# Diglossia, Intralingual Translation, Rewriting: Towards a New Approach to the Analysis of the Relationship between Ming-Qing Vernacular Stories and their Classical Sources (1)

Rainier Lanselle

<figure><img src="image_1.png" /></figure>

## To cite this version:

Rainier Lanselle. Diglossia, Intralingual Translation, Rewriting: Towards a New Approach to the Analysis of the Relationship between Ming-Qing Vernacular Stories and their Classical Sources (1). The Journal of the European Association for Chinese Studies, 2022, 3, pp.207-262. 10.25365/jeacs.2022.3.lanselle. hal-03925851

HAL Id: hal-03925851

https://hal.science/hal-03925851

Submitted on 5 Jan 2023

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access
archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci-
entific research documents, whether they are pub-
lished or not. The documents may come from
teaching and research institutions in France or
abroad, or from public or private research centers.

L'archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est
destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents
scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non,
émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de
recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires
publics ou privés.

<figure><img src="image_2.png" /></figure>
## RESEARCH ARTICLE

# Diglossia, Intrilingual Translation, Rewriting: Towards a New Approach to the Analysis of the Relationship between Ming-Qing Vernacular Stories and their Classical Sources (1)

Rainier LANSELLE

École Pratique des Hautes Études EPHE-PSL & CRCAO, France

rainier.lanselle@ephe.psl.eu

The article addresses the issue of the numerous vernacular narratives of the *huaben* 話本 genre (late Ming/early Qing period, 17th c.) that are the result of the rewriting of earlier sources in literary language. It introduces a new method of analysis of this transformative process based on a systematic survey of the components of these stories: language, narrative points of view, rewriting micro-strategies. This allows for a detailed description of the way in which the authors/editors of the time produced these narratives. This methodology is anchored in a comprehensive theoretical approach to the development of the vernacular in the period under consideration, underlining that the definition of the vernacular is not purely linguistic but includes many other factors. It recalls that the situation of diglossia in written Chinese was a subject that authors of the time were acutely aware of and which they discussed extensively in their critical writings. It suggests that the process whereby *huaben* were produced from earlier sources corresponds to what has been described in modern times as intrilingual translation, which could be defined as a commentary, but a commentary that plays on several language registers.

十七世紀中國出現大量基於文言小說改編的話本小說。本文通過考察話本這一敘事體裁的語言、敘事視角和微觀改寫策略，介紹一種分析小說改編過程的新方法，用以詳細描述作者或編者的寫作方式和敘述宗旨。文章立足於對明末清初通俗文學發展的綜合性理論研究，強調對“俗”的特殊定義，比如“白話”不單純指一套語言上與文言相對的體系，而是還包括許多其他因素。評論著作表明，當時的作家和文人都敏銳地意識到中文書面語中白話與文言並存的現象。基於文言模本的話本小說，其編寫過程在某種意義上實屬翻譯學的“語內翻譯”範疇。語內翻譯基本上可視為一種評述，在這裡則表現為一種轉換不同語體的評述。

**Keywords:** *huaben*, short story, intrilingual translation, diglossia, rewriting, commentary, vernacular literature, textual comparison, early modern China, Ming-Qing

**關鍵詞：**話本，短篇小說，語內翻譯，雙言現象，改寫，評論，白話文學，文本比較，中國明清時期

The Journal of the European Association for Chinese Studies (JEACS) is a peer-reviewed open access journal published by the EACS, www.chinesestudies.eu. ISSN: 2709-9946

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. See http://creativecommons.org/li-censes/by/4.0/.
**Introduction**

One of the most fascinating observable phenomena in the making of Chinese classical premodern fictional literature is the way so many of its products result, not from creation, but rather from *recreation*: from the recycling of earlier sources, tirelessly rewritten into new stories. Far from being a limitation on the creative process, this practice which consists in generating new contents from a network of pre-existing textual references shows how heavily the imaginary realm relies on the power of rewriting.

Nowhere, perhaps, does this power of rewriting seem more obvious than in the production of vernacular short stories of the Ming and early Qing periods—what are commonly referred to in sinological literature as *huaben* 話本-type vernacular novellas.<fnref n="1" /> Of the few hundreds of stories of the time that have come down to us, almost always published in collections, a significant part are the result of the reprocessing of previous sources. Each chapter typically consists of at least one introductory story and one main story, with each of these having its own sources.<fnref n="2" /> Over decades of scholarly research, a huge number of these sources have been identified.<fnref n="3" /> Sometimes they were given by the writers themselves within their own narratives. The existence of such a wealth of material, including source texts and target texts resulting from their rewriting, provides ample fodder for textual comparisons. Modern observers have extensive matter therein to analyse in full detail the making of a considerable number of literary texts, with an access to related data rarely equalled in the whole Chinese literary tradition.

It is the aim of this paper to propose a general description of the textual strategies developed and implemented by the authors/editors of the late Ming period writing in this particular genre, and to attempt to analyse some of the effects, intended or unexpected, which result from such strategies. These strategies, as some of the examples cited will show, will remain embedded in writing practices well beyond the period under consideration. As will be further outlined, it is remarkable how textual strategies developed by authors/editors of the late Ming period anticipate theoretical approaches developed in translation studies, in particular in relation to the act of rewriting or operations of intralingual translation.

<footnote n="1">¹ The author wishes to express his thanks to the two anonymous reviewers for their careful reading of this paper and for their very helpful suggestions. He also would like to express his sincere gratitude to the editors of the *Journal of the European Association for Chinese Studies* for agreeing to the publication of this long article in two successive issues of the journal.</footnote>

<footnote n="2">² Classic references on this genre include Hanan 1973, Hanan 1981, Lévy 1981, S. Hu 1980.</footnote>

<footnote n="3">³ At least up to the collections written by Li Yu 李漁 (1610-1680). A strong advocate of originality and personal imagination in the creation of theatrical plays as well as short story collections (Wusheng xi 無聲戲/Liancheng bi 連城壁, Shierlou 十二樓), he rarely explicitly relied on previous stories. See Hanan 1988, Chap. 3, “The necessity of invention”, p. 45-58. After him, *huaben* authors tended increasingly to create their own stories.</footnote>

<footnote n="4">⁴ Some have been published, as is the case for sources for Feng Menglong 馮夢龍 (1574-1646) and Ling Mengchu's 凌濛初 (1580-1644) five collections in Tan 1980. Some have been exhaustively inventoried, as in Lévy et al. 1978-2006, the most comprehensive compendium to date for story by story descriptions of the genre, which provides plot summaries and a great number of sources for close to five hundred chapters amounting to many more individual stories, in around twenty-five collections. New publications regularly give reports of new sources that have been identified, for individual stories or even full collections (see, e.g., Rao 2006 or H.-H. Chan 1995).</footnote>
Keeping in mind how rewriting changes the destiny of a text, we will outline how language strategies were
as important to the authors/editors as the contents of their narratives—in other words, how they were
constantly led by the assumption that *how* things were said was inseparable from *what* was said. Their
approach to writing as rewriting sheds light on how they interpreted texts: their *modus operandi*, obviously
indebted to their own practice of commentary, can be seen as an interpretation, which in turn is not
fundamentally different from actual translation.

Rewrite, recycle, translate

In the above-mentioned division between the *how* and the *what*, the former has always attracted
surprisingly little interest in the scholarly literature describing the making of *huaben* stories. This was not
for want of a thorough knowledge of the hundreds of textual sources at the origin of hundreds of vernacular
stories, nor for lack of remarkable studies on the subject, especially in the West, during the few last decades
of the 20th century, including Idema, Lévy, and Hanan, to name a few. (Idema 1974) (Lévy 1981) Perhaps
because of a greater interest in historical, diachronic perspectives, many Western scholars have favoured
approaches that prioritise questions of dating, authorship, and composition understood in a
predominantly stylistic way. In this respect, Patrick Hanan's work has had such a profound and lasting
influence, at least in Western Sinology, that it may have durably inhibited other possible approaches to
the analysis of short story formation—in particular the concrete description of textual micro-strategies that
authors, synchronically, implemented in order to transform a textual source, typically written in literary
Chinese, into a vernacular story. (Hanan 1973) If one does find in Western scholarship sustained
reference to a story as “amplification” of a source text, *how* exactly this was done is rarely documented in
a concrete, descriptive way, and certainly not in full detail. It is true that it would be a very time-consuming
task, as it would imply minute textual comparisons in an extensive way; but it would be extremely rewarding,
as has been demonstrated by Vibeke Børdahl in a slightly different field, namely storytellers’ narrative
variations on a given theme. (Børdahl 2013; Børdahl and Ge 2017)

I believe this lack of interest is partly due to the fact that the translation paradigm implied in the writing of vernacular stories has been largely neglected. This question relates to that of the diglossia of the Chinese language, a subject that, as it happens, never appears to its full extent as a proper theoretical object under the pen of historians of literature; more often it surfaces as something referred to *en passant*, while the focus of the study is directed at other topics. Not that there has never been a consciousness that something like translation was at stake: surprisingly, this has been repeatedly mentioned, and even from very early on. For example, Jaroslav Průšek, sticking to the storyteller’s figure in the writing of short stories, talks about “the artistic way in which the story-teller adapted, expanded and remodeled his pattern”. (Průšek 1970, 376) Patrick Hanan refers repeatedly to the practice of what he can only call “translation” in the work scheme of *huaben* editors when they created a vernacular story on the basis of a classical tale, as is

<footnote n="5">⁵ Lévy, e.g., remains quite short on “L’utilisation des sources” and the precise way in which the sources are used: Lévy 1981, 211–18.</footnote>
the case in “dozens of such pairs of stories”, in the work of Feng Menglong馮夢龍 (1574-1646) and other publishers. However, while acknowledging the importance of “the choice of a particular language, literary or vernacular”, and the transformative relationship between the two, he cannot fully agree with a translation paradigm, as he considers the diglossic situation at stake “is merely one of the elements within the total narrative method”, which encompasses many other narrative and rhetorical features, and above all a “mode of commentary” distinct, in his view, from the act of translation. (Hanan 1967, 172-73) Indeed, how can we talk about translation when, in some cases, the rewriting barely even shifts from literary to vernacular? And yet, Hanan acknowledges, how deftly even the “most economical adaptation possible” changes everything from one version to another, how “subtle” the “differences of character and theme”, with what virtuosity the “mode of commentary” plays as “a lens through which the whole work appears different”!<fnref n="6" /> More recently, Roland Altenburger, discussing a female knight-errant story in literary language rather faithfully transformed into a vernacular story by Ling Mengchu 澍濱初 (1580-1644), again incidentally refers to this relocation as a “translation”. But, interestingly enough, he does this while mitigating the use of the word “translation” with several correlated procedures such as “recycling”, “rewriting”, “compiling”, “arranging”, and with the *caveat* that it is more or less relevant, again, to commentary, and above all, tied up by the need to *control the story’s interpretation*.<fnref n="7" /> Actually, all these words relate to hugely important issues, to which we will come back in due time.

To sum up, in Western Sinology, an understanding of (re)writing as a form of translation in the production of stories is no sooner sketched out than it is immediately eschewed, because of a kind of general avoidance regarding this very word of *translation*, which may sound strange in this context. Its use hardly goes beyond a vague reference as a metaphor, not in its full meaning. In Chinese Sinology, it almost goes without saying that, partly for ideological reasons, referring to the relationship between *su 俗* and *wen 文* as one of translation would be regarded as outright heresy.<fnref n="8" /> This is despite the fact that the most recent research in China has produced some excellent studies on the narrative specificities of *huaben* stories, including comparisons with other genres in terms of literary language. But this research tends to remain within a framework of general comparison between narrative modes rather than a systematic source/target

<footnote n="6">⁶ Patrick Hanan about “TY 29”, i.e., *Jingshi tongyan* 警世通言, chap. 29, an “early” story published by Feng Menglong: Hanan 1973, 178.</footnote>

<footnote n="7">⁷ Altenburger discusses Hu Rujia's 胡汝嘉 (jīnshǐ 1553) story “Wei Shiyiniang zhuan” 韋十一娘傳 rewritten into Ling Mengchu's story “Cheng Yuanyu diansi dai changqian, Shiyiniang Yungang zong tanxia” 程元玉店肆代償錢十一娘雲岡縱譚俠, in chap. 4 of *Pai'an jīngqi* 拍案驚奇. He states: “Neither Ling Mengchu nor Feng Menglong should principally be regarded as the original authors of the stories in their collections, since they practically always reworked extant narrative material. Therefore, their authorial functions rather consisted in the editorial procedures of textual “recycling”, such as rewriting, translating from classical diction to the vernacular idiom, compiling and arranging. While the classical tale used to be presented with rather little narrative and commentarial framework, the vernacular novella was commonly accompanied by a vast apparatus of rhetorical and commentarial features which aimed at controlling the story’s interpretation.” See Altenburger 2009, 129.</footnote>

<footnote n="8">⁸ Oddly enough, the term *jiè* 譯 (“translation”) is routinely used nowadays in editions of Classics in modern *baihua* 白話. But it is never used when commenting on vernacular stories rewritten from previous material in literary language. Discussing the making of several such stories, the word most often used by the great *huaben* specialist Hu Shiying 胡士瑩 is *fuyan* 敷演, literally “elaborate” (on a theme), “expound the meaning” (of the Classics). See S. Hu 1980, vol. 2, 455-58. While this activity is unquestionably implied, it does not cover the full range of the writing strategies at stake in such textual production that we will discuss further on.</footnote>
text juxtaposition, and generally places little emphasis on the linguistic features of the texts." In both cases, it is remarkable to see how little attention has been paid to minute, factual analysis of the textual strategies and micro-strategies implied in the writing of such stories from extant sources, and on how this shift between the source in *wenyanwen* 文言文 (literary Chinese) and a target text in *tongsu* 通俗 (vernacular) operates on a concrete level, with reference to textual evidence. Let us confess it: in Western Sinology at least, this notion of rewriting has been considered a weakness instead of something to be celebrated, and as a sign of limited imagination—which may be why, conversely, an author like Li Yu 李漁 (1610-1680), a strong advocate of originality and personal imagination who claims to care very little for the recycling of pre-existing sources, has garnered so much attention. In China, it is the linguistic transformation between the two realms of literary and vernacular languages that is most easily overlooked: if much erudition is always dedicated to the diachronic evolution of narrative themes, much less is said about its synchronic effects at the narratological, stylistic, and linguistic levels.

In concluding these introductory remarks, and before going on to our central topic, I would like to pause briefly here to comment on terminology and methodology.

First, with regard to terminology, I have no qualms whatsoever about repeatedly using the term *huaben* 話本 to refer to the Ming-Qing vernacular stories as published under the names of Feng Menglong, Ling Mengchu, and their many emulators and successors. I prefer the Chinese term over its English equivalents—if only as its two syllables come in rather handy! This being said, no scholar of premodern Chinese narrative literature is unaware that this term, which has been in common use in international Sinological practice for decades, is to a large extent a reconstruction dating back to the 1920s, that it only very partially covers the reality of the terms that have historically been used by authors and publishers contemporary with the production of these texts, and that it is an accurate way to designate a genre that itself is far from having a formal unity and has been the subject of continuous debate for almost a century.
I see no reason, though, to reject a well-established term, widely used by Chinese colleagues, who resort to it in full knowledge of its complex history and of the heterogeneous aspects it conveys. Such a case of denomination as a relative artifice is in fact common to many literary genres, and no matter how much we like it or not, there has to be a term, however imperfect, for a reality that we want to investigate in writing.
I will also readily use its English equivalents, such as short story, vernacular story, or novella, but with the *caveat* that these equivalents often tell us more about the history of English literature than anything else.
If we refer to the terms used by Patrick Hanan's French counterpart André Lévy at the time both were researching the subject, we are forced to note that establishing a coherent terminology between two

<footnote>"This is the case, for example, of Li Guikui 李桂奎 in his comparison between the narration of the *chuanqi* 傳奇 Tang tale in literary language and that of the *huaben*: not to mention intralingual translation, which is absent as might be expected, the linguistic question between the two genres, though striking from a Western point of view, is almost entirely ignored in his study. In his otherwise comprehensive and competent analysis, it is reduced to a few final pages, mainly in the form of a reference to "empty words" and other grammatical markers typical of the literary language: G. Li 2013, 244-47. Liu Yongqiang's **劉勇強** work presents a notable exception in this respect, devoting an entire chapter of his book to an analysis, including linguistic analysis, of the way in which the narratives of the *Yijian zhi* 夷堅志 by Hong Mai 洪邁 (1123-1202) were transformed and vernacularised in the *huaben* of the *San Yan Er Pai* 三言二拍 (the five collections in total compiled by Feng Menglong and Ling Mengchu): Y. Liu 2015, 58-82.</footnote>
relatively close European languages proved hardly possible, the French literary framework being different, which reveals by contrast that the objectivity of the English translations was itself relative, being dependent on usages specific to that language. For example, the English *novella* does not cover the same thing as the French *nouvelle*, which itself means *short story* but would not be applicable to this particular kind of Chinese text. This debate could go on endlessly and would be nothing short of sterile, and the author of these lines prefers to remember the exchanges he had about it with Lévy, who found the discussion rather flawed and had the common sense to give as a Chinese subtitle to the vast *Inventaire analytique et critique du conte chinois en langue vulgaire* he had directed: *Huaben zongmu tiyao* 話本總目提要. Better *huaben* then, than its not-that-objective foreign substitutes...<fnref n="10" />

More importantly, the second point aims at providing the reader with some explanation of the outline adopted by this article and the reason why I have considered developing a new methodological approach. This paper is relatively long, which accounts for its publication in two parts. The first part has a certain descriptive and technical character; the second part is more theoretical. As a matter of fact, the theoretical dimension has intellectually preceded the practical dimension, which is the way I have attempted to put certain conceptual models to the test. But in order to support the theoretical arguments, it is essential to have first described our method of analysis and put forward some data. Thus the need to deal with the more technical aspects as a first stage, and with the theoretical ones in the subsequent part.

