tryst. Li Yi’s confidence in his wife’s fidelity is shattered. To
allay these fears, Li Yi turns to a friend, who attempts to reassure him of his wife’s
blameless conduct. Yet while the social community may have supported Xiaoyu in
1086 Jack W. Chen
her desire for justice and closure, Li is unable to find such solace. The ghostly
visitations continue, eventually driving Li insane with jealousy and paranoia.
He divorces his wife and has affairs with women of lower social classes, even
killing some of them. The narrative ends with Li’s descent into madness and
utter failure to find happiness in wedlock or with lovers.
Naturally, one might ask how one should view the historiographic status of
“Huo Xiaoyu zhuan.” Following the example of Lu Xun, modern scholars have
tended to treat Tang tales as works of fiction, but this reflects a twentieth-century
desire to find the origins of Chinese fiction in older prose narrative traditions
(1973, 54; Nienhauser 1998, 32–33). More recently, Sarah Allen has argued
that the idea of the Tang tale is based not so much in fictionality as it is in the
private and local perspective of the individual around whom the events unfold.
As Allen writes, “The events related … are usually not subject to public verifica-
tion, but purport to recount information that could only be known by an eye-
witness” (2003, 4–5). That is to say, the question is not one of ontology, but
rather of epistemology.
In the case of “The Account of Huo Xiaoyu,” however, the structural role of
the eyewitness never quite comes into play. Other Tang tales take up the issue of
how the private knowledge related by the narrative is transmitted into the larger
public sphere, most explicitly through the use of a storyteller who frames the nar-
rative and lodges it within a mimesis of the historical real. While “Huo Xiaoyu”
might lack the device of the storytelling frame or coda of other Tang tales, the
narrative is far from oblivious to the problem of how private knowledge
crosses into the public realm. The narrative takes pains to note how Li Yi is a
figure already well known by the beginning of the story, a rising young talent
whose poetry is known to the heroine. Moreover, as the story progresses, Huo
Xiaoyu tells her story over and over, in the hope of hearing news of Li Yi. In
this way, the chuanqi is more than the narratival recounting of gossip; it serves
as an allegory of gossip. The social world represented in “Huo Xiaoyu” may be
said to be the very eyewitness to the events of the narrative: a community that
serves as narrator, audience, and actor, and one that is interested both in the
story being told and in the preservation of the gossiping network along which
information is transmitted and received.
This fictional account is the only explanation of Li Yi’s secret past that has
come down to the present. Yet if the Northern Song historians thought it appro-
priate to exclude such an explanation from Li Yi’s biography, the reasoning likely
had little to do with the problem of reproducing hearsay, which they did for other
literary biographies. Rather, the difference is better understood as one of privacy
and of private knowledge. The Tang tale does that which the dynastic history
cannot, foregrounding the realm of private experience at the expense of the
public life, and indeed, it might be considered the inversion of the official
history. At the same time, the official history cannot entirely forego the use of
anecdote and gossip, as it is this material that puts flesh on the bones of annalistic
Blank Spaces and Secret Histories 1087
factuality, creating narrative where there might have only been chronological
archive.
The ambivalence of narrative has its roots in the seductive unreliability of
anecdote, and even as Ouyang Xiu and Song Qi draw the line at Li Yi’s private
affairs, they hint at the secret facts they cannot report. This is both an attempt
at fidelity to Confucius’s exemplary historiographic principles, as well as a subver-
sion of the same Confucian ideal. That is, a scribal blank might tempt one to fill in
what is missing, but it nevertheless stands as a refusal on the part of the writer to
engage in baseless speculation. The suggestion of a hidden story, however, is an
invitation to such speculation, a form of narrative enticement that engenders a
greater desire for more narrative to explain that which has been suppressed.
What the story of Li Yi and Huo Xiaoyu illustrates is how knowledge is trans-
mitted across a network of social relationships in the form of a recounted narra-
tive, a tale whose reiterations relocate a private anecdote in the sphere of the
public. Yet the story that is told cannot be reproduced in the public sphere,
where the Song historians can only make guarded allusion to Li Yi’s private
affairs. By concealing the exact details of Li Yi’s lurid private life, Song Qi and
Ouyang Xiu not only acknowledge the necessity of maintaining a sense of histor-
iographic decorum, but also indicate the limits of what is allowable by the epis-
temic standards of the state. Nevertheless, in their refusal to recount the
anecdotal explanation for Li Yi’s behavior, the Song historians effectively issue
an invitation to seek out the “true story” elsewhere, calling attention to the gap
of knowledge instead of censoring it.
Acknowledgments
Earlier versions of this essay were presented at Wellesley College, the University of
California, Berkeley, and National Taiwan University. I would liketo thank Sarah Allen,
Cheng Yu-yu, Natasha Heller, Stephen Owen, Michael Puett, David Schaberg, and Paula
Varsano for their comments and suggestions.
List of Characters
Ban Gu 班固
biji 筆記
chuanqi 傳奇
Chunqiu 春秋
“Chunqiu huowen” 春秋或問
“Diwang shici tu xu” 帝王世次圖序
Gongyang Gao 公羊高
Gongyang zhuan 公羊傳
1088 Jack W. Chen
Han shu 漢書
“Huo Xiaoyu zhuan” 霍小玉傳
Jiang Fang 蔣防
jingxueshi 經學史
Li Yi 李益
Liu Xie 劉勰
Liu Zhiji 劉知幾
Meng Haoran 孟浩然
ming 名
Ouyang Xiu 歐陽修
Shang shu 尚書
shi 史
shixueshi 史學史
Shi ji 史記
Shi tong 史通
“Shi zhuan” 史傳
Sima Guang 司馬光
Sima Qian 司馬遷
Song Qi 宋祁
Tang liudian 唐六典
wen 聞
Wenxin diaolong 文心雕龍
Wu Zhen 吳縝
xiaoshuo 小說
Xin Tang shu 新唐書
“Zashu” 雜述
Zhao Yi 趙翼
zi 字
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