Meng Jiangnu Brings Down the Great Wall Ten Versions of a Chinese Legend Meng Jiangnu Brings Down the Great Wall brings together ten versions of a popular Chinese legend that has intrigued readers and listeners for hundreds of years Elements of the story date back to the e
Meng Jiangnu Brings Down the Great Wall brings together ten versions of a popular Chinese legend that has intrigued readers and listeners for hundreds of years Elements of the story date back to the early centuries B.C.E and are an intrinsic part of Chinese literary history Major themes and subtle nuances of the legend are illuminated here by Wilt L Idema s new translaMeng Jiangnu Brings Down the Great Wall brings together ten versions of a popular Chinese legend that has intrigued readers and listeners for hundreds of years Elements of the story date back to the early centuries B.C.E and are an intrinsic part of Chinese literary history Major themes and subtle nuances of the legend are illuminated here by Wilt L Idema s new translations and pairings.In this classic story, a young woman named Meng Jiang makes a long, solitary journey to deliver winter clothes to her husband, a drafted laborer on the grandiose Great Wall construction project of the notorious First Emperor of the Qin dynasty BCE 221 208 But her travels end in tragedy when, upon arrival, she learns that her husband has died under the harsh working conditions and been entombed in the wall Her tears of grief cause the wall to collapse and expose his bones, which she collects for proper burial In some versions, she tricks the lecherous emperor, who wants to marry her, into providing a stately funeral for her husband and then takes her own life.The versions presented here are ballads and chantefables alternating chanted verse and recited prose , five from urban printed texts from the late Imperial and early Republican periods, and five from oral performances and partially reconstructed texts collected in rural areas in recent decades They represent a wide range of genres, regional styles, dates, and content From one version to another, different elements of the story the circumstances of Meng Jiangnu s marriage, her relationship with her parents in law, the journey to the wall, her grief, her defiance of the emperor are elaborated upon, downplayed, or left out altogether depending on the particular moral lessons that tale authors wished to impart.Idema brings together his considerable translation skills and broad knowledge of Chinese literature to present an assortment of tales and insightful commentary that will be a gold mine of information for scholars in a number of disciplines Haiyan Lee s essay discusses the appeal of the Meng Jiangnu story to twentieth century literary reformers, and the interpretations they imposed on the material they collected.
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Meng Jiangnu Brings Down the Great Wall: Ten Versions of a Chinese Legend Wilt L. Idema Haiyan Lee
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Wilt L. Idema Haiyan Lee
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Title:
Meng Jiangnu Brings Down the Great Wall: Ten Versions of a Chinese Legend Wilt L. Idema Haiyan Lee
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Published :2019-09-05T03:39:02+00:00
Wilt L Idema obtained his BA and MA from Leiden University Following continued study in Sapporo at Hokkaido University and in Kyoto at Kyoto University , and research in Hong Kong at the Universities Service Center , he returned to Leiden, where he taught in the Department of Chinese Language and Culture He obtained his doctorate in 1974, and was promoted to Professor of Chinese Literature and Linguistics in 1976 Since 2000, he has been teaching at Harvard as Professor of Chinese Literature Wilt Idema s research initially was focused on the early development of Chinese vernacular fiction Chinese Vernacular Fiction The Formative Period, 1974 , but later shifted towards early Chinese drama Chinese Theater 1100 1450, A Source Book, with Stephen West 1982 The Dramatic Oeuvre of Chu Yu tun 1379 1439 , 1985 Wang Shifu, The Moon and the Zither The Story of the Western Wing, with Stephen H West, 1992 In recent years he also has published on Chinese women s literature of the premodern period The Red Brush Writing Women of Imperial China, with Beata Grant, 2004 His current research is focused on China s rich tradition of popular narrative ballads He is also the author, with Lloyd Haft, of A Guide to Chinese Literature 1997 For his voluminous Dutch language translations, especially of classical Chinese poetry, he received the Martinus Nijhof Award for 1991, the highest distinction for literary translations in the Netherlands.
486 Replys to “Meng Jiangnu Brings Down the Great Wall: Ten Versions of a Chinese Legend”
A fantastic, interesting, and gripping read. I thoroughly enjoyed the content and format of this book.Definitely will remain in use for reference and browsing in the future into these 10 accounts from the past 2500 years.An historical overview filled with a treasure trove of varied tales. One takes away more than a piece of the Great Wall(s) when reading this work.Read for pleasure and personal interest. Overall, a great book for the researcher and enthusiast.I found this book's contents helpful [...]
I really loved this book. Idema introduces the story of Mengjiang and then proceeds to translate 10 different versions of the story from different parts of China. Most of the stories translated were from the 19th or 20th century but the origin of the tale can be traced back in it's current form to around the 6th century and is based on an earlier tale of a virtuous woman from the Han dynasty (200BCE-200CE). The story at it's simplest is that the young woman Mengjiang marries a young man who is f [...]