In the course of years of exposure to *huaben* literature, I have always been under the impression, in those cases where these texts had known sources, that the vernacular versions were in fact nothing more than their commentaries. Among the many different traditions of commentary that have permeated China's intellectual and literary history, this one had the particular characteristic of involving continual changes of linguistic register. This was its most original trait: that which showed tensions, and remarkable displays of virtuosity, between the two poles of literary language and vernacular, with many possible intermediary nuances. There was thus a dimension of translation included in the commentarial process. The intersemiotic transfer inextricably mixed utterance and enunciation, content (meaning) and form (linguistic variations). This interested me because of a personal position resolutely in favour of the broadest possible definition of what I would call the spectrum of translation: it was obvious to me that the dimension of translation was to be considered fully, and not just as a metaphor or an image.

In order to assess these questions, I turned to the field of Translation Studies, a discipline still far too neglected by the Sinological community, although this is beginning to change, because it was initially developed under very Eurocentric conditions, with little consideration for East Asian realities. Within it, a niche research area—itself subject to contrasting assessments—deals with what is known as intralingual translation. From its point of view, we can observe that, far from being original, the situation of the

<footnote n="10">¹⁰ Lévy addressed these terminological issues in various publications from as early as the 1960s: Lévy and Lei 1968; Lévy 1971; Lévy 1976. An excellent summary of the term was given by Lévy in the “Hua-pen” entry of the *Indiana Companion*. Lévy 1985. The use of the term *huaben* is definitely not avoided by most Western scholars of Sinology today, who, like myself, find it unproblematic provided they are aware of its history. Idema and Haft, *e.g.*, use it throughout the related chapters of their authoritative guide to Chinese literature: Idema and Haft 1997, 212–30. Scholars of the younger generation rightly follow this line, such as Ewan MacDonald throughout his PhD dissertation (MacDonald 2016), to cite only one among innumerable examples.</footnote>
formation of Chinese vernacular narratives on the basis of classical sources was in fact very similar to what is described in completely different contexts, both culturally and temporally—for example in Greece, Turkey, and Denmark. In each case the drive for intralingual translation typically took place in times of strongly evolving socialities, and paradigm shifts characterised by the emergence of vernaculars. Sometimes this occurred with much more radical changes than those observed in China: the case of Turkey, for example, shows massive upheavals of combined lexicographic and graphic systems. This raised recurrent questions, which I was able to share with some colleagues, about the role of the vernacular in the transmission of knowledge and the role played by new literacies in premodern China.<fnref n="11" />

The testing of the intralingual translation paradigm thus constitutes the focal point of this paper, insofar as it proposes a reasoned reflection on resemantisation phenomena considered in a broad sense. These can take a variety of forms, from recognisable translation strategies to more exotic forms including literary amplifications with no obvious connection to the source. But in order to talk about intralingual translation, it is essential to first discuss what is implied by the notion of the vernacular. Of this notion, which is covered by the semantic field of the term *tongsu* 通俗, widely used in premodern sources, one might quip that it is what Sinologists talk about all the time while carefully avoiding having to give it a definition. It is not our aim to give a complete answer to this complex subject, but we will at least offer some observations in which our method of textual analysis will be put to use. Let us say from the outset that the field of *tongsu* combines elements that are obviously linguistic with others that are more related to social bonds or semiological strategies. We can thus notice that it is not necessary to write in the vernacular in order to engage in vernacular discourse, and that vernacularisation can very well be situated less on a level of enunciation (language) than on utterance (the rearrangement of content). This can be shown objectively. But in order to talk about *tongsu*, there is still another precondition: one must first have raised another crucial question, that of diglossia. Here again is a subject that is very often neglected in the Sinological discourse, even, perhaps surprisingly, among specialists of vernacular literature. In this field more than anywhere else, it is important to give full weight to historical voices: what did the authors, commentators, preface writers of the times say about it? It so happens that they have left us many reflections in this regard, to which we will give our full attention.

This, then, is essentially the roadmap we propose to follow, and the few theoretical elements we have just sketched out will suffice for the moment to determine roughly in which direction we are heading, pending further development in the second part of this paper. Before turning to these issues, we must first address the question we started from: how were the rewritings (or amplifications, or intralingual translations) achieved, in regard to the factual process of their making? Since we have determined that the process of rewriting involved in the formation of *huaben* stories fundamentally combines two voices, a properly linguistic voice and a voice that is more specifically hermeneutic, we have to manage to take them jointly into account.

<footnote n="11">¹¹ See, for example, the workshops I co-organised with Barbara Bisetto and Roland Altenburger: “Dynamics of knowledge transmission and linguistic transformation in Chinese textual cultures” (2021): https://knowl-lingtrans.sciencesconf.org; “Premodern Chinese literature as an archive of vernacular knowledge and everyday life culture” (2022): https://vernaknowl.sciencesconf.org.</footnote>
# Towards a new methodology of textual comparison: I. Textual analysis, rewriting dynamics, micro-strategies

This combination of the linguistic *and* hermeneutic dimensions comes to light if we make the effort to conduct a careful analysis of the textual strategies implemented by authors/editors in order to produce their stories. Having undertaken a systematic survey of these strategies through concrete cases of textual comparisons between source texts and vernacular stories written on their basis, I have experimented with a methodology that takes into account concomitantly both the linguistic/stylistic aspects and the rewriting procedures involved. (Lanselle 2018) To put it in more theoretical terms, what needs to be accounted for at the same time here pertains to both indexical and denotational levels. By indexical level, I mean the language and enunciation characteristics (*how* things are expressed, *i. e.*, in what language and from what narrative point of view, or diegetic position); by denotational level, I understand the utterance per se, *i.e.*, the different micro-strategies involved to transform a source text into a target text (*what* is expressed).<sup>12</sup> The table below summarises all the categories, defined after several rounds of trial runs, involved in the textual analysis and characterisation of rewriting procedures. It will be the reference for all subsequent descriptions.

## I. Indexical Level

→ Language and Enunciation Characteristics

### I.a. Linguistic Characteristics

* Literary Chinese

* Vernacular Chinese: Standard Guanhua

* Vernacular Chinese: Dialectal

* Mixed Language

* Bivalent

### I.b. Narrative Point of View

* 1st Person Narration

* 3rd Person Narration

* Dialogue

* Inner Monologue

* Reported Speech/Reported Text

* 3rd Person + Dialogue Combination

* Rhetorical Dialogue/Storyteller's Stock Phrase

* Inserted Verse/Inserted Depiction

## II. Denotational Level (Utterance)

→ Textual Transformation Micro-strategies

* Verbatim Quotation

* Quasi-Quotation/Amplified Quotation

<footnote n="12"><sup>12</sup> Hereafter I shall refer to source text as ST and to target text as TT.</footnote>
* Translation/Replacement by (Quasi-)Synonym

* Amplified Translation

* Explanatory Translation/Reformulation

* Divergence

* Addition/Amplification

* Diverging Addition/Diverging Amplification

* Omission

* Textual Displacement

Below are some explanations, accompanied by examples, in the knowledge that any textual comparison between a given source text (ST) and a given target text (TT) necessarily implies characteristics relevant to each of the three categories, I.a, I.b and II.

Two points should be noted about the examples given. First, they are not taken randomly from the texts: all the quotes are drawn from a corpus of textual comparisons made in full between a *huaben* text and a source (or sometimes more than one)—a time-consuming but systematic task.<fnref n="18" /> Second, the purpose of the examples given is to highlight the processes of transformation, not to explain the context in which these examples are embedded, which would take us out of our scope. Our only interest at this stage is to demonstrate a methodology of survey in order to offer new possibilities for interpretation.

## I. Indexical Level (Language and Enunciation Characteristics) : I.a. Linguistic Characteristics

With virtually 100 % of the ST written in literary Chinese, TT, even though generally referred to as “vernacular literature”, actually combines the full palette of the possible linguistic combinations of vernacular and classical written styles in both prose and verse. While making wide use of a typically standardised vernacular, based on the Northern *guanha* 官話 as spoken in the lower Yangzi regions with the influence of the Henan so-called *Zhongzhou yun* 中州韻, TT also makes use of many dialectal expressions. The vernacular literary language of the *huaben* stories was to some extent a supra-regional style of writing, which in no way means that it would not have been a language spoken by anyone. As has been observed in all instances of the formalising of written vernacular expression, in Asia or elsewhere, and as has often been demonstrated in relation to the role of theatrical performances, the vernacular style has been a powerful lever for the standardisation of a spoken language at a national level.<fnref n="19" /> Though it may seem quite obvious for any reader of vernacular literature, we should stress nevertheless that there

<footnote n="18">¹⁸ The methodology described in this paper is the result of the detailed analysis of *ca. 20 huaben* and their identified ST, this corpus being regularly expanded.</footnote>

<footnote n="19">¹⁹ On *guanhua*, see the reference work Ōta 1958, with its Chinese translation Ōta 2003. See also the entries of the Brill *Encyclopedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics*: Coblin 2015; Lamarre 2015; Simmons 2015; Kaske 2015; C. W. Li 2015; Altenburger, Wan, and Børdahl 2015, 8, 40, 175, 286-287, 345, 360, 379 n. 20; Børdahl 2010a; Wan 2020, 63-71. On *Zhongzhou yun*: Picard and Lau 2016, 133-135. On opera and linguistic standardisation in the Ming: Vedal 2022, 105-34. Many dialectal expressions found in *huaben* literature are collected in D. Lu 1979, re-ed. D. Lu 2009. On dialect in *huaben* short stories: Lan 2017; Lei 2003. An excellent and up-to-date account of the linguistic situation of standard *guanhua* in early Qing and its Jiangnan influence is given by Simmons 2021, 14-19. This situation was described in the West as early as Father Jean-Baptiste Du Halde (1674-1743): Simmons, *ibid*, 17. W. South Coblin repeatedly refers to the role played by vernacular narratives: Coblin 2000.</footnote>
probably does not exist a single case of a *huaben* story in which literary Chinese is not also present, sometimes massively. Actually, translation/rewriting from literary Chinese to literary Chinese deserves special attention, and for this reason we will come back to it too in part II. of this paper.

The Mixed Language category, or intermediary language, is very interesting and relevant everywhere as well, as literary and vernacular writing so often appear as tightly interwoven. One can even affirm that to a large extent the intermingling of different nuances between the two styles is what makes the stylistic richness of the so-called “vernacular” literature.<fnref n="15" /> Here is an example of “Translation/Replacement by (Quasi-)Synonym” (cf. micro-strategies classification as detailed below), with a small added amplification, between a source text in literary Chinese and a target text in mixed language:

**Source Text (hereunder ST):**

公大驚恐，不早相接，妾之罪也，然寶鏵已取，卻僕與馬當即至也。

Sir, you've been exposed to a great deal of fright, and it's my fault that I didn't come to meet you sooner. I have retrieved your goods, as for your servant and your horse, they will be arriving right away.

**Target Text (hereunder TT):**

公如此大驚，不早來相接，甚是有罪！公貨物已取還，僕馬也在，不必憂疑。

Sir, you've been exposed to a great deal of fright, and it's a great fault of mine that I didn't come to meet you sooner. I have retrieved your goods, your servant and your horse are there too. You have nothing to worry about.<fnref n="16" />

The translation closely follows the original, with the last sentence of TT as a slight amplification. In a TT otherwise marked by the grammar and vocabulary of the classical language (公如此大驚，甚是有罪，不必憂疑)，elements of vernacular include the verb *lai* 來 inserted in the middle of the original phrase; the suppression of *ran* 然 at the beginning of a clause and of the classical particle *ye* 也 at the end of another clause; the lexical replacement of the rather rare *baoqiang* 寶鏵 by the more common *huowu* 貨物; the replacement of the monosyllabic verb *qu* 取 by the resultative construction *quhuan* 取還, the use of *ye* 也 as the vernacular adverb (“too”), and not as the classical particle. The monosyllabic *gong* 公 (honorific “you”, “your”) appears only once in ST and twice in TT, giving the impression that while the rewriting aims at easing the reading, it still wants to display a somewhat dignified tone. The “translation” is the same size as the original (ST 25 char./TT 24 char., excluding punctuation).<fnref n="17" /> Overall, it can be said that the

<footnote n="15">¹⁵ On “intermediate”, or “mixed” language used in the *huaben* stories, see Hanan 1981, 14–16.</footnote>

<footnote n="16">¹⁶ ST: Hu Rujia, “Wei Shiyiniang zhuan” 韋十一娘傳 (The Story of Lady Wei Eleven); TT: Ling Mengchu, *Pai’an jingqi*, chap. 4, “Cheng Yuanyu diansi dai changqian Shiyiniang Yungang zong tanxia” 程元玉店肆代償錢 十一娘雲岡縱譚俠 (Cheng Yuanyu pays for a meal at a restaurant, Lady Eleventh explains swordsmanship on Mount Cloud), main story. See Ling 1981, 84, vol. 1; R. Hu 1995, 2b and R. Hu 1997, 26. On the origin of Hu Rujia’s story “Wei Shiyiniang zhuan” 韋十一娘傳 and its two different editions in *Gen shi chao* 亘史抄 and *Shanbu wenyuan zhaju* 剪補文苑植橘: Altenburger 2009, 129–33. More generally on the story of Wei Shiyiniang and its rewriting by Ling Mengchu: Altenburger 2009, 127–51. I am thankful to Roland Altenburger who shared with me these two versions of Wei Shiyiniang’s story. See also: Lévy et al. 1978–2006, vol. 3, 838; Tan 1980, vol. 2, 603–4.</footnote>

<footnote n="17">¹⁷ In this paper, all punctuation marks are excluded from the character count, as they are usually modern additions.</footnote>
mixed language statement tends to open up the original ST in literary language, to make it more accessible, but without going as far as a complete vernacular transformation; it retains some of the advantages attached to the literary language statement (e.g. in terms of the authority associated to the use of the latter, as in the case cited below, p. 238).

The presence of literary language in vernacular writing is in fact so important and so universal that in order to account for it we also have recourse to an additional “Bivalent” linguistic category. This category concerns cases of statements which are fundamentally in literary language, whether from the point of view of grammar or lexicon, but which are naturally inserted unchanged into the flow of a vernacular statement. The cases are very varied, and reflect the deep and lasting imbrication of the literary language in even the most vernacular utterances and their structuring quality, a phenomenon still much present in today’s Chinese. A typical case is that of *chengyu 成語* or proverbs—for which it is not necessary to cite examples, so common are they in the *huaben* narratives. Another is that of nominal statements, as in the following example (underlined):

ST:

其桃梅榛栗等菓，日輪猴形者二人供辦。

As for the peaches, plums, hazelnuts and other fruits, two monkey-like men took turns every day serving them.

TT:

桃梅果品，日輪猴形人兩個供辦。

For fruits such as peaches and plums, two monkey-like men took turns every day serving them.<fnref n="18" />

In many cases, these statements expressed in a bivalent register are the result of a translation: the author/editor of TT has been keen, for reasons that are sometimes difficult to pinpoint, to reformulate the ST but without departing from the original classical form. This effort is universally invested even when the gain in clarity appears to be minimal. This is the case in the following example from the same story, where we find two successive bivalent statements in TT, one resulting from a translation (underlined), the other from a verbatim quotation (double underlined):

ST:

婦女十餘人，倚臥不一，如醉迷之狀。

There were about ten women there, some reclining and others lying down, giving the appearance of being drunk.

<footnote n="18">¹⁸ ST: Zhou Shaolian 周紹濂 (Diaoyuan huke 釣鶯湖客), *Yuanzhu zhiyu Xuechuang tanyi 駕渚志餘雪窗談異*, chap. 2, #14, “Dashi zhuxie ji” 大士誅邪記 (The story of the bodhisattva who puts the evil spirits to death); TT: *Ling Mengchu, Pai'an jingqi*, chap. 24, “Yanguanyi laomo meise Huihaishan dashi zhuxie” 鹽官邑老魔魅色 會骸山大士誅邪 (The old demon of Yanguan county indulges in debauchery, The bodhisattva on mount Huihai puts the evil spirits to death), main story. See Tao and Zhou 2008, 227; Ling 1981, vol. 2, 507; Q. Li 2013, 9; X. Wang 2018, 62, 65-67; Lévy et al. 1978-2006, vol. 3, 961-65.</footnote>
TT :

婦女十數個，或眠或坐，多如醉迷之狀。

There were about ten women there, some of them lying down, others seated, most of them giving the appearance of being drunk.<fnref n="19" />

It should be noted that, of all the features defined to describe the different facets of textual transformations, linguistic features are undoubtedly the most delicate area. As in any language, points of contact and hybridisation between different speech levels are pervasive.<fnref n="20" /> This is even more so in the case of Chinese due to its diglossic characteristics, where the continuous incorporation of the classical register into the vernacular sometimes makes the analysis tricky. This is why, if on the one hand the question of the vernacular language is relatively clear given its distinct grammatical and lexical characteristics, we have defined the three registers of the literary language, the mixed language, and a bivalent register in an attempt to account for the interactions of the vernacular with its classical environment—an effect of the pervasiveness of the practices of the written culture of the time. As much as we are aware of the experimental character of this endeavour at this stage, which may be subject to further refining, we nevertheless maintain that the analysis requires distinctions to be made, and therefore categories to be defined, without which any data-sustained investigation into textual transformations would be impossible.

