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Narrative Structure and the Problem of Chapter Nine in The “Hsi-Yu Chi”*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

Anthony C. Yu
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Extract

Whether the story about the Ch'ên Kuang-jui, the father of Tripitaka, belongs to the “original” version of the Hsi-yu chi (chapter 9 in modern editions of the novel) is a problem which has occupied the attention of scholars and editors for at least two and a half centuries. If we accept the conclusions of Professor Glen Dudbridge, who has done in recent years the most intensive and impressive examination of the novel's textual history, it would appear that the best textual support is lacking for this segment of the Hsi-yu chi to be considered authentic, as it is not found in the earliest known version of the hundred-chapter novel: the edition published by Shih-tê-t'ang of Chin-ling in 1592. The numerous clashes of details between this version and later ones, most notably the glaring inconsistency found in the later editions which put Ch‘ên Kuang-jui’s assumption of his public career in the thirteenth year of the reign of the T'ang Emperor, T'ai-tsung, the same year when Ch‘ên’s son, Hsiian-tsang, was to have been commissioned to begin his westward journey, further evidence editorial changes and faulty re-arrangements. In the judgment of Dudbridge, chapter nine of the novel may well have been introduced by the late Ming compilerfrom Canton, Chu Ting-ch'ên.

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Articles
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 34 , Issue 2 , February 1975 , pp. 295 - 311
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1975

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References

1 bridge, Glen Dud, “Hsi-yu chi tsu-pêin k‘ao ti tsai shang-chüeh,” Hsin-ya hsüeh pao, VI (1964), 497–518;Google Scholar“The Hundred-chapter Hsi-yu chi and its Early Versions,” Asia Major, n.s., XIV (1969), 141–191.Google Scholar

2 Dudbridge, “Early Versions,” 184.

3 “Lun Hsi-yu chi ti ti-chiu-hui wên-t‘i,” in Hsi-yu chi yen-chin lun-wên chi (Peking, 1957) PP. 173–77.Google Scholar

4 The name of the monk is Ch'ien-ang in this poem, whereas the monk of chapter 9 has the name Fa-ming.h

5 Dudbridgc, loc. cit.

6 iê,n Tung-ching so-chten hstao-shuo shu-mu (Peking, 1953), p. 108.Google Scholar

7 Dudbridge, “Early Versions,” 151.

8 See “Mizu to honoo no densho; Saiyuki seiritsu no ichi sokumen,” Nihon Ckŭgohu gakkai hō, XVIII (1966), 225–26. In a forthcoming essay, I shall take up more systematically themes of the Hsi-yu chi.Google Scholar

9 I realize that Kuan-yin (Avalokiteśvara) was in all probability a male deity originally, but the figure in the novel is unambiguously feminine.

10 Dudbridge, “Early Versions,” 183–84.

11 Ta Tz'ŭ-ên-ssu San-tsang Fa-shih Chuan, I:4.

12 Ibid, 1:6.

13 Hsüan, Chu (Fu Shu-hsien), “Hsi-yu chi ti ti-pa-shih-inan,” Chung-kuo shih-pao, March 17,Google Scholar

14 Nan-yang, Ch'icn, Sung Yüan hsi-wên chi-i (Shanghai, 1956), pp. 165–172;Google ScholarChing-shên, Chao, Yüan Ming nan-hsi k'ao-lüch (Peking, 1958), pp. 68–79;Google ScholarDudbridge, Glen, The Hsi-yu chi: A Study of Antecedents to the Sixteenth-Century Chinese Novel (Cambridge, England, 1970), pp. 75–89.Google Scholar

15 Dudbridge, “Early Versions,” 184.

16 Ibid, 172–73.

17 Chüan 2, p. 12b. I use a 1924 edition of the Hsi-yu chên ch'üan published in Shanghai.

18 Dudbridge, “Early Versions,” 184.