## I. Indexical Level (Language and Enunciation Characteristics): I.b. Narrative Point of View

While third-person narration is generally predominant in both ST and TT, the other categories are much more differently distributed. It is interesting to note that first-person narration is much more often to be found in ST, i.e., in texts in literary style, than in TT. Sources in literary Chinese, often pertaining, besides historical works, to collections of tales and stories (e.g., *chuanqi 傳奇*), or to *biji 筆記* and other miscellanea categories, are by tradition environments within which authors are inclined to self-expression, albeit in a very coded way. All manner of rhetorical resources exist for the expression of self in the literati's classical culture—and this includes their culture of examinations. By contrast, TT regularly illustrate a kind of rule by which the more open the style, tending to more transparency by the use of the vernacular, the

<footnote n="19">¹⁹ *Ibid.* See Ling 1981, vol. 2, 509; Tao and Zhou 2008, 227–28.</footnote>

<footnote n="20">²⁰ As Patrick Hanan puts it, rightly pointing out the difficulty, at times, of defining exactly what vernacular is: “Since grammar is, in essence, constant, and since there are no inflections in the proper sense, Classical and vernacular may easily be allowed to interpenetrate on the printed page. They are, to a large extent, grammatically compatible systems with different sets of interchangeable parts. It is therefore possible to design a language constructed of both Classical and vernacular elements. In fact, many modern expository and scientific styles use Classical for the syntactical words and vernacular for the substantive words, to borrow a traditional distinction. [...] The vernacular writer has the ever-present opportunity and inclination to create an intermediate language, or more commonly, to adopt one ready made. The two languages can be alternated or they can be mixed, but although a rigorous standard is maintained for Classical, the vernacular writer always compromises to some degree. In the vernacular, the two languages are thus effectively reduced to styles or ingredients of styles. The writer, being bilingual [by this term Hanan clearly means: “diglossic”], can if he chooses work out his own combination of styles, both serially, alternating the two languages, and synthetically.” Hanan 1981, 14. With John DeFrancis, who quotes him (DeFrancis 1985, 58), I have reservations, however, if what Hanan expresses by speaking of “grammatically compatible systems” and “in essence, constant” “grammar” implicitly amounts to positing the existence of a single, universal Chinese grammar.</footnote>
more hidden the direct authorial expression. This phenomenon has been amply discussed, and is
consistent with the fact that the practice of anonymity has been much more widespread with the writing of
novels and vernacular story collections than with, say, theatre, until the eighteenth century at least.<fnref n="21" />
Routinely, when first-person narration occurs in stories and novels, the “I” (and by this I understand the
use of any first-person pronoun or of any noun playing the role of a pronoun by proxy) is a narrator distinct
from the author, whose identity is typically embodied in the persona of a story-teller, as in the following
example:

如今待小子再宣一段話本，叫做《包龍圖智賺合同文》。你道這話本出在那裡？

Today let your humble servant tell you a *huaben*-story, which is entitled “Thanks to his sagacity, Judge Bao reclaims the contract”. And where, do you ask, did that *huaben* occur?<fnref n="22" />

In this regard, the most extreme case of first-person narration in short story collections is the *Doupeng xianhua* 豆棚閒話 (Idle Talk under the Bean Arbor), in which virtually all twelve stories should be theoretically considered entirely narrated in the first person, as the author expresses himself through the speeches of twelve successive narrators/villagers in the position of impromptu storytellers taking turns to tell a story in the frame of the bucolic bean arbor. The storytelling device includes the persona of a rector of a Confucian school giving a lesson, again speaking in his own name, in the twelfth and concluding chapter.<fnref n="23" />

We do not need to cite a particular example of dialogue here either, as source rewriting routinely includes
the transformation of third person narration into dialogue form. One would not be surprised to find that
the proportion of dialogic narration is far greater in vernacular versions of stories in comparison with their
sources in literary Chinese, even when no fundamental changes to the plotline occur, as vernacular
language is par excellence the domain of subjectivity. By this word I mean something very different from
what is being expressed under the signifier of the first person in the case of texts in classical language. The
latter, as we have just said, are quite coded, mostly in the sense of an introspection or discovery of one's
interiority. But talking about one's interiority does not necessarily mean that one will reveal much about
one's subjectivity, as these are two very different notions. Some of the posturing present in the
autobiographies of scholars (for example, the constant references to Buddhism) act more as masks than
as revelators. The definition I would give of subjectivity is quite the antithesis of this. It corresponds to
what Maria Franca Sibau expresses so nicely in her book essentially devoted to the study of the *Xingshi yan* 型世言 collection:

<footnote n="21">²¹ Robert Hegel contrasts the case of poetry, in which the “persona of the poet” is openly asserted, and that of vernacular short stories and novels where the authorship is routinely masked behind pseudonyms: Hegel 1985, 27. For a study on autobiographical writings, see P. Wu 1990. For discussions on the anonymity of fiction writers see M. Wang 2012, 35–36, Zhu 2004, 69–72. Martin Huang notes how eighteenth-century novels see the rise of autobiographical sensibilities along with the decline of formal autobiographical writings: Huang 1995, 6–9.</footnote>

<footnote n="22">²² Ling Mengchu, *Pai'an jingqi*, chap. 33: Ling 1981, vol. 2, 704.</footnote>

<footnote n="23">²³ On *Doupeng xianhua*, see Lévy 1965, 110–37, Lévy 1981, 400–403, “Aina” in Hanan 1981, 191–207, Lanselle 2006; translations: Aina jushi 2010, Aina jushi 2017; on the 12th and last chapter, to which we will come back at the end of this paper: H. Wu 2017a, H. Wu 2017b, 229–89.</footnote>
(...) these stories offer an ideal vantage point to illuminate the rhetorical and ideological differences between classical language biographies and vernacular *huaben*. The vernacular stories, as one would expect, typically flesh out the characters’ background and motives for action, often adding subplots and incidents to the terse biographical account. Most significantly, the vernacular stories feature what I have called “discursive frame.” Typically, the plots are built around a moral conflict of sorts, which, however, is not presented as an interiorized dilemma, in that there is no depiction of hesitation or inner torment over the proper course of action. Rather, the dilemma is externalized, so that the significance of the heroine’s act, the alternative courses of action, and the claims of competing values are discussed by a more or less colorful crowd of relatives, servants, friends, and neighbors. What was portrayed as an individual, private drama in the original biography becomes an issue whose social ramifications are explored in the vernacular story. Such a discursive frame thus opens a textual space in which a debate over the moral choice can be articulated. (Sibau 2018, 107)

Maybe unknowingly, Sibau points here towards a perfect Lacanian definition of subjectivity. In contrast to an interiority as an autonomous entity, it is one in which the psyche is constituted from elements that are essentially external to the individual. To put it in Lacan's categories, we find the components of the symbolic (language, discourse, social rules, morality), the imaginary (what image of myself does the Other send back to me?), and the real (the background, events, all the hard facts over which the individual has no control, and which they come up against). The subjectivity in question then becomes that of a divided subject, in which the uncanny of the “darker side of human action and psyche” looms. (Ibid., p. 2) Its narrative is less that of an inner voice understood as something retaining a certain level of singular agency, than one in which several voices are inextricably intertwined and where it is no longer clear who is in the driver’s seat. Even inner monologue, far more frequent in TT than in ST, comes much less as introspective than as a lively, dialogic response to external stimuli, words, or situations (“she considered:...”, “hearing this, he thought:...”). It is no wonder then that the vernacular voice needs so much amplification, compared to the tightness of the classical text, to give an account of everything that truly constitutes a subject!

Not only does vernacular narration favour dialogue, which enriches motifs and makes situations more complex, but it also opens windows on interiority in a way that makes use of a rich palette of narrative point of views, or diegetic positions, including inner monologue, reported speech, and densely interwoven mixtures of dialogue and third-person discourse. Through them subjects openly explore their own subjectivity and that of others, and this appears in vernacular versions in a far wider scope than in their counterparts in literary style, which incline towards elliptical turns of phrase and dwell less, or in a more conventional way, on characters' motivations. Take a story in which strange things or dreams occur, triggering strings of inner conflicts, fears, doubts, etc., as in Feng Menglong's story "Student Dugu enters a raucous dream while en route home". None of its three ST has a single sentence of inner monologue, whereas in the TT, no less than 21 inner monologues appear. All are attributable to the editor (Langxian 浪仙), the overwhelming majority consisting in additions or pure amplification (see classification of micro-strategies as detailed below), while a few are expanded (amplified) translations, as in this example:
ST2:

遐叔悵然悲惋。謂其妻死矣。

Upset, Xiashu sighed in sorrow. He told himself his wife was dead.

ST3:

張君謂其妻已卒。

Zhang told himself his wife was already dead.

TT:

那遐叔想了一會，歎道：“我曉得了。一定是我的娘子已死，他的魂靈遊到此間，卻被我一磚把他驚散了。”

Xiashu thought for a moment, then sighed, “I know. It is certainly that my wife is already dead, and her soul has travelled all the way here, but it has been dispelled by the brick I threw.”<fnref n="21" />

Like the inner monologue, the reported speech/reported text is a way to turn into direct speech elements of dialogue which otherwise would be recorded in the third person. But whereas inner monologue appears as much more frequent in TT than in ST, and as such tends to appear more or less as a device related to vernacularisation, reported speech/reported text is frequent in ST as well as in TT, to such an extent that it is often a case in which the ST is itself reproduced with little change in TT, as a (quasi-)quotation. See this example from the same *Pai'an jingqi* 拍案驚奇 (Slapping the Table in Amazement), chap. 4. quoted above:²⁵

ST:

“道姑欣然接納，曰：‘此地不可居，吾山中有別業。’”

“The Daoist nun accepted me cheerfully and said, ‘You cannot stay in this place, I have a separate villa in the mountain.’”

<footnote n="21">²¹ ST2: *Taiping guangji* 太平廣記, chap. 281, “Dreams, Six” 夢六, “Dugu Xiashu” 獨孤遐叔 by Xue Yusi 薛漁思 (n.d.), originally in *Hedong ji* 河東記; ST3: *Taiping guangji*, chap. 282, “Dreams, Seven” 夢七, “Zhang Sheng” 張生, by Li Mei 李玫 (n.d.), originally in *Zuanyi ji* 篆異記; TT: “Dugu sheng guitu naomeng” 獨孤生歸途鬧夢 (“Student Dugu enters a raucous dream while en route home”), in Feng Menglong, *Xingshi hengyan* 醒世恆言 (Constant Words to Awaken the World), chap. 25, main story. (There is also an ST1, which on that particular passage says nothing.) See: *Taiping guangji* 1981, vol. 6, 2244-45; *ibid.*, 2250-51; Feng 2007, 3:529-53. The first version of the story is “Sanmeng ji” 三夢記 (“Story of Three Dreams”) by Bai Xingjian 白行簡 (775-826); see P. Wang 1958, 108-10. In ST3, the main character is named Student Zhang 張生 (referred to as Zhang-jun 張君), whereas in other versions his name is Dugu Xiashu 獨孤遐叔. For a thorough study of the rewriting process leading to the composition of *Xingshi hengyan*, chap. 25, see Lucas 2018, 196-250 & 688-769. Pages 688-769 include the texts of five versions of the same story as well as two stories inspired by them, with their full French translations, including full-length translation of the main story of *Xingshi hengyan*, chap. 25. The study includes a detailed and extensive commented textual comparison of Langxian's story with ST1, ST2, and ST3. On the source texts, see also Tan 1980, vol. 2, 505-8, Lévy et al. 1978-2006, vol. 2, 712. On Langxian's identity and authorship, see Hanan 1967, 120-39.</footnote>

<footnote n="28">²⁸ See p. 216, n. 16.</footnote>
TT:

“道姑欣然接納，又道：‘此地不可居。吾山中有庵，可往住之。’”

“The Daoist nun accepted me cheerfully and added, ‘You cannot stay in this place, I have a hermitage in the mountain, we can go live there.’”

We associate Reported Text in the same sub-category as Reported Speech. Instead of being spoken, what is reported in this case is any written document, such as a letter, poster, judicial decision, etc. For example:

出一單榜在通衢，道：“有能探訪得女兒消息來報者，願賠家產，將女兒與他為妻。”

He put up a sign in the street, which said, “Anyone who will be able to find my daughter and give me information will be given a share of my estate, and will receive my daughter in marriage.”<fnref n="26" />

It appears that a specific category of comparison analysis, “3rd Person + Dialogue Combination”, often comes in handy in order to analyse narrative sections. Such combinations are present in both ST in literary Chinese and in TT in vernacular, but dialogues are so prevalent in the latter that one often finds rewritings in which TT is fragmented in more complex sequences than ST, with both points of view closely interwoven. This often leads to long amplifications, but here we will limit ourselves to a short example:

ST:

乃王氏之女。因暴疾亡。不知何由至此。

It was the daughter of the Wang family. As she had died of a sudden illness, she did not quite understand why she was here.

TT:

那女子見人多了，便說出話來，道：“奴是此間王家女。因昨夜一個頭暈，跌倒在地，不知何緣在此？”

The young woman, seeing that many people had come, started to speak and said: “Your servant is the Wangs’ daughter, from this locality. Last night as I suddenly felt dizzy, I fell on the ground. I don’t understand for what reason I am here.”<fnref n="27" />

With the last three categories (Inner Monologue, Reported Speech/Reported Text, 3rd Person + Dialogue Combination), the expression of subjectivity in vernacular narratives rises to the level of true polyphony, with expanded incursions into the subjects' inner realm and outward excursions towards their connections, as compared to the relatively limited means of the sources in literary language, with their predominant extra-diegetic point of view interspersed with limited dialogic inserts. One wonders to what extent this

<footnote n="26">²⁶ Ling Mengchu, *Pai'an jingqi*, chap. 24, "Yanguanyi laomo meise Huihaishan dashi zhuxie", main story (*op. cit*). TT. See Ling 1981, vol. 2, 508.</footnote>

<footnote n="27">²⁷ ST: “Liu shi zi qi” 劉氏子妻, originally from *Yuanhua ji* 原化記, in *Taiping guangji*, chap. 386; TT: Ling Mengchu, *Pai'an jingqi*, chap. 9, “Xuanhuiyuan shinü qiuqian hui Qing'ansi fufu xiao tiyuan” 宣徽院仕女鞦韆會 清安寺夫婦笑啼緣 (In the Director's garden, young ladies enjoy a swing-set party; At Pure and Peaceful Temple, husband and wife laugh and cry at their reunion), introductory story. See *Taiping guangji* 1981, vol. 8, 3082-83; Ling 1981, vol. 1, 179; Tan 1980, vol. 2, 631-33.</footnote>
masterly manipulation of so many narrative levels is indebted to the practice of drama, with its habit of rewriting well-known stories into elaborate dialogic form—to say nothing of the role of songs. What is certain is that this development in the sense of narrative complexity will ultimately have the effect of pushing classical writing as well towards a more sophisticated use of dialogues and monologues, as with authors like Pu Songling 蒲松齡 (1640-1715), Yuan Mei 袁枚 (1716-1797), Shen Qifeng 沈起鳳 (1741-?), and many others.<fnref n="28" />

The last two subcategories in the “Narrative Point of View” category, “Rhetorical Dialogue/Storyteller’s Stock Phrase” and “Inserted Verse/Inserted Depiction”, are composed of narrative devices that most often interrupt the flow of the narration and are placed on a plane that overlooks it. The majority are external to the plot of the story and its characters and represent the main areas where the author/editor operates, one might say, in plain sight. But while Rhetorical Dialogue/Storyteller’s Stock Phrase is essentially extradigetic in nature, this may vary for Inserted Verse/Inserted Depiction. And if the former appears always as additions present only in TT and not in ST, the latter, while being mostly additions too, may sometimes be already present in ST. In any case, their effects are innumerable, and figure among the most lasting characteristics of vernacular stories and novels.

Rhetorical dialogue and storyteller's stock phrase do not need many illustrations as they are ubiquitous. Much has been written on the “storyteller's manner” in vernacular literature, a characteristic which is very obvious in *huaben* stories but is significant in other genres as well.<fnref n="29" /> Stories are full of “the story goes that” (*hua shuo* 話說), “let me tell you” (*qie shuo* 且說), “in your opinion” (*ni dao* 你道), “let's not mention it” (*bu ti* 不題), “we're not telling about that” (*bu zai huaxia* 不在話下), “storyteller, I am asking you” (*shuohuade, wo qie wen ni* 說話的, 我且問你), “readers/members of the audience, there is something you should know” (*kanguan you suo buzhi* 看官有所不知), and dozens of other expressions or narrative devices which all deserve to be distinguished as a particular category. In the counting of occurrences, it would be unwise to separate rhetorical dialogue from storyteller's stock phrases, as they are intrinsically related and appear in neighbouring locations. Both come explicitly from the “mouth” of the narrator, and are emphatically relevant to a lively, “realistic” conversational tone. Needless to say, they always appear as additions in TT, and are basically never present in ST. In a way congruent with their extradigetic nature, they are more often found in places that surround the story proper, typically in opening, introductory, or concluding parts, or in transitions (often marked by a new paragraph in modern editions). For this reason, too, they are often highly likely to be associated with moralistic, commanding, “controlling” messages that form the explicit motive of the story and its vernacular writing, as “storyteller” and “schoolmaster” are often interchangeable personae. Here is a typical example of a transitional usage:

<footnote n="28">²⁸ For example, the influence of vernacular fiction on Pu Songling’s writing style has been amply demonstrated by Allan Barr: Barr 2007.</footnote>

<footnote n="29">²⁹ See, e.g., Idema 1973; Lévy 1981, 112–41; L. T. Chan 1997; Lévy 2010. See Vibeke Børdahl’s careful analysis of stock phrases and simulated dialogue between author and reader in the case of the story of Wu Song fighting the tiger and its numerous rewritings: Børdahl 2013, 114–26. See also Børdahl 2003; Børdahl 2010b.</footnote>
不道人情難料，事有不然。偏又有一等得了美人為妻，又要去惹閑花、沾野草的。天公知道，豈不惡其淫心無厭，於是即以其人之淫，還報其人之身，使聞之者，略加警悟。在下得諸傳聞，頗覺新異，聊述與看官醒一醒睡。

話說清朝初年，福建州府地方，有一鄉紳，姓趙名虞，字舜生，年方二十一歲，即連科中了進士。

But we can never say enough about how unpredictable human affairs can be and how upsetting events can be. For mention should also be made of those who, married to beautiful women, are constantly picking other flowers and gleaning wild herbs. This inextinguishable lust does not fail to arouse the wrath of the Lord of Heaven, who one day makes the offender personally pay the price for his turpitude, thus leaving an example to ponder for those who hear it. Your servant will tell you a novel fact that he finds rather curious, which he has been made aware of by hearsay, a story, dear reader, that will not fail to bring you out of your drowsiness.

The story tells that in the early years of the Qing Dynasty, a rich notable named Zhao lived in Fuzhou Prefecture in Fujian. His personal name was Yu and his public name was Shunsheng. Barely twenty-one *sui* old, he had passed all the official examinations one after the other and had become a metropolitan graduate.<fnref n="90" />

The presence of inserted verse and inserted depictions is another well-known hallmark of *huaben* short stories, whose prosimetric characteristics have been widely studied, and of novels as well—though to a lesser extent, generally speaking. Distichs, quatrains, eight lines regulated verses, but also *ci*詞 and *qu* 曲 songs, even *gāthā* (偈), to name only a few of the forms involved, are omnipresent, although the frequency of their use can vary greatly. (For example, they are everywhere with Langxian, while Li Yu barely uses them.) The most typical use of this device is the interruption of the story to make a point in verse about a description of a scene or to give a brief moralistic lesson. They are often introduced by a “truly” (*zhengshi* 正是), or “there is a poem in testimony” (*you shi wei zheng* 有詩為證), as in the following example:

有詩為證：

朝灌園兮暮灌園，灌成園上百花鮮。

花開每恨看不足，為愛看園不肯眠。

There is a poem in testimony:

He watered his garden in the morning, he watered it at night,

And tended to it so well that a hundred flowers bloomed in all their brightness.

When the blossoms bloomed, he could not get enough of them,

<footnote n="90">⁹⁰ Fengliu wu 風流悟, chap. 2, “Yi qi yi qi anzhong jiaoyi, Shijie shijie sihou chongfeng” 以妻易妻暗中交易 矢節失節死後重逢 (“With a wife make an exchange of wives: shadowy trade; Chastity versus bawdiness: a meeting after death”): Hong P. and Zuohua sanren 2012, 198–99.</footnote>
And for the sake of his garden no longer wanted to find sleep.<fnref n="31" />

In this moralistic example, the sententious aspect brings it closer to a proverb:

正是：

日間不做虧心事，夜半敲門不吃驚。

Truly:

He who does not commit shameful acts in broad daylight

Has no reason to be afraid when there is a knock on his door in the middle of the night.<fnref n="32" />

In these instances, the inserted verses are entirely extradigetic, to the point of having, in the case of moralistic sentences or proverbs, a kind of “superegotic” flavor intended to make the reader reflect upon themselves. But they can also be intradigetic when they are enunciated by the characters of the stories, as in this example:

伯牙道：

「摔碎瑤琴鳳尾寒，子期不在對誰彈！

春風滿面皆朋友，欲覓知音難上難。」

And this was Boya's reply:

"The zither smashed, the phoenix's tail grew cold.

Now that Ziqi's gone, for whom can I play?

All call themselves friends and give you a smile,

But to find a true friend is all too hard.”<fnref n="33" />

In this example, verses put in the mouth of a character are composed by the author/editor of the vernacular story and are not present in the ST. They can be copy-pasted from other sources than the source of the story: one remarkable example is the inclusion of the 104 lines “Song of eternal sorrow” (“Changhen ge” 長恨歌) left by the heroine of one of Feng Menglong’s stories when she kills herself, which results from the insertion of a (modified) quotation of a poem borrowed from a poetry collection inside the amplification of the story, borrowed from a different ST.<fnref n="34" /> In many cases though, they come as quotations

<footnote n="31">³¹ Xingshi hengyan, chap. 4, “Guanyuan sou wan feng xiannü” 灌園叟晚逢仙女：Feng 1981c, vol. 1, 81. For Yang Shuhui’s and Yang Yunqin’s translation, see Feng 2009, 87.</footnote>

<footnote n="32">³² Ling Mengchu, Erke Pai’an jingqi 二刻拍案驚奇, chap. 5, “Xiangmin-gong yuanxiao shizi, Shisanlang wusui chaotian” 襄敏公原宵失子 十三郎五歲朝天: Ling 1980, 116.</footnote>

<footnote n="33">³³ Feng Menglong, *Jingshi tongyan*, chap. 1, “Yu Boya shuai qin xie zhiyin” 俞伯牙摔琴謝知音: Feng 1981b, vol. 1, 10. Translation by Yang Shuhui and Yang Yunqin: Feng 2005, 20.</footnote>

<footnote n="34">³⁴ Feng Menglong, *Jingshi tongyan*, chap. 34, “Wang Jiaoluan bainian changhen” 王嬌鸞百年長恨. The ST comes from Feng’s *Qingshi leilüe* 情史類略, chap. 16 (citing a story, “Zhou Tingzhang” 周廷章, from an unidentified, possibly Yuan, original source), while the poem is drawn from Zhong Xing’s 鍾惺 (1574-1624) *Gujin Mingyuan shigui* 古今名媛詩歸 (1621), chap. 27, introduced by an abstract of the plot. See Tan 1980, vol. 1, 358–60; Lévy</footnote>
of the ST. This is the case, for example, in the ninth chapter of Ling Mengchu's *Pai'an jingqi*, with two ci詞 to the tunes “Pusa man” 菩薩蠻 and “Man jiang hong” 滿江紅, which are improvised by a character in order to show his literary talent, and which are verbatim quotations of the ST.<fnref n="35" /> Generally speaking, inserted verse and inserted depiction can take all conceivable forms, in verse as well as in prose, in order to achieve all kinds of desirable effects, from the sternest admonitions or ominous warnings to the most sententious pieces of wisdom or the most comically inflated descriptions. The stylistic palette is as wide as we can possibly imagine, and in the case of depictions, it is interesting to see how the ci and qu forms, which are in a category of their own, strongly tending towards vernacular, neighbour with pieces of parallel prose essays in classical language which come from a very different background: that of “eight-legged” (*baguwen* 八股文) examination essays—a fact which is rarely identified as such.<fnref n="36" />

## II. Denotational Level (Utterance) (Textual Transformation Micro-strategies)

While all the different categories and subcategories cited above can apply, at least theoretically, to any section of both ST and TT, are intrinsically static, and are indexical in nature—they are concerned with *how* something is said—the textual transformation micro-strategies are inherently dynamic. They are only concerned with the way ST is turned into TT, implying a comparison analysis of *what* is said in the new text as compared with *what* is said in the preceding text. So, they should be considered as applying to TT only, but dynamically and always by comparison with ST. They are denotational in nature as they deal with content rather than form. They lie at the core of the rewriting/intralingual translation operation, and one may find they constitute the most fascinating part of the process. In the textual transformation involved in the writing of *huaben* stories, we can observe that writers actually relied on a limited number of micro-strategies: according to my survey, as shown in the list above, no more than ten of them are needed to achieve the full range of the rewriting possibilities. They can be grouped into five categories:

### 1. Quotation

#### a. Verbatim Quotation

#### b. Quasi-Quotation/Amplified Quotation

<footnote>et al. 1978-2006, vol. 2, 542; Feng 1984, 483-86; Zhong 1621, 13a-17b, fasc. 13.</footnote>

<footnote n="35">³⁵ Ling Mengchu, *Pai'an jingqi*, chap. 9, "Xuanhuiyuan shinü qiuqian hui Qing'ansi fufu xiao tiyuan" 宣徽院仕女鞻轆會 清安寺夫婦笑啼緣 (In the Director's garden, young ladies enjoy a swing-set party; At Pure and Peaceful Temple, husband and wife laugh and cry at their reunion), main story: Ling 1981, vol. 1, 181-82. Source in Li Zhen 李禎 1376-1452, *Jiandeng yuhua* 剪燈餘話, chap. 4, "Qiuqianhui ji" 鞻轆會記: Qu, Li, and Shao 1981, 253, Tan 1980, vol. 2, 634.</footnote>

<footnote n="36">³⁶ The most extensive among recent studies on the subject of ci詞 and qu曲 in prosimetric literature, going well beyond the *(nǐ) huaben* (擬)話本 genres, is Zhao et al. 2013. Depictions in *baguwen* form inserted in *huaben* stories are present everywhere. For example, in Langxian's *Shi diantou* 石點頭, there is an average of one per chapter, not including the numerous letters or "official" documents which are written in the same style. See, e.g., *Shi diantou* 2015, 3 & 5 (chap. 1), 35-36 & 44 (chap. 3), 132-133 (chap. 10). The influence of *baguwen* on vernacular literature is still a little-studied subject, but one whose importance is increasingly recognised. On the case of its influence on *(nǐ) huaben*, see, e.g., Y. Zhang 2008, 100-112, Ye 2009, 508-17, Y. Zhang 2010, Jia 2011.</footnote>
## 2. Translation

a. Translation/Replacement by (Quasi-)Synonym

b. Amplified Translation

c. Explanatory Translation/Reformulating

## 3. Divergence and Addition

a. Divergence

b. Addition/Amplification

c. Diverging Addition/Diverging Amplification

## 4. Omission

## 5. Textual Displacement

The micro-strategies are explained below, again accompanied with examples whenever relevant. Here, even less than in the previous cases, the examples given, intended to show cases, are only commented on in terms of form, and not in terms of hypotheses about the supposed motivations of the authors.

### 1. Quotation: a. Verbatim Quotation

The first of the two types of quotation, this is the most basic operation of “rewriting”: that within which any section (word, phrase, whole sentence, poem, etc.) of ST is copied, unchanged, into TT. The verbatim is typically in literary Chinese, as this is the language in which most ST are written, but verbatim quotations from vernacular to vernacular can also be found. This is a universal practice, to the point that it is very rare not to find some verbatim quotation of ST, no matter how small, in any given TT. Verbatim quotations play a huge role in the recreation of a story, their presence being universal in Chinese textual practices, and with multiple effects. Here is a basic example, in which the verbatim quotation part is underlined, and belongs to a dialogic passage:

ST:

> 含屍以玉珥，留一自含，曰：「九泉之下，以此為信。」

> She put a jade earring in the corpse's mouth, keeping the other to be put into her own mouth [at her death], and said: "Below the Nine Springs, it will be our authentication token".

TT:

> 殇時，出二玉珥，以一納善世口中，以為含。一以與母，道：「留為我含，九泉之下，以此為信。」

> When the body was laid into the coffin, she produced two earrings, one of which she put in [Gui] Shanshi's mouth for him to be buried with it. The other one she gave to her mother, saying: "This
is to be kept in order to put it in my mouth [at my death], below the Nine Springs, it will be our
authentication token”.<fnref n="37" />

In this example the contrast between what is identical in ST and TT and what has been translated into vernacular between ST and TT is even more obvious:

ST:

[...] 生自相門,窮極富貴,第宅宏麗,莫與為比。然讀書能文,敬禮賢士,故時譽翕然稱之。

This student came from a ministerial family, he enjoyed an immense fortune and a high status, lived in luxurious mansions, to such extent that no one could compete with him. Yet he had studied and was versed in literary composition, and expressed reverence for the virtuous scholars, which is why his good reputation at that time was unanimously praised.

TT:

生在相門,窮極富貴,第宅宏麗,莫與為比。卻又讀書能文,敬禮賢士,一時公卿間,多稱誦他好處。

This student was of a ministerial family, he enjoyed an immense fortune and a high status, lived in luxurious mansions, to such extent that no one could compete with him. But in addition, he had studied and was versed in literary composition, and expressed reverence for the virtuous scholars; at that time, among the high-ranking officials, most praised his fine qualities.<fnref n="38" />

In the above example, we should note how, despite the high proportion of verbatim quotation in classical Chinese, TT is vernacularised nevertheless through the translation of grammatical words or articulation into more common, vernacular equivalents: *zi* 自 becomes *zai* 在, *ran* 然 becomes *que you* 卻又.

Obviously some of the verbatim quotations come as *yanyu 諺語* (adages), *chengyu 成語* (set phrases), and other forms of fixed phrases. Fixed phrases are universal in oral as well as in written vernacular literature,<fnref n="39" /> and it is a fascinating fact that in any given story or episode one will have a hard time not to find at least one kernel of verbatim material transferred from ST to TT. It is also very intriguing to see how these verbatim quotations emphatically concern seemingly insignificant material details over facts that might appear more important, as if the unchanged detail was a simple indicator of the importance of a scene and insignificant in itself. For example when, in the *Romance of the Three Kingdoms*, Tian Feng 田豐 “strikes

<footnote n="37">³⁷ ST: “Gui liefu Chen shi zu” 歸烈婦陳氏卒”, in Chen Jian 陳建 and Shen Guoyuan 沈國元, *Huang Ming cong xin lu* 皇明從信錄 chap. 38 (Wanli 34 = 1606): J. Chen and Shen 1620, 34a-36a, fascicle 25. TT: Lu Renlong 陸人龍, *Xingshi yan* 型世言 chap. 10, “Liefu ren si xun fu Xian’ao ge ai cheng nü” 烈婦忍死殉夫賢媼割愛成女: R. Lu 1993, 184. NB: at the end of the TT, the author specifies that the ST story is by Gui Zimu 歸子慕 (1563-1606).</footnote>

<footnote n="38">³⁸ ST: Li Zhen, *Jiandeng yuhua*, chap. 4, “Qiuqianhui jī”, *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu, *Pai'an jingqi*, chap. 9, “Xuanhuiyuan shinü qiuqian hui Qing'ansi fufu xiao tiyuan”, main story, *op. cit*. See Qu, Li, and Shao 1981, 252-53; Ling 1981, vol. 1, 181-82; Tan 1980, vol. 2, 634.</footnote>

<footnote n="39">³⁹ Vibeke Børdahl’s analysis of the story of Wu Song fighting the tiger has no less than 30 occurrences about fixed phrases in her index (Børdahl 2013, 532). See in particular *ibid.*, p. 211-215.</footnote>
the ground with his staff" in anger as Yuan Shao 袁紹, troubled by the illness of his youngest son, refuses to send his army to attack Cao Cao 曹操, you can bet that this particular gestural detail is present in the source text: and indeed it is.<fnref n="40" /> And yet this small gesture is an apparently irrelevant detail compared with the great military defeat that would ensue. The following example shows how such telling details can indeed be found repeatedly through many different sources of the same story before being employed unaltered in the vernacular version:

ST1:

李云:“曾得龍巾拭唾,御手調羹(...)”

Li [Bai] said: “I had the dragon handkerchief wipe the drool on my mouth, the imperial hand stir my broth...”

ST2:

但曰:“曾用龍巾拭吐,御手調羹(...)”

He said simply: “My vomit was wiped with the dragon handkerchief, the imperial hand stirred my broth...”

ST3:

天子親迎降輦,御手調羹。

The Son of Heaven descended from his carriage to meet me, the imperial hand stirred my broth.

TT:

眾人知是李謫仙學士,御手調羹的,誰敢不依?

The assembly knew that he was the Academician Li the Exiled Immortal, the one who had the imperial hand stir his broth, who would dare not to obey him?<fnref n="41" />

The great commentator Jin Shengtan 金聖歎 (1608-1661) suggests that the verbatim repetition of a particular concrete detail is valuable, as it gives dynamic structure to a narrative. He works out one of his famous narrative micro-strategies (*fa* 法), the “strategy of the snake in the grass or discontinuous chalk line” (*caoshe huixian fa* 草蛇灰線法) on the basis of the eighteen repeated occurrences of the same word *shaobang* 哨棒 (fighting staff) in chapter 22 (of his own edition), which, he explains in his interlineal commentaries, echo the number of bowls of wine Wu Song 吳松 drank before encountering the tiger at

<footnote n="40">⁴⁰ ST: “豐舉杖擊地曰：[...]” Sanguo zhi 三國志 1959, vol. 1 (Wei shu, j. 6), 197; TT: “田豐以杖擊地曰：[...]” (Zuben Sanguo yanyi 足本三國演義 1958, 144-45, chap. 24). The quotation is actually a quasi-quotation as ST’s 舉 is replaced by 以 in TT (and TT has the complete name 田豐 instead of the sole *ming* 豐 in ST), but quasi-quotation and verbatim quotation are functionally but one single micro-strategy.</footnote>

<footnote n="41">⁴¹ ST1: Liu Fu 劉斧 (11th c.), Qingsuo gaoyi 青瑣高議, chap. 2; ST2: Feng Shihua 馮時化, *Jiushi* 酒史, chap. 1; ST3: Tu Long 屠隆 (1543-1605), Caihao ji 彩毫記, scene 12, “Xiang E si yi” 湘娥思憶; TT: Feng Menglong ed., *Jingshi tongyan* 警世通言, ch. 9, “Li Zhexian zui cao he man shu” 李謫仙醉草嚇蠻書 (“Li the banished immortal writes in drunkenness the letter that terrifies the Barbarians”). See Tan 1980, vol. 1, 262, 263; Tu n.d., p. *shang* 上 34a; Tu 1982, vol. 5, 30; Feng 1981b, vol. 1, 111; Lévy et al. 1978-2006, vol. 2, 398-99.</footnote>
Jingyang Ridge 景陽崗.<fnref n="12" /> To him the verbatim repetition gives life to a narrative.<fnref n="13" /> The importance of the detail of Wu Song’s “broken staff” is enduring: Børdahl finds it in every single one of the seven versions of the episode she examines, without counting the novel and drama versions. (Børdahl 2013, 207)

## 1. Quotation: b. Quasi-Quotation/Amplified Quotation

In this second of the two types of quotation, an ST segment is reproduced almost identically in TT, with various modifications, such as word order, replacement of a character by another one or of a syntagm in the classical language by its vernacular equivalent, switching to mixed language, or introducing additions. For statistical as well as logical reasons, we do not separate quasi-quotation and amplified quotation, lest we would be faced with differentiations sometimes very tricky to establish, and would be forced to hazard a guess about the author’s intention. Indeed, a quotation may become a quasi- or amplified quotation for any number of reasons. The change can be made involuntarily or voluntarily. Because quotations are part of cultures where rote learning holds an important place, a quasi- or amplified quotation may be the involuntary result of errors in memorising or due to a lapse in copying when the author is working with the original text in front of him. Voluntary changes in quotations are often aimed at fluidifying the insertion of the quotation within its environment in TT, or simply to give an equivalent (which often borders on translation), or in order to add a new layer of authority to a quotation in literary language, or even to change the meaning of the text cited.

Here is a basic example:

ST:

> 七竅流血而死。

> He died bleeding from the seven apertures.

TT:

> 九竅流血而死！

> He died bleeding from the nine apertures.⁴¹

In the following example the quasi-quotation is slightly amplified, and no more than in the previous example are the changes due to chance or inattention; on the contrary they pertain to a kind of careful quasi-translation, in which the literary language of ST shifts inconspicuously into mixed language:

<footnote n="12">¹² “Du Diwu caizi shu fa” 讀第五才子書法, parag. 53, *Diwu caizi shu Shi Nai’an Shuihu zhuan* 1985, vol. 1, 22; interlineal comments to chap. 22, *ibid.*, vol. 1, 366-371. See also Rolston and Lin 1990, 140-41.</footnote>

<footnote n="13">¹³ “If you look at it in haste, there seems to be nothing. But if you search in the details, you find there is one single thread in the middle of it: pull on it and it gives movement to the whole body.” 驟看之，有如無物，及至細尋，其中便有一條線索，拽之通體俱動. (*Diwu caizi shu, ibid.*)</footnote>

<footnote n="14">¹⁴ Hong Mai, *Yijian (ding) zhi* 夷堅(丁)志, j. 15, “Zhang ke qi yu” 張客奇遇, quoted in Feng Menglong, *Qingshi leilüe*, j. 16, “Nian Erniang” 念二娘. TT: Feng Menglong, *Jingshi tongyan*, chap. 34, “Wang Jiaoluan bainian changhen” 王嬌鸞百年長恨, introductory story. See Tan 1980, vol. 1, 356-57; Lévy et al. 1978-2006, vol. 2 (1979), 542; M. Hong 1981, vol. 2, 666-67; Feng 1984, 499-500; Feng 1981b, vol. 2, 517.</footnote>
ST:

時已昏黑，乃就升榻上施衾褥，命程臯，仍加以鹿裘。

By this time, it was already dark, so she climbed on the couch and spread out the bedding, and
having told Cheng to lie down, further added a buckskin cloak.

TT:

時已夜深，乃就竹榻上施衾褥，命程在此宿臥，仍加以鹿裘覆之。

By this time, it was already late at night, so she spread out the bedding on the bamboo couch, and
having told Cheng to sleep there that night, in addition put a buckskin cloak on top of him.¹⁵

In this example, the vernacularisation in TT is observable through several details: the place of the locative *zaici* 在此; the transformation of the monosyllabic *wo* 臥 into the disyllabic *suwo* 宿臥; the relocation of the coverbal construction of means *yi luqiu* 以鹿裘 in anteposition to the verb *fu* 覆. Note also how the chain *rengjia yi* 仍加以 is also opportunistically deconstructed and reconstructed, grammatically speaking, in the process: in ST the logic is *reng* 仍 + *jiayi* 加以, with a construction, typical of classical language, in which *V + yi* 以 introduces a direct object (*luqiu* 鹿裘); whereas in TT the logic is *rengjia* 仍加 + *yi* 以, in which *rengjia* 仍加 becomes a simple prepositional group (“and in addition”), and *yi* 以 introduces the coverbal complement of means in vernacular speech, preceding *V* (as in constructions with *jiang* 將 or *ba* 把). Thus, between ST and TT, the verbal function switches from *jia* 加 to *fu* 覆.

The following example is a typical amplified quotation, in which the vernacular narrator borrows from the
natural authority of the formulation in literary language, with its resource in parallelism, in order to
redouble its sententious character:

ST:

躍而籲天，俯而泣地。

Jumping up and down, I sighed towards Heaven; bowing my head, I sobbed to the earth.

TT:

躍而呼天，天不我憐。俯而泣地，地不我惜。

Jumping up and down I implored Heaven, but Heaven had no mercy on me; bowing my head I sobbed to the earth, but the Earth didn't care about me.⁶⁰

In the following instance, a quasi-quotation is clearly intended to modify the meaning of the source text:

<footnote n="50">⁵⁰ ST: Hu Rujia, “Wei Shiyiniang zhuan”, *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu “Cheng Yuanyu diansi dai changqian, Shiyiniang Yungang zong tanxia” in *Pai’an jingqi*, chap. 4, *op. cit*. See Ling 1981, vol. 1, 81; R. Hu 1995, 6a and R. Hu 1997, 29.</footnote>

<footnote n="61">⁶¹ ST: “Li Zheng” 李徵, in *Taiping guangji*, chap. 427 (originally from *Xuanshi zhi* 宣室志); TT: Dong Lu Gukuang sheng 東魯古狂生, *Zuixing shi* 醉醒石, chap. 6, main story, “Gaocai sheng aoshi shi yuanxing Yiqi you niangu fen banfeng” 高才生傲世失原形 義氣友念孤分半俸. See *Taiping guangji* 1981, vol. 9, 3478; *Zuixing shi* 1985, 87.</footnote>
ST :

氣蒸雲夢澤，波撼嶽陽城

A breath of steam surrounds the Yunmeng marshes,

The waves shake the walls of Yueyang.

TT:

氣吞雲夢澤，聲撼嶽陽樓

A breath that engulfs the Yunmeng Marshes,

A voice that shakes the Yueyang Pavilion.

In this playwright's example, the meaning of the original distich from Meng Haoran 孟浩然 (689/691-740), quoted by the great storyteller Liu Jingting 柳敬亭 (1592-1674/1675), is deliberately twisted, in a humorous and self-centred way, into a play on words intended to advertise Liu's professional talents.<fnref n="47" />

## 2. Translation: a. Translation/Replacement by (Quasi-)Synonym

Of all the transformative strategies, the most fascinating is obviously the translation part. It is at the heart of the rewriting process, with its strong linguistic component and as an act consciously bridging the gap between different states of the Chinese language. Translation can be very close to the original or can incorporate added elements and amplifications in varied proportions.

The first sub-category, translation or replacement by (quasi-)synonym, is what comes closest to pure translation. In essence, although we are talking about intralingual translation, there is no fundamental difference here from what happens in interlingual translation. A semantic chain is reproduced by means of alternative linguistic signs in an equivalent manner, with as few exogenous signifying elements as possible. As in the case of interlingual translation, a certain latitude remains in the choice of words, in rewording or in the reconfiguration of turns of phrase, or in making some details more explicit, but without ever adding anything intrinsically foreign to the original. Finally, the process relies on the author's full awareness and understanding of the linguistic factors at play. This kind of translation can be found everywhere in Ming-Qing vernacular stories. Here is a typical example, in which the dialogic form of ST is respected, and with only barely visible clarification:

ST:

“適無所攜，而已饕主人飯，奈何？”

“Just now I came with nothing on me, and I have just gobbled down all your food, master innkeeper. What's to be done?”

<footnote n="47">⁴⁷ ST : Meng Haoran, “Looking at Dongting Lake—Presented to Prime Minister Zhang [i.e., Zhang Jiuling 張九齡, 673-740]” (“Wang Dongting hu zeng Zhang chengxiang” 望洞庭湖贈張丞相); TT: Kong Shangren 孔尚任 (1648-1718), *Taohua shan 桃花扇*, scene 13. See *Quan Tang shi* 1996, vol. 5, 1633, chap. 160; Kong 2016, 90.</footnote>
TT:

“適才忘帶了錢來，今飯多吃過了主人的，卻是怎好？”

“Just now I came forgetting to take money with me, and I have just gorged myself on your food, master innkeeper. What’s to be done?”¹⁸

The intralingual translation implied in such rewritings often gives the opportunity to appreciate the authors’ consummate linguistic mastery, both in terms of lexicon and grammar of the two aspects, literary and vernacular, of the Chinese diglossia—as for example when a *fan ji bi* 飯既畢 (“when she had finished eating”) is faithfully transformed into a *chibale fan* 吃罷了飯。¹⁹ This often raises the question of where authors acquired such a command of both vernacular language writing and translating skills, as those were by no means part of their official learning curriculum.²⁰ In the following example we can only admire how every single element of the original text has its distinctly chosen counterpart in the target text:

ST:

適有飛蛾來火上，媪佯以扇撲之，燈滅，偽啟門點燈。

At this moment a flying moth came near the flame; the old woman intentionally gave it a flick with her fan, putting it out, and then pretending to open the door in order to light a lamp.

TT:

只見一個飛蛾在燈上旋轉，婆子便把扇來一撲，故意撲滅了燈，叫聲：「阿呀！老身自去點個燈來。」

At this moment a flying moth came fluttering around the lamp; the old woman gave it a flick with her fan, intentionally putting it out, and exclaiming: “Aya! I am going outside to light a lamp.”<fnref n="51" />

<footnote n="48">⁴⁸ ST: Hu Rujia, “Wei Shiyiniang zhuan”, *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu “Cheng Yuanyu diansi dai changqian, Shiyiniang Yungang zong tanxia” in *Pai’an jingqi*, chap. 4, *op. cit*. See Ling 1981, vol. 1, 81; R. Hu 1995, 1a and R. Hu 1997, 24. In the *Shanbu wenyuan zhaju* 刪補文苑植橘 version, 饗 is replaced by 餐, though Ji Xianlin 季羨林 and Ding Kuifu 丁奎福 recognise that the manuscript they relied upon had 饗 (R. Hu 1997, 31); thus their correction may not be justified. I agree with Altenburger that for Ling Mengchu the source of this story was not the *Shanbu wenyuan zhaju* version, anyhow, but Pan Zhiheng’s 潘之恆 (1556-1621/1622) *Gen shi* 亘史 (Altenburger 2009, 133).</footnote>

<footnote n="49">⁴⁹ Ling Mengchu, *op.cit*.</footnote>

<footnote n="50">⁵⁰ An indication of the need to learn to master this form can be found in Jin Shengtan, who constantly encourages “young people” (zidi 子弟) to learn to write by reading novels or plays, and draws up, partly for educational purposes, a list of exemplary works mixing literary and vernacular writings. He explains this extensively, for example, in his “How to Read the Sixth Book of Genius, *The Story of the Western Wing*” (“Du diliu caizi shu *Xixiang ji fa*” 讀第六才子書西廂記法): see items 9 to 14, *Jin Shengtan piben Xixiang ji* 1986, 11–13.</footnote>

<footnote n="51">⁵¹ ST: Feng Menglong, *Qingshi leilüe*, chap. 16, “Zhenzhu shan” 珍珠衫, based on Song Maocheng 宋懋澄 (1569-ca. 1620), *Jiuyue ji* 九簫集, “Bieji” 別集, chap. 2, “Zhushan” 珠衫 (somewhat transformed by Feng, who, compared to Song Maocheng, has brought his version of *Qingshi* closer to his own vernacular version); TT: Feng Menglong ed., *Gujin xiaoshuo* 古今小說, chap. 1, “Jiang Xingge chonghui zhenzhu shan” 蔣興哥重會珍珠衫, “Jiang Xingge Re-encounters the Pearl-Sewn Shirt”. See Feng 1984, 478; M. Song 1984, 272; Tan 1980, vol. 1, 4; Feng 1981a, vol. 1, 19; Lévy et al. 1978-2006, vol. 1, 158-59.</footnote>
The only parts in this example that do not fully adhere to the original are the liberty taken in having the moth “ fluttering around the lamp ” (*zai dengshang xuanzhuan* 在燈上旋轉) instead of “ coming near the flame ” (*lai huoshang* 來火上), and the transformation of the last segment from a third person narration into a dialogic form, both obviously in order to make the scene appear even more lively. But this licence is more about expressive change, with barely any semantical addition, and does not exceed the limits of what would be commonly found in any interlingual translation, especially at that time. It is as though the author of the rewriting, despite being in such a monolingual written space as premodern China, knew what the basic rules of translation proper were to be.<fnref n="52" /> As in innumerable other cases, the intralingual translation is strikingly faithful to the original. Some renderings could very well figure in a text book of classical vs vernacular grammar (see, e.g., *shi you fei'e* 適有飛蛾/zhi jian yige fei'e 只見一個飛蛾; *yi shan pu zhi* 以扇撲之/bian ba shan lai yipu 便把扇來一撲).

Below is another example of this skill, this time under the brush of Ling Mengchu:

ST:

此南有支徑可二十餘裡直達河水灣，又二十餘裡即鎮耳。公官道迂回，故不相及。

South of here there is a shortcut, perhaps over twenty li, which leads directly to a bend in the river, and again over twenty li further on you arrive at a town. The public roads take detours, which is why you will not be able to keep up with me.

TT:

此間有一條小路，斜抄去二十裡，直到河水灣，再二十裡，就是鎮上。若你等在官路上走，迂迂曲曲，差了二十多裡，故此到不及。

Close to here there is a small road which makes a shortcut, perhaps twenty li, which allows you to reach directly a bend in the river, and twenty li further on you arrive at a town. If you take the public roads, you will make all sorts of detours, and that will make more than twenty li of difference, that is why you will not be able to keep up with me.<fnref n="53" />

This example again shows a remarkable skill in matter of intralingual translation, with the typical way in which this is performed in Chinese. The main signifiers remain almost identical (*heshui wan* 河水灣, *zhen* 鎮, *gongguandao* 公官道/guanlu 官路), whereas the updating of the language is more centred on grammatical articulation: *zhida* 直達 (ST) becomes *zhidao* 直到 (TT), *jí* 即 (ST) becomes *jíushi* 就是 (TT), *yuhui* 迂回 (ST) becomes *yuyuququ* 迂迂曲曲 (TT), while *you zhijing ke ershiyu li* 有支徑可二十餘裡 (ST) is turned into *you yitiao xiaolu, xiechao qu ershili* 有一條小路，斜抄去二十裡 (TT).

In many cases the motivation to translate into the vernacular reflects a need to highlight an idea, to make it more immediately understandable to everyone. After all it seems to be the common-sense understanding

<footnote n="52">⁵² Here the licence, with this small change in point of view, is akin to what occurs in the context of stage translation, where the translator “cannot simply translate a text linguistically”: here it adds a tiny fragment of dialogic *mise en scène*. Pavis 1989, 25; Y. Yang 2020, 80.</footnote>

<footnote n="53">⁵³ ST: Hu Rujia, “Wei Shiyiniang zhuan” *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu, Pai’an jingqi, chap. 4., *op. cit.* See Ling 1981, vol. 1, 82; R. Hu 1995, 2a and R. Hu 1997, 26. See also: Lévy et al. 1978-2006, vol. 3, 838; Tan 1980, vol. 2, 603-4; Altenburger 2009, 127-51.</footnote>
of the necessity to translate into an easier language (as expressed in many prefaces), and it should appear
as the basic reason for the need for intralingual translation. In the following case, in which a mother
explains why she accepts her daughter's decision to commit suicide, translation into the vernacular
enhances an important twist in the story:

ST:

母見其志堅不可奪，慨然曰：“女死不過一時痛耳，吾旦暮之人，適使吾無後累。”

Her mother, seeing that her determination was unshakeable, said with deep emotion: “That you die, my daughter, will after all be but a momentary pain, and for me, who am at the dusk of my life, this at least will relieve my worries about what will happen after me.”

TT:

其母聞言，見他志氣堅執不移，也弦然流淚道：“罷，罷！你死，少不得我一時痛苦，但我年已老，風中之燭，倒也使我無後累。”

At her words, and seeing that her determination was unshakeable, her mother said, her eyes fogged with tears: “All right! All right! That you die will after all be but a momentary pain, but for me, who am old already, like a candle flickering in the wind, this at least will relieve my worries about what will happen after me.”<fnref n="54" />

But it is also true that in a fascinatingly high number of cases, the translation process is from literary
Chinese to literary Chinese or mixed language. In these cases, there is no or little change of linguistic
register, but there is nonetheless a need to translate. From a methodological point of view, this is why plain
intralingual translation and replacement by a synonym or a quasi-synonym need to be included in the
same sub-category in spite of their theoretical differentiation. Examples such as the following are common:

ST:

修即呼僕命筆，隨其口書。近二十章，文甚高，理甚遠。

[Yuan] Can then called a servant and ordered him to take a brush to record its words. This resulted in a total of almost twenty sections, whose literary qualities attained a very high degree of refinement and whose principles were very far-reaching.

TT:

儼即呼隨行吏人，聽虎所言，命筆書之。近二十章，文理甚高遠。

[Li] Yan then called an officer from his retinue, and, listening to what the tiger would say, ordered him to take a brush to have it recorded. This resulted into a total of almost twenty sections, whose

<footnote n="54">⁵⁴ ST: Gui Zimu, “Gui liefu Chen shi zu”, in Chen Jian & Shen Guoyuan, eds., *Huang Ming cong xin lu*, chap. 38, *op. cit*; TT: “Liefu ren si xun fu Xian’ao ge ai cheng nü”, in Lu Renlong, *Xingshi yan*, chap. 10, main story, *op. cit*. See J. Chen and Shen 1620, j. 38, year Wanli 34 (*bingwu*, 1606), p. 38b, fascicle 25; R. Lu 1993, 184; Lévy et al. 1978-2006, vol. 5, 39.</footnote>
literary qualities and principles attained a very high degree of refinement and were very far-reaching.<fnref n="53" />

This kind of classical language to classical language translation, which can seem paradoxical as it does not correspond *stricto sensu* to a vernacularisation, is of such importance that we will discuss it in greater depth further on.

## 2. Translation: b. Amplified Translation

Unmitigated translation is not the most frequently used of all micro-strategies. Much more common is the case of amplified translation. This is the supposedly typical approach of storytellers fleshing out the original story, seen as a canvas on which telling details are added, with new elements large or small. The important point in order to identify such a procedure properly is that it does not imply details that diverge fundamentally from the original (as in diverging addition, below), but only ones that render the original more plausible and comprehensive.

Here is a basic example, with limited amplification:

**ST:**

盜果取其鑷而去，勵勸中僕馬俱失所在。

The bandits did actually walk off with his money, and in the rush of the moment he could find neither his servant nor his horse.

**TT :**

那一夥強盜聽了說話，果然只取包裹來，搜了銀兩去了。程元玉急回身尋時，那馬散了疆，也不知那裡去了，僕人躲避，一發不知去向。

The bandits, on hearing these words, took his bag, searched it, and did actually walk off with the money they found. When Cheng Yuanyu, in the rush of the moment, turned round to look for them, the horse whose reins had been let go had disappeared into thin air, and his servant, who had taken cover, was also nowhere to be found.<fnref n="56" />

In a number of cases, as in other subcategories of translation, we find amplified translations in which the TT remains in literary Chinese, as in this example:

**ST:**

婦曰：“[...] 何心為名？”

The woman said: “[...] What heart would I have to do this for the sake of reputation?”

<footnote n="53">⁵³ ST: “Li Zheng”, *op. cit.*; TT: *Zuixing shi*, chap. 6, main story, *op. cit*. See *Taiping guangji* 1981, vol. 9, 3479; *Zuixing shi* 1985, 88. NB: the name of one of the protagonists, Yuan Can 袁修 in ST, is changed to Li Yan 李儼 in TT.</footnote>

<footnote n="56">⁵⁶ ST: Hu Rujia, “Wei Shiyiniang zhuan” *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu, *Pai’an jingqi*, chap. 4., main story, *op. cit*. See Ling 1981, vol. 1, 83; R. Hu 1995, 2b; R. Hu 1997, 26.</footnote>
TT:

烈女道：“兒亦何心求貞烈名，但已許夫以死。”

The chaste woman said: “What heart would your daughter have, to do this for the sake of securing a reputation for chastity? It is only that I promised my husband that I would die.”<fnref n="57" />

It is a well-established fact that the “storyteller’s manner” (Idema), or more accurately in view of the authorial practices in operation with textual production, the “storyteller’s rhetoric” (McLaren) is deeply related—if not phylogenetically, at least as a deep-rooted reference—to the formation of *huaben* style stories; and it is all too normal that “interplay of the oral and the written” may often appear in a very talkative fashion in the (re)writing practices. (Idema 1974, xii, 70; McLaren 1998, 194, 261–78; Børdahl 2013, 20, n. 14; Børdahl and Wan 2010) It should therefore not come as a surprise that this particular micro-strategy of amplified translation, which is one of the most creative among the different ways of rewriting from a source, may show a strong tendency to dramatise ST in proportions that can become significant. But it is also essential to observe—and this also counts for our classification—that these amplifications are always achieved on the basis of an existing kernel, identifiable as such in the continuum of the ST, and not as a simple addition, which would constitute a different category. Given the extent of the reference to oral practices in the art of amplification, it is also expected that the amplification will be mostly in vernacular language—and according to my survey to date, such is obviously the case. But this linguistic aspect is not the primary factor, as we also find many occurrences in which the amplified translation comes in literary language, as in the example above. It is again illustrated in the following example, taken from a particular “vernacular story” that is basically a patchwork of rearranged source texts in literary language, barely turned into vernacular. In this example, a mere four characters in the ST chunk are turned into a 52-character-long corresponding chunk in TT, an increase of over ten times the original core:

ST:

逞欲無厭，[...]。

He indulged insatiably in his own desires.

TT:

凡平日曾與淫者，悉召入內宮，列之妃位。又廣求美色，不論同姓、異姓，名分尊卑，及有夫無夫，但心中所好，百計求淫。多有封為妃嬪者。

He also summoned into the palace and ennobled as Imperial Consorts all of the women with whom he had shared his excesses in the days before his rise. He eventually sent agents far and wide to seek out beautiful women. Whether or not the woman shared his surname, whether she was noble

<footnote n="57">⁵⁷ ST: Gui Zimu, “Gui liefu Chen shi zu”, in Chen Jian & Shen Guoyuan, eds., *Huang Ming cong xin lu*, chap. 38, *op. cit.*; TT: “Liefu ren si xun fu Xian’ao ge ai cheng nü”, in Lu Renlong, *Xingshi yan*, chap. 10, main story, *op. cit*. See J. Chen and Shen 1620, j. 38, year Wanli 34 (*bing-wu*, 1606), p. 38b, fasc. 25; R. Lu 1993, 184.</footnote>
or common or whether she was married was no concern of his; as long as he was attracted, he would use any means to satisfy his lust. Many of the women he ennobled as Imperial Consorts.<fnref n="58" />

## 2. Translation: c. Explanatory Translation/Reformulating

Third in the category of translation, the subcategory of explanatory translation, or reformulating, is a kind of intralingual translation wherein the transfer between ST and TT is accompanied by a clear explicative, explanatory intent. It is basically a paraphrase. There is no significant additional narrative poured into the rewording from one text to another, as in the case of amplified translation, but it can involve at times copious extraneous commentarial content. The rewriting concerns primarily the linguistic field but may affect the semantic field as well, in the form of an expansion of the ST's semantic reach. The process is typically used in the case of a narrative involving an (at least imaginary) expert-to-lay relationship of educational bearing, where the meaning of ST is presented as needing to be explained. It shows a clear intent at elucidation, clarification, or comment regarding the ST. The paraphrasing can be quite simple but at times lengthy, especially when the pedagogical intent is emphatic. This kind of translation, where the author/editor clearly wants to make a point, is particularly present in stories that show a strong pedagogical or moralistic purpose. It is probably where intralingual translation comes closest to being a simple commentary. We should also note that, according to my survey to date, the proportion of vernacular versus literary language is higher than in the other two types of translation—which is consistent with its explanatory function. Here is a basic example, with a limited amplification but an intent at making the discourse as clear as possible for any reader:

ST:

> 自數宜死者四：無子宜死；年少宜死；舅姑老，異日無倚，宜死；舅姑自有子奉養，無須我，宜死。

> She had listed the four good reasons she had for dying. She had no children: reason to die. She was young: reason to die. Her parents-in-law were old and one day she would be without support: reason to die. Her in-laws had sons of their own to support them, and did not need her: reason to die.

TT:

> 我有四件該死，無子女要我撫育，牽我腸肚，這該死；公姑年老，後日無有倚靠，二該死；我年方二十三，後邊日子長，三該死；公姑自有子奉養，不消我，四該死。

> There are four reasons why I'd better die. I don't have children to bring up, and who would be a cause for concern: for this reason, I'd better die. My in-laws are old, and later on I will be left without any support: second reason why I'd better die. I am only in my twenty-third year, and I still

<footnote n="58">⁵⁸ ST: *Jin shi* 金史 (*History of Jin*), chap. 63, “Liezhuan” (“Biographies”) 1, “Hailing hou Tudan shi, Hailing zhubi fu” 海陵后徙單氏，海陵諸嬖附 (“Lady Tudan, The Consort of Prince Hailing (1115-1234), with addendum, The Favourites of Prince Hailing”). TT: “Jin Hailing zongyu wangshen” 金海陵縱慾亡身 (“Prince Hailing of Jin Dies from Indulgence in Lust”), in Feng Menglong, *Xingshi hengyan*, chap. 23, main story. See *Jin shi*, vol. 5, 1508; Feng 2007, 3:472; Tan 1980, vol. 2, 482; Tan 1980, vol. 2, 482.</footnote>
have plenty of time to live: third reason why I had better die. My in-laws have sons of their own to support them, and don't need me: fourth reason I'd better die.<fnref n="59" />

This example is drawn from a collection well known for its strong moralistic stance, the *Words to Rectify the World (Xingshi yan)* 型世言), by Lu Renlong 陸人龍 (ca. 1632). (Sibau 2018) This particular sentence can be considered the core of the moralistic discourse of the whole story. This is a tragic narrative replete with stern Confucian values on female behavior, almost openly advocating the suicide of widowed women, especially if they have not yet borne children. Here the principles that validate the reasons for committing suicide are exposed as plainly and clearly as possible, as if it was a lesson to be retained by heart, as with the *Biographies of Exemplary Women (Lienü zhuan)* 烈女傳), in which the author describes the heroine as being immersed since childhood. The rewriting is a good example of what we call “mixed” or “intermediate” language. The ST in literary language is opened up towards a translation with vernacular characteristics (e.g., the more common *gai si* 該死 instead of *yi si* 宜死; the usual *gonggu* 公姑 instead of *jiugu* 舅姑; *buxiao* 不消 instead of *wuxu* 無須), in a way that tends to make the meaning clearer for everyone while retaining the commanding characteristics of the original, literary register (e.g., the use of the negatives *wu* 無, *wuyou* 無有*, *nian fang* 年方 for “aged only”, the verbatim quotation of *zi you zi lengyang* 自有子奉養). The rhythmic characteristics of ST are retained in TT, to a formulaic effect, while the necessary explanations in TT are given in order to make the statement appear even more logical than in ST; this intention is further underlined by the inversion of reasons 2 and 3, more logical in TT’s order. Last but not least, the reformulating implies a switch from third-to first-person narration, strongly enhancing the value of the passage as something to be interiorised.

The following example is taken from another collection rife with educational purpose, but in a different way, the *Second West Lake Collection (Xihu erji)* 西湖二集), edited by Zhou Qingyuan 周清原 in the late Chongzhen period. It is well known for its at times very instructive and practical message. (Wivell 1969, 34-37; Y. Liu 2015, 218-30; H. Hu 2019, 400-401) In the context of the late Ming civil wars, its encyclopaedic practical knowledge goes so far as to give recipes for cooking in food shortage situations or methods for defending the coasts against piracy.<fnref n="60" /> In the following instance, it takes the opportunity of an ST giving a hint about population relief in such a situation and then expands it into how-to recommendations on the appropriate treatment of famine victims. This is a good example of the manner in which *huaben* stories act on the imaginary expert/novice relationship.

ST:

遇歲飢，發私廩以賑餓夫，所活以千計。

In years of famine, he would take from his personal granaries to help the starving, and the lives he saved numbered in the thousands.

<footnote n="59">⁵⁹ ST: Gui Zimu, “Gui lienü Chen shi zu”, in Chen Jian & Shen Guoyuan, eds., *Huang Ming cong xin lu*, chap. 38, *op. cit.*; TT: “Liefu ren si xun fu Xian’ao ge ai cheng nü”, in Lu Renlong, *Xingshi yan*, chap. 10, main story, *op. cit*. See J. Chen and Shen 1620, j. 38, year Wanli 34 (*bing-wu*, 1606), p. 54a, fasc. 25; R. Lu 1993, 183.</footnote>

<footnote n="60">⁶⁰ *Xihu erji*, chap. 34: Lévy et al. 1978-2006, vol. 4, 204; Y. Liu 2009, 172-73; Q. Zhou n.d., 31b-37a, fasc. 5. These practical instructions are deleted from most modern editions.</footnote>
TT:

他每遇饑荒之歲，便自己發出米糧以救饑餓之人。又搭造篷廠，煮粥於十字路口，使饑者都來就食。又恐怕饑餓過火之人，一頓吃上十餘碗，反害了性命，只許吃三五碗便住，吃三五碗之後，又要他暫時行走數步，以消腹中之食，行走之後，方許再吃。費了一片心，方得饑餓之人無患。如此設法救饑，不知救活了多少多少百姓。

In years of famine, he would take some of his own grain to save the starving. He had shelters built to prepare porridge at the crossroads, so that the hungry could come and eat. And to prevent those who were too hungry from swallowing ten bowls at once, which might have killed them, he allowed them only three to five bowls, and then these three to five bowls once eaten, he made them walk a certain number of steps to allow them to digest what they had in their stomachs, and only after they had walked did he allow them to eat again. He took great care to ensure that the hungry could be put out of harm's way. So, by establishing this method of famine relief, the lives he saved among the people were countless.<fnref n="61" />

A last example of this particularly interesting category is from vernacular to mixed and bivalent languages, in the style of “easy classical” commonly used in narratives of the Republican era. It is taken from outside the *huaben* tradition, just to recall how this kind of intralingual translation has become a long-lasting rewriting technique, valid far beyond the limits of any given genre and time. In this case it is found in one of those editions of classical works—here, more specifically, drama—published under the name of *yanyi* 演義 during the first decades of the last century:

ST:

(小旦)草草妝完,抱他下樓罷。(末抱介)(旦哭介)奴家就死不下此樓。(倒地撞頭暈臥介)。

(Xiao Dan) Now that she is more or less attired, we must carry her down the stairs. (Mo grasps her in his arms) (Dan, crying) Even if I should die, I won't go down from this house. (She falls to the floor, hits her head, and lies there unconscious)<fnref n="62" />

TT:

貞麗曰：“草草妝竟，速抱下樓無遲。”龍友乃急抱之，香君大哭曰：“儂誓死不下此樓！”言時用力過猛，此身向前一傾，龍友勢不能支，頭已撞地，身亦隨之而倒，昏暈不省人事。

Li Zhenli: “Now that she is more or less attired, we must carry her down the stairs straight away.”
So Longyou hurried to grasp her in his arms. Crying loudly, Xiangjun said: “I pledge my life I will
never go down from this house!” And as she said this, having employed too much strength, her

<footnote n="61">⁶¹ ST: Song Lian 宋濂 (1310-1381), “Jingyou miao bei” 景祐廟碑, in *Song xueshi wenji* 宋學士文集, j. 71; TT: *Xihu erji*, chap. 29. See: L. Song, n.d., 3b, j. 71, fasc. 14; Q. Zhou 1981, vol. 2, 557-58; Ren 2014, 98-99; Lévy et al. 1978-2006, vol. 4, 180.</footnote>

<footnote n="62">⁶² Xiaodan: Li Zhenli 李貞麗; Mo: Yang Wencong 楊文聰 (Yang Longyou 楊龍友); Dan: Li Xiangjun 李香君.</footnote>
body tilted forward. Longyou was in such a position that he could not prevent her fall, and her head hit the floor as she fell over. She fainted and passed out.<fnref n="63" />

### 3. Divergence and Addition: a. Divergence

In some cases, the wording in TT shows that the author/editor intends to diverge from the original meaning. This particular subcategory concerns occasional, one-off discrepancies, limited in scope, that do not give rise to amplification. They may have a significant impact though, as in the following example:

ST:

夫婦愧嘆，待之愈厚，收為贅婿，終老其家。

Husband and wife sighed with shame, and treated him more generously than before; they took him as an adopted son-in-law, a position which was to remain his in their family until his old age.

TT:

三夫人見說，自覺沒趣，懊悔無極，把女婿越看待得親熱，竟贅他在家中終身。

The Third Lady, on hearing these words, was embarrassed and found herself endlessly remorseful; she treated her son-in-law much kindlier than before, and invited him to become an adopted son-in-law in their family, a position which was to remain his until his old age.<fnref n="64" />

This example shows how a textual divergence (underlined here) can be consequential, however small it may be. Whereas in the ST the responsibility for mistreating the fiancé of the family's daughter by finally refusing marriage after he became poor is shared by both spouses, in TT it is the sole responsibility of the woman. The father is thus cleared, the mother is turned into a shrew, and the lesson of the vernacularised story, differing from ST, may be that a husband should not let himself be influenced by his wife—a conservative moralistic view shared by many vernacular narratives.

<footnote n="63">⁶³ ST: Kong Shangren, *Taohua shan*, scene 22; TT: Jiang Yinxiang 江蔭香 (1877-?), *Taohua shan yanyi* 桃花扇演義, chap. 22. See Kong 2016, 151; Jiang 1919, 113. It is interesting to note that this skilful intralingual translation is faithful to the original on a level that the interlingual “translation” by Harold Acton and Chen Shih-hsiang falls far short of. The latter appears much more like an interpretation, as it translates 倒地撞頭暈臥 as: “She falls to the ground wailing, and knocks her head against it till she faints”, completely warping the original text and changing an obviously accidental injury into an intentional self-harming attempt. (K'ung 1976, 166) It is true, though, that this crucial passage of Kong Shangren's play has given rise to many fanciful interpretations. Tina Lu clearly adheres to Acton and Chen's construal: T. Lu 2001, 164, 167-68, 188-89. See Lanselle 2013, 112-13, Lanselle 2021, 437-41. I am thankful to Barbara Bisetto for sharing with me the rare 1919 edition of Jiang Yinxiang's *Taohua shan yanyi*, and I would like to refer to Bisetto's ongoing research on *yanyi* more generally: Bisetto 2018a; Bisetto 2018b; see also her presentation on *Xixiang ji yanyi* 西廂記演義 at our common workshop “Dynamics of knowledge transmission and linguistic transformation in Chinese textual cultures” (2021): https://knowl-lingtrans.sciencesconf.org.</footnote>

<footnote n="64">⁶⁴ ST: Li Zhen, *Jiandeng yuhua*, chap. 4, “Qiuqianhui ji”, *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu, *Pai'an jingqi*, chap. 9, “Xuanhuiyuan shinü qiuqian hui Qing'ansi fufu xiao tiyuan”, main story, *op. cit*. See Qu, Li, and Shao 1981, 255; Ling 1981, vol. 1, 187; Tan 1980, vol. 2, 635.</footnote>
### 3. Divergence and Addition: b. Addition/Amplification

This category is a huge one. It refers to parts of the TT that are simply added to flesh out the story, as pure amplification. It is related to amplified translation, with the difference that amplification builds on a pre-existing core, whereas in this case addition does not elaborate on an element already present in ST. Additions are ubiquitous in the vast majority of stories, and the higher the ST/TT ratio in terms of number of characters, the more this category is likely to be represented. We are talking here about additions that are consistent with the original story, that develop it, and do not diverge fundamentally from it in terms of narrative contents or spirit. Typically, the additions serve to reinforce and amplify narrative features already present in ST. The size of such additions can be large, even very large. For the sake of practicality, we will limit ourselves here to two relatively short examples, in vernacular and literary languages, showing the position of the addition in the TT continuum, and the position of the segments relative to those of the ST.

In vernacular language:

<table><thead><tr><th>ST</th><th>TT</th><th>Textual Transformation<br>Micro-strategy</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>劉氏子者，少任俠，有膽氣；<br>There was a certain son of a Liu family, who in his youth boasted of chivalry, and showed a certain bravery;</td><td>有一個劉氏子，少年任俠，膽氣過人，<br>There was a certain son of a Liu family, who in his youth boasted of chivalry, and showed uncommon bravery;<br><br>好的是張弓挾矢、馳馬試劍、飛鷹蹴鞠諸事。<br>he was especially fond of archery, horse racing and fencing, boozing and football games.</td><td>Translation/Replacement<br>by (Quasi-)Synonym<br><br>Addition/Amplification</td></tr><tr><td>交遊多市井惡少。<br>his company consisted mainly of the town's young ruffians.</td><td>交遊的人，總是些劍客、博徒、殺人不償命的<br>無賴子弟。<br>His company consisted mainly of lawless sons of families, thugs, gamblers, and people who could get away with murder.</td><td>Amplified Translation<sup>65</sup></td></tr></tbody></table>

<footnote n="65">65 ST: “Liu shi zi qi”, in *Taiping guangji*, chap. 386, op. cit; TT: Ling Mengchu, *Pai’an jingqi*, chap. 9, “Xuanhuiyuan shinü qiuqian hui Qing’ansi fufu xiao tiyuan”, introductory story, op. cit. See *Taiping guangji* 1981, vol. 8, 3083; Ling 1981, vol. 1, 176; Tan 1980, vol. 2, 631. Note that the passage “交遊多市井惡少” is a case of textual displacement (see below): in ST it is not positioned exactly in the corresponding place in relation to TT.</footnote>
In classical language:

<table><thead><tr><th>ST</th><th>TT</th><th>Textual Transformation<br>Micro-Strategy</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>「君今既為異類,何尚能人言耶?」<br>“But if you now belong to another species, how come you still speak the language of humans?”</td><td>「君既為異類,則有咆哮而已,何尚能人言耶?」<br>“But if you now belong to another species, you should only be roaring: how come you still speak the language of humans?”</td><td>Quasi-<br>Quotation/Amplified<br>Quotation</td></tr><tr><td>虎曰:<br>The tiger replied:</td><td>虎對道:<br>The tiger replied:</td><td>Translation/Replacement<br>by (Quasi-)Synonym</td></tr><tr><td>「我今形變而<br>“Today my form has been changed but</td><td>「我形雖虎,<br>“Although my form is that of a tiger,</td><td>Explanatory<br>Translation/Reformulating</td></tr><tr><td>心甚悟,<br>my heart is very much<br>awakened.</td><td>心猶人也。<br>my heart is still human.</td><td>Divergence</td></tr><tr><td>故有撞突,以悚以恨,<br>So to have offended you<br>horrifies me and fills me<br>with remorse</td><td>不意唐突故人,慚惶無地。」<br>That is how, unexpectedly, I offended you, my old<br>friend; this fills me with confusion, and I do not<br>know where to hide my shame.</td><td>Addition/Amplification<br>Explanatory<br>Translation/Reformulating</td></tr><tr><td>難盡道耳。」<br>to an extent I cannot<br>express.”</td><td></td><td>Omission<sup>66</sup></td></tr></tbody></table>

<footnote n="66">⁶⁶ ST: “Li Zheng”, in *Taiping guangji*, chap. 427, *op. cit.*; TT: Dong Lu Gukuang sheng, *Zuixing shi*, chap. 6, main story, “Gaocai sheng aoshi shi yuanxing Yiqi you niangu fen banfeng” *op. cit*. See *Taiping guangji* 1981, vol. 9,</footnote>
Inserted poems and verse, inserted depictions including those sung to a *ci*詞 or *qu* 曲 tune, final verses, and inserted final morals usually belong to this category, unless they are present in ST.

### 3. Divergence and Addition: *c.* Diverging Addition/Diverging Amplification

In some cases, the addition, or amplification in TT, can diverge from ST, which makes it different from the last category. Note that by “divergence” we do not mean opposed to, or in contradiction with, the original narrative: simply that a different content is present, which was not part of the storyline of ST, and which has developed opportunistically out of the narrative elements present in the source, but not by expanding a distinct kernel present in it. Such occurrences are widespread throughout the *huaben* literature. This can result in a set of added elements distributed in different places in the text which, even if they are not contiguous, relate to this new amplification continuum. This may generate relatively brief divergent additions in places, which may bear some similarity to, but should not be confused with, the occasional divergences discussed in 3.a.

A good example of this sub-category is Chapter 24, main story, of the *Pai'an jingqi*. The original story, as well as its rewriting, tells of the abduction of a girl from a well-to-do family by a libidinous Taoist magician, who spirits away and abuses women, followed by her return to her family. In TT, this story has two Diverging Additions/Diverging Amplifications. One involves a conversation between the mother and daughter back at her parents' home, in which the mother makes sure that her daughter has not been raped and that she has returned from the kidnapper's lair a virgin. A second one, which is more developed—and also clarifies why the first was necessary—concerns the girl's rescuer. The ST segment in which this figure is referred to, somewhat vaguely, as:

好事者

a helpful person

becomes in TT:

内中有一秀士，姓劉名德遠，乃是名家之子，少年飽學，極是個負氣好事的人

Among them was a talented scholar with the surname of Liu and the personal name of Deyuan ['Whose virtue goes far'], who was the son of a reputable family; young and full of knowledge, he was someone who was extremely willing to take up the cudgels on behalf of others.<fnref n="67" />

The whole ending of the story as rewritten by Ling Mengchu takes a romantic turn, culminating in marriage, with the girl's family discovering all the good qualities of the young man, who ends up being considered the ideal son-in-law. For reasons of length, we do not give any other quotations here as examples. The sequencing chart on page 253 below, however, shows the distribution of the TT's diverging elements in the narrative continuum of this story. One can see the proportion of Diverging Addition/Diverging

<footnote>3478; *Zuixing shi* 1985, 87.</footnote>

<footnote n="67">⁶⁷ ST: Zhou Shaolian, *Yuanzhu zhiyu Xuechuang tanyi*, chap. 2, #14, “Dashi zhuxie ji”, *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu, *Pai'an jingqi*, chap. 24, “Yanguanyi laomo meise Huihaishan dashi zhuxie”, main story, *op. cit*. See Tao and Zhou 2008, 227, Ling 1981, vol. 2, 509.</footnote>
Amplification across its entire final part. The example given by this *huaben* is typical of the prevalent *modus operandi* in which the vernacular version adds substance to the characters, making them more like identifying objects (sympathetic characters, romantic adjuvant), or corresponds to vernacular concerns (virginity of the girl, family values, exemplarity).

## 4. Omission

The Omission is in some ways the opposite of the Additions described in 3.b and 3.c. Any passage of the narrative in ST that is not found in TT is tagged in the textual comparison as an Omission. Note that we do not call an omission an element that would not be found identically in TT simply because it has been transformed by translation or reformulation: an omission must be a significant element, however small, of ST that is not reproduced in TT. Omissions are very frequent. They appear most often as intentional, motivated by reasons that can be very diverse and often deserve to be analysed according to what can be perceived as the intentions of the author of TT in exploiting his source. Here is a simple example:

<table><thead><tr><th>ST</th><th>TT</th><th>Textual Transformation<br>Micro-strategy</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>酒至紫衣者。<br>It was now the turn of the<br>purple-robed one to toast.</td><td>那酒就行到紫衣少年面前。<br>It was now the turn of the purple-robed young<br>man to toast.</td><td>Translation/Replacement<br>by (Quasi-)Synonym</td></tr><tr><td>復持盃請歌。<br>Raising his cup as well, he<br>called on her to sing.</td><td></td><td><strong>Omission</strong></td></tr><tr><td>張妻不悅，沉吟良久，乃<br>歌曰：[...]<br>Zhang's Wife was unhappy;<br>after remaining silent for a<br>long time, she sang another<br>song, that said: [...]</td><td>白氏料道推託不得，勉強揮淚又歌一曲云：<br>[...]<br>Considering she would not be able to get out of it,<br>Dame Bai, wiping away her tears, forced herself to<br>sing another song, that said: [...]</td><td>Explanatory<br>Translation/Reformulating<sup>68</sup></td></tr></tbody></table>

The effect of the small omission in this passage is to shift the motivation of the song to the woman's own will rather than the host's prompting. If Feng Menglong considered the small segment he omitted to be superfluous, it is arguably because this omission was consistent with his overall plan to emphasise the subjectivity of the characters, as noted above (p. 14); this appears to be evidenced in TT by a rephrasing that includes a hint of inner monologue (“considering” 料道) as well as the mark of increased emotional response (“wiping away her tears” 揮淚).

<footnote n="68">68 ST: *Taiping guangji*, chap. 281, “Dugu Xiashu” by Xue Yusi, *op. cit.*; TT: “Dugu sheng guitu naomeng” in Feng Menglong, *Xingshi hengyan*, chap. 25, main story. See: *Taiping guangji* 1981, vol. 6, 2250; Feng 2007, 3:546; Tan 1980, vol. 2, 508; Lévy et al. 1978–2006, vol. 2, 712; Lucas 2018, 693. As noted above (p. 10, n. 24), names differ between this source and Feng’s story: in this ST, Dugu Xiashu 獨孤遐叔 is referred to as Student Zhang 張生, and Née Bai 白氏 is referred to as Zhang’s Wife 張妻.</footnote>
### 5. *Textual Displacement*

Generally speaking, *huaben* authors/editors tend to follow their source quite closely. The many examples above have shown how at times they pay surgical attention to the smallest detail of the original narrative(s): far from writing more or less loosely from the outline of a story to recast the narrative in their own way, the writing of a *huaben* story, when inspired by a source, is more akin to a form of continuous commentary. Most often we can imagine the authors working with the source books sitting open right on their desk. The chronology of the events reported, and more generally the order of the narrative elements, are mostly respected. It is therefore all the more important to pay attention to cases of *Textual Displacement*. By this we mean chunks of the text that, in the order of narration, may have been relocated either by anteposition or by postposition in the TT with respect to their original position in ST.

These displacements obviously correspond to a need to modify the layout of the narrative, for example to maintain the reader's expectation and interest by creating suspense and tension or by modifying the strategies for revealing details of the story. We know to what extent commentators on novels and theatre, in the tradition of Jin Shengtan, have paid attention to these questions of narrative organisation, to the development of prolepses, analepses, the effects of anticipation, flashbacks, and other procedures, often described with sophisticated terminology (cf. Jin's technical devices, or *fa* 法), which come in part from their culture of *baguwen*.<fnref n="69" />

Cases of *Textual Displacements* are ubiquitous throughout the *huaben* literature when a text is the result of a rewriting. It is rare to find a TT in which this does not occur. It is not possible at this stage of my research to put forward an average proportion of the presence of *Textual Displacements* in the whole literature. In the twenty or so texts considered to date, the proportion of TT resulting from ST displacement is around 5%, whereas the proportion of ST that has been displaced in TT is around 15% (TT being always longer than ST). There are substantial differences, however. Chap. 23, main story, in Feng Menglong's *Xingshi hengyan*, referred to above, is a patchwork of multiple STs, which have been rearranged to form a single whole, and textual displacements occur everywhere, in much higher proportions than those given above (over 50%). But this is a somewhat unusual case.<fnref n="70" />

Lastly, let us note from a methodological point of view that *Textual Displacement* is the only textual transformation micro-strategy that can be concomitant with any of the other defined micro-strategies (Omission and Additions excepted, since in these cases there is no ST/TT correspondence). For example, if a TT segment is identified as Translation/Replacement by (Quasi-)Synonym of a corresponding ST segment, it can only come under this micro-strategy to the exclusion of all others. However, it can also, at the same time, constitute a *Textual Displacement* with respect to the positions of the corresponding segments in, respectively, ST and TT.

<footnote n="69">⁶⁹ See above, p. 226, n. 36.</footnote>

<footnote n="70">⁷⁰ See above, p. 238, n. 58.</footnote>
## Towards a new methodology of textual comparison: II. Implementation, results, perspectives

In the previous section we have defined the different descriptive and dynamic characteristics involved in the processes of rewriting and intralingual translation between a literary source text and a vernacular target text, especially (though not exclusively) in the context of the *huaben* narrative genre, according to the textual analyses we have carried out so far. These characteristics, it may be recalled, involve: I.a Linguistic Characteristics, I.b Narrative Point of View (with I, Indexical Level, corresponding to Language and Enunciation Characteristics), and II, Textual Transformation Micro-strategies (situated at a Denotational Level, or Utterance). In this section, we will describe the concrete methodology we use to establish a textual comparison and its technical implications.

The basic methodology for comparing an ST with a TT, using spreadsheets, consists in the segmentation of both ST and TT into as many textual units as necessary, combined with a tagging of the units. After identifying which chunk of ST is associated with which corresponding chunk of TT, the ST segment is tagged with one and only one item from the I.a list, and one and only one item from the I.b list; the TT segment is tagged with one and only one item from the I.a list, and one and only one item from the I.b list; and the transformation between the ST and TT segments is tagged with one and only one item from the II list. When either II.3.b or II.3.c (Addition or Diverging Addition) occurs, a blank is left in ST at the corresponding place with the added element in TT; reciprocally, when an Omission occurs, a blank is left in TT at the corresponding place with the element from ST that has been omitted. Additionally, as said above, Textual Displacement is the only exception to the rule that just one micro-strategy is involved in a given segment: therefore, a specific tagging, which does not rule out the other micro-strategy associated with a given chunk, indicates the respective places of both the ST and TT segments between which a displacement occurs.

<table><caption>Ex. 1 - Basic case:<fnref n="71" /></caption><thead><tr><th>ST<br>Linguistic<br>Characteristics</th><th>ST<br>Narrative<br>Point of<br>View</th><th>SOURCE<br>TEXT</th><th>TARGET<br>TEXT</th><th>TT<br>Linguistic<br>Characteristics</th><th>TT<br>Narrative<br>Point of<br>View</th><th>Micro-<br>strategy</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>3rd<br>Person<br>Narration</td><td>宣徽意其<br>必流落死<br>矣，而人<br>物整然。</td><td>[宣徽]想道：<br>「我幾時不見<br>了他，道是流<br>落死亡了，如<br>何得衣服濟<br>楚，容色充盛<br>如此？」</td><td>Vernacular<br>Chinese:<br>Standard<br>Guanhua</td><td>Inner<br>Monologue</td><td>Amplified<br>Translation</td></tr></tbody></table>

<footnote n="71">⁷¹ ST: Li Zhen, *Jiandeng yuhua*, chap. 4, “Qiuqianhui ji”, *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu, Pai’an jingqi, chap. 9, “Xuanhuiyuan shinü qiuqian hui Qing’ansi fufu xiao tiyuan”, main story, *op. cit.*</footnote>
<table><caption>Ex. 2 - Case with Addition/Amplification or Diverging Addition:<fnref n="72" /></caption><thead><tr><th>ST<br>Linguistic<br>Characteristics</th><th>ST<br>Narrative<br>Point of<br>View</th><th>SOURCE<br>TEXT</th><th>TARGET<br>TEXT</th><th>TT<br>Linguistic<br>Characteristics</th><th>TT<br>Narrative<br>Point of<br>View</th><th>Micro-<br>strategy</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td></td><td></td><td></td><td>遐叔想道：<br>“我曉得了，<br>今日”</td><td>Vernacular<br>Chinese:<br>Standard<br>Guanhua</td><td>3rd Person<br>Narration</td><td>Addition/<br>Amplification</td></tr><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>3rd Person<br>Narration</td><td>時近</td><td>今日</td><td>Bivalent</td><td>Inner<br>Monologue</td><td>Addition/<br>Amplification</td></tr><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>3rd Person<br>Narration</td><td>清明，</td><td>清明佳節，<br>一定是貴家子<br>弟出郭遊春。<br>因見</td><td>Bivalent</td><td>Inner<br>Monologue</td><td>Translation/<br>Replacement<br>by (Quasi-)<br>Synonym</td></tr><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>3rd Person<br>Narration</td><td>月色如<br>畫。</td><td>月色如畫，<br>[…]</td><td>Vernacular<br>Chinese:<br>Standard<br>Guanhua</td><td>Inner<br>Monologue</td><td>Addition/<br>Amplification</td></tr><tr><td></td><td></td><td></td><td></td><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>Inner<br>Monologue</td><td>Verbatim<br>Quotation</td></tr></tbody></table>

<footnote n="72">⁷² ST: *Taiping guangji*, chap. 281, “Dugu Xiashu” by Xue Yusi, *op. cit.*; TT: “Dugu sheng Dugusheng guitu naomeng” in Feng Menglong, *Xingshi hengyan*, chap. 25, main story, *op. cit.*.</footnote>
<table><caption>Ex. 3 - Case with Omission:<fnref n="73" /></caption><thead><tr><th>ST<br>Linguistic<br>Characteristics</th><th>ST<br>Narrative<br>Point of<br>View</th><th>SOURCE<br>TEXT</th><th>TARGET<br>TEXT</th><th>TT<br>Linguistic<br>Characteristics</th><th>TT<br>Narrative<br>Point of<br>View</th><th>Micro-<br>strategy</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>Dialogue</td><td>「甚愧謝<br>爾，奈相<br>從不久<br>何？」</td><td>「妾往楊川家<br>討債去。」</td><td>Vernacular<br>Chinese:<br>Standard<br>Guanhua</td><td>Dialogue</td><td>Divergence</td></tr><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>3rd Person<br>Narration</td><td>張泣下，</td><td></td><td></td><td></td><td>Omission</td></tr><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>3rd Person<br>Narration</td><td>莫曉所<br>云。</td><td>張乙方欲問<br>之，[…]</td><td>Literary Chinese</td><td>3rd Person<br>Narration</td><td>Explanatory<br>Translation/<br>Reformulating</td></tr></tbody></table>

<table><caption>Ex. 4 - Case with Textual Displacement:<fnref n="74" /></caption><thead><tr><th>ST<br>Linguistic<br>Characteristics</th><th>ST<br>Narrative<br>Point of<br>View</th><th>Displace-<br>ment</th><th>SOURCE<br>TEXT</th><th>TARGET<br>TEXT</th><th>TT<br>Linguistic<br>Characteristics</th><th>TT<br>Narrative<br>Point of<br>View</th><th>Micro-<br>strategy</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="2">Literary<br>Chinese</td><td rowspan="2">3rd<br>Person<br>Narration</td><td>Displ. A</td><td></td><td>端慧多<br>能，工容<br>兼妙。</td><td>Bivalent</td><td>3rd<br>Person<br>Narration</td><td>Verbatim<br>Quotation</td></tr><tr><td>Displ. B</td><td></td><td>父母愛惜<br>他真個如<br>珠似玉。</td><td>Mixed<br>Language</td><td>3rd<br>Person<br>Narration</td><td>Amplified<br>Translation</td></tr><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>3rd<br>Person<br>Narration</td><td>Displ. A</td><td>時年十<br>九，父母<br>已六十餘<br>矣，</td><td>候忽已是<br>十九歲，<br>父母俱是<br>六十以上<br>了，[…]</td><td>Vernacular<br>Chinese:<br>Standard<br>Guanhua</td><td>3rd<br>Person<br>Narration</td><td>Translation/<br>Replacement<br>by (Quasi-)<br>Synonym</td></tr><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>3rd<br>Person<br>Narration</td><td>Displ. B</td><td>端慧多<br>能，工容<br>兼妙，</td><td></td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Literary<br>Chinese</td><td>3rd<br>Person<br>Narration</td><td>Displ. B</td><td>夫妻望之<br>甚重，<br>[…]</td><td></td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr></tbody></table>

<footnote n="73">⁷³ ST: Hong Mai, *Yijian (ding) zhi*, j. 15, “Zhang ke qi yu”, *op. cit.* TT: Feng Menglong, *Jingshi tongyan*, chap. 34, “Wang Jiaoluan bainian changhen”, introductory story, *op. cit.*</footnote>

<footnote n="74">⁷⁴ ST: Zhou Shaolian, *Yuanzhu zhiyu Xuechuang tanyi*, chap. 2, #14, “Dashi zhuxie ji”, *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu, *Pai'an jingqi*, chap. 24, “Yanguanyi laomo meise Huihaishan dashi zhuxie”, main story, *op. cit.*</footnote>
The complete analysis of the rewriting of a source text (ST) into a story (TT) is the result of the succession of all the segments analysed in this way. There is no *a priori* definition, in terms of length, of what constitutes a textual unit, or segment. Reading both texts side by side, a single change in the application of any of the options of I.a and I.b relevant to a particular point in ST or TT, or in the application of the options of II for the relevant micro-strategy at a particular point of the transformative continuum, is sufficient to define a new segment, as no two characteristics, no two strategies can be concomitant (except, as said, when a textual displacement occurs). Therefore, a segment may well be as large as one or even several sentences, or as small as a single word or even a single sinogram.

For the efficacy of the whole textual comparison, it is paramount to define the segments and their tagging as accurately as possible, as the tracking of a single change may have consequences from an analytical point of view. For example, in ST, a heterodiegetic narrative segment in the third person and in literary language can result, when translated into TT, in an amplified translation written intradiegetically as inner monologue or reported speech, first expressed in vernacular language, but suddenly turning into mixed or literary language: however small, this change has to be taken into account, in order to be properly tagged. This means, of course, that a full comparison between an ST and a TT can result in a total of several hundred segments.

For the sake of simplicity, in most of the descriptions above we have considered the relationship between a single ST and a TT, but naturally we must remember that in many cases a vernacular narrative has several sources. The method developed here is consequently applicable to as many source texts as necessary in relation to a given target text. At the present stage, an experimental one in which the task is carried out by means of simple spreadsheets, it appears simpler to make as many individual ST/TT comparisons as there are STs. The hoped-for development of the method using more elaborate tools in digital humanities should make it possible to carry out concomitant comparisons of multiple source texts against a given target text. Such a tool would also allow part of the comparison tasks to be automated, by identifying *verbatim* or *quasi-verbatim* text reuses, as is being developed for early Chinese literature in the framework of the Chinese Text Project. (Sturgeon 2018) Ideally it should also allow the matching, on a lexico-grammatical basis, of literary language segments with the corresponding vernacular language segments.

We can already show the method's benefits from a statistical point of view by allowing an analysis of all the different factors involved in a textual transformation. This methodology enables the production of quantifiable results, of tables and charts highlighting the techniques employed by authors/editors to produce a story from its sources. Although statistical methods do not need to be fetishised, I believe, together with an increasing number of researchers, that they can be helpful in the humanities where judgements sometimes rely too much on intuitions without concrete evidence, leading at times to idiosyncratic conclusions. I am of the opinion that by relying on facts more than on impressions they can help to expand "how we in the humanities understand the nature of meaning" and to solve some "epistemological impasses", as Michael Fuller puts it. (Fuller 2020, 259, 275) I do believe such is the case in our approach to the formation of *huaben* stories as well as the products of other genres, where the statistical results obtained from textual comparisons can be exploited in many different ways, establishing statistical databases for single stories as well as entire collections.
The graphical representations that can be drawn from a full text comparison are as varied as desired, and we will limit ourselves here to giving some basic examples of statistical output. The statistical data are obtained by tallying the number of characters in each of the defined categories. Punctuation marks are never included in the counting.

If we take one of the previously mentioned examples of textual comparisons, that of *Pai'an.jingqi* 24, main story,<fnref n="75" /> the first chart we can draw is of course its ST to TT amplification ratio—in this case +287%:

<figure><img src="image_3.png" /></figure>

Then the linguistic characteristics involved in TT (ST being 100% literary Chinese):

<figure><img src="image_4.png" /></figure>

Then the distribution of narrative points of view in ST:

<figure><img src="image_5.png" /></figure>

<footnote n="75">⁷⁵ ST: Zhou Shaolian, *Yuanzhu zhiyu Xuechuang tanyi*, chap. 2, #14, “Dashi zhuxie ji”, *op. cit.*; TT: Ling Mengchu, *Pai'an.jingqi*, chap. 24, “Yanguanyi laomo meise Huihaishan dashi zhuxie”, main story, *op. cit.*</footnote>
The distribution of narrative points of view in TT:

<figure><img src="image_6.png" /></figure>

Then the evolution of the narrative points of view between ST and TT:

<figure><img src="image_7.png" /></figure>

And finally, of course, the distribution of the textual transformation micro-strategies involved in the ST to TT rewriting (without including the textual displacements, which, in this case, amount to 14% of ST, corresponding to 4% of TT). The transformation is considered from two different perspectives: either what is the distribution of the micro-strategies applied to ST, or what distribution of micro-strategies is TT resulting from:

<figure><img src="image_8.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_9.png" /></figure>
It is also possible to compare the application of the different micro-strategies between ST and TT:

<figure><img src="image_10.png" /></figure>

In this example, we can see that the three kinds of translation amount to 14+6+14 = 34% of the total of the formation of TT, and that 43+9+13 = 65% of ST has been subject to one form or another of translation. We can see, too, that, while the source has been quite faithfully reproduced (translated/rewritten) in the *huaben* version, with relatively few textual displacements, the important quantitative difference between ST and TT (total increase +287%) is explained in good part by the fact that the author has added a fair amount of plot of his own design: 29% of Addition/Amplification, and 28% of Diverging Addition/Diverging Amplification.

It may then be useful to display other kinds of results, such as the distribution of a particular feature in relation to the whole text. For example, here is the position of Additions/Amplifications, Divergences, and Diverging Additions/Diverging Amplifications along the TT narrative continuum, expressed as a sequencing chart:

<figure><img src="image_11.png" /></figure>

In this case we can see that the Additions/Amplifications are everywhere, while the Diverging Additions/Diverging Amplifications are concentrated in the latter part of the story. This allows Ling Mengchu to do two things while taking advantage of the original plot: first he fleshes out its contents, adding many telling details that make the plot more absorbing, then he considerably modifies not only the denouement, but also the whole final moral. As we have already mentioned, in his *ni huaben* 擬話本 (“imitative *huaben*”) the girl of great intelligence and strength of character returns miraculously preserved from the lair of a perverse Taoist rapist, and not only is the latter punished, but her saviour becomes her
ideal husband. Moreover, the girl is a living advertisement for the excellent education given to her by her parents and for their piety. Although these latter elements are not present in the original story, Ling has still exploited all its threads in a very economical and effective way.

The above example is just one of many possible ways to extract data on specified criteria. As we can see, the methodology is very versatile, since it allows us to isolate and visualise any element or relevant category resulting from the comparative analysis. Whether it is Linguistic Characteristics, Narrative Point of View, or Textual Transformation Micro-strategies, specific or mixed information can be extracted *ad libitum* from the data established by the textual comparisons. A particular example of the application of this methodology will be discussed later. It is difficult to foresee what the repercussions of such an approach could be, but we can already imagine what might be achieved by a generalisation of the method, especially if it could be applied to a large number of texts, as is our objective, by taking advantage of the possibilities offered by the Digital Humanities. The method could be implemented on entire collections and could, for example, show the different working methods of different authors/editors, based not just on subjective impressions but on a proven foundation. What is, for instance, the proportion of intralingual translation in a particular collection or for a given author? What about their use of language levels? In which cases do they use the literary language or the vernacular? What are their strategies for shifting points of view or perspectives? For emphasising a subjective reading of a text? What about their greater or lesser fidelity to a source text? The possibilities are endless, and could perhaps—although it is too early to tell—help build more substantiated hypotheses on the authors/editors of individual stories or entire collections, in the case of problematic identifications, from the accumulation of data on their handling of sources.

The theoretical approach to intralingual translation, developed within the field of translation studies, is important for analysing these phenomena, for the practices of authors/editors as they developed in Ming China are in fact very comparable to those described in the theoretical literature for quite different periods and cultural environments. But since we have seen that Ming-Qing authors/editors were acutely aware of language levels, and often showed an impressive mastery, and even more so a remarkable fluency, in the handling of vernacular writing codes, with practices always embedded in their initial environment with the literary language, we would first like to take stock of the notion of diglossia, which lies at the heart of their practice.

*(End of Part 1)*

# Bibliography

## Primary Sources

Chen Jian 陳建, and Shen Guoyuan 沈國元. 1620. *Huang Ming cong xin lu (Si shi juan)* 皇明從信錄 (四十卷) (Reliable Records on the August Ming Dynasty [40 chap.]). Late Ming xylography. Harvard Yenching Library Preservation Microfilm Project: 00377. https://ctext.org/library.pl?if=gb&res=1872.
Diwu caizi shu Shi Nai'an Shuihu zhuan 第五才子書施耐庵水滸傳 (The Fifth Book of Genius, Water Margin by Shi Nai'an). 1985. Edition and commentary by Jin Shengtan 金聖歎. Wen Zisheng 文子生, ed. 2 vols. Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou Guji chubanshe.

Feng Menglong 馮夢龍. 1981a. Gujin xiaoshuo 古今小說 (Stories Old and New). 日本內閣文庫藏天許齋本影印. 2 vols. Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe.

——. 1981b. Jingshi tongyan 警世通言 (Penetrating Words to Caution the World). 2 vols. Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe.

——. 1981c. Xingshi hengyan 醒世恆言 (Constant Words to Awaken the World). 2 vols. Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe.

——. 1984. Qingshi leilüe 情史類略 (Thematic Summary of a History of the Passions). Changsha: Yuelu shushe.

——. 2007. Xingshi hengyan 醒世恆言 (Constant Words to Awaken the World). Vol. 3. Feng Menglong quanji 馮夢龍全集. Nanjing: Shanghai Guji chubanshe.

Hong Pian 洪梗 and Zuohua sanren 坐花散人. 2012. Qingpingshantang huaben — Fengliu wu 清平山堂話本 — 風流悟 (Novellas Printed by the Qingping Mountain Pavilion — Awakening from Libertinism). Qiu Jia 裘佳 and Song Haijiang 松海江, eds. Beijing: Huaxia chubanshe.

Hong Mai 洪邁. 1981. Yijian zhi 夷堅志 (Records of Yijian). He Zhuo 何卓, ed. 4 vols. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

Hu Rujia 胡汝嘉. 1995. “Wei Shiyiniang zhuan”韋十一娘傳 (The Story of Lady Wei Eleven). In Gen shi chao 互史抄, edited by Pan Zhiheng 潘之恆, Ming edition, Zhejiang Library. Reprint: Siku quanshu cunmu congshu: Zibu 四庫全書存目叢書子部, vols. 193-194, “Waipian” 外篇: “Nüxia” 女俠, juan 9:1a-8b. Jinan: Qi Lu shushe.

——. 1997. “Wei Shiyiniang zhuan”韋十一娘傳 (The Story of Lady Wei Eleven). In Shanbu wenyuan zhaju (j. 1) 刪補文苑植橘 (卷一) (Literary Park of Hawthorn and Orange Trees: Abridged and Supplemented [chap. 1]), in Hanguo cang Zhongguo xijian zhenben xiaoshuo 韓國藏中國稀見珍本小說 (Rare Chinese Narratives Kept in Korean Archives). Ji Xianlin 季羨林 and Ding Kuifu 丁奎福, eds. 2/5:25-32. Beijing: Zhongguo dabaike quanshu chubanshe.

Jiang Yinxiang 江蔭香. 1919. Taohua shan yanyi 桃花扇演義 (The Romance of the Peach Blossom Fan). Shanghai: Shijie shuju.

Jin Shengtan piben Xixiang jī 金聖嘆批本西廂記 (The Story of the Western Wing) with the Commentary of Jin Shengtan). 1986. Zhang Guoguang 張國光, ed. Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe.

Jin shi 金史 (History of the Jin). 1975. Tuotuo 脫脫, ed. 8 vols. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

Kong Shangren 孔尚任. 2016. Taohua shan 桃花扇 (The Peach Blossom Fan). Wang Jisi 王季思, Su Huanzhong 蘇寰中, and Yang Deping 楊德平, eds. Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe.

Ling Mengchu 凌濛初. 1980. Erke Pai'an jingqi 二刻拍案驚奇 (Slapping the Table in Amazement, Second Volume). Li Tianyi 李田意, ed. 2 vols. Hong Kong: Youlian chubanshe.

——. 1981. Pai'an jingqi 拍案驚奇 (Slapping the Table in Amazement [First Volume]). Li Tianyi 李田意, ed. 2 vols. Hong Kong: Youlian chubanshe.
Lu Renlong 陸人龍. 1993. *Xingshi yan* 型世言 (Exemplary Words for the World). Chen Qinghao 陳慶皓, ed. Zhongguo huaben daxi 中國話本大系. Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe.

Qu You 瞿佑, Li Changqi 李昌祺, and Shao Jingzhan 邵景詹. 1981. *Jiandeng xinhua – Jiandeng yuhua – Mideng yinhua* 剪燈新話 – 剪燈餘話 – 覓燈因話 (New Stories to Trim the Lamp by – Additional Stories to Trim the Lamp by – Karmic Stories to Search the Lamp for). Zhou Lengqie 周楞伽, ed. Shanghai: Shanghai Guji chubanshe.

Quan Tang shi 全唐詩 (The Complete Tang Poetry). 1996 (1st 1960). Wang Quan 王全, ed. 25 vols. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

Sanguo zhi 三國志 (Records of the Three Kingdoms). 1959. Chen Shou 陳壽, and Pei Songzhi 裴松之. 5 vols. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

Shi diantou (chatu) 石點頭(插圖) (The Stones Nod their Heads (Illustrated)). 2015. Tianran chisou 天然癡叟. Zhongguo gudian wenxue mingzhu congshu 中國古典文學名著叢書. Ha'erbin: Heilongjiang meishu chubanshe.

Song Lian 宋濂. n.d. *Song xueshi wenji* 宋學士文集 (A Prose Anthology by Song Literati). Sibu congkan jibu 四部叢刊集部. https://ctext.org/library.pl?if=gb&res=77601.

Song Maocheng 宋懋澄. 1984. *Jiuyue ji* 九篇集 (The Nine Flutes Collection). Wang Liqi 王利器, ed. Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe.

Taiping guangji 太平廣記 (Extensive Notes from the Taiping Xingguo Era). 1981. Li Fang 李昉. 10 vols. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

Tao Fu 陶輔, and Zhou Shaolian 周紹濂. 2008. *Huaying ji + Yuanzhu zhiyu Xuechuang tanyi* 花影集 + 駕渚志餘雪窗談異 (Flower Shadows Collection + Strange Discourses at the Window of the Remaining Snow from the Record of the Duck Islet). Cheng Yizhong 程毅中 and Yu Wenzao 于文藻, eds. Guti xiaoshuo congkan 古體小說叢刊. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

Tu Long 屠隆. 1982. *Caihao ji, in Liushizhong qu* 彩毫記 (六十種曲) (The Colourful Brush [in Sixty Plays]). Edited by Mao Jin 毛晉. 12 vols. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

—. n.d. “Caihao ji 彩毫記”, in *Liushizhong qu 六十種曲* (Yanjing Library ed.), Chen ji 辰集, fasc. 49” (The Colourful Brush [in Sixty Plays]). Zhongguo zhexue shu dianzihua jihua 中國哲學書電子化計劃. https://ctext.org/library.pl?if=gb&res=4598.

Zhong Xing 鍾惺. 1621. *Ming yuan shi gui* 名媛詩歸 (Poetry from renowned ladies). Harvard-Yenching Library Chinese Rare Books Digitization Project-Collected Works. sl: sn. http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:FHCL:12398107.

Zhou Qingyuan 周清源. 1981. *Xihu erji* 西湖二集 (Second West Lake Collection). Liu Yaolin 劉耀林 and Xu Yuan 徐元, eds. 2 vols. Xihu wenyi congshu 西湖文藝叢書. Hangzhou: Zhejiang renmin chubanshe.

—. n.d. “Xihu erji” 西湖二集 (*Second West Lake Collection*, Facsimile of unspecified Ming xylographic edition). Zhongguo zhexue shu dianzihua jihua 中國哲學書電子化計劃. https://ctext.org/library.pl?if=gb&res=81267.

Zuben Sanguo yanyi 足本三國演義. 1958. 2 vols. Taibei: Shijie shuju.

Zuixing shi 醉醒石 (The Sobering Stone). 1985. Dong Lu Gukuang sheng 東魯古狂生. Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe.
## Secondary Sources

Aina jushi. 2010. *Propos oisifs sous la tonnelle aux haricots*. Edited and translated by Claire Lebeaupin. Connaissance de l'Orient 119. Paris: Gallimard.

—. 2017. *Idle Talk under the Bean Arbor: A Seventeenth-Century Chinese Story Collection*. Edited by Robert E. Hegel. Translated by Robert E. Hegel et al. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

Altenburger, Roland. 2009. *The Sword or the Needle: The Female Knight-Errant (Xia) in Traditional Chinese Narrative*. Bern, New York: Peter Lang.

Altenburger, Roland, Margaret B. Wan, and Vibeke Børdahl, eds. 2015. *Yangzhou, a Place in Literature: The Local in Chinese Cultural History*. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press.

Barr, Allan. 2007. "Liaozhai Zhiyi and Chinese Vernacular Fiction." In *Reading China: Fiction, History and the Dynamics of Discourse: Essays in Honour of Professor Glen Dudbridge*, edited by Daria Berg, 3-36. China Studies. Leiden, Boston: Brill.

Bisetto, Barbara. 2018a. "Commentary and Translation: Exploring the *Du Lü Yanyi* 杜律演義." *Acta Universitatis Carolinae Philologica (Orientalia Pragensia)* 2017 (4): 97-108.

—. 2018b. "Le Note di Commento nell'Antologia *Du Lü Yanyi* di Epoca Yuan." In *La Trasmissione del Testo Poetico in Cina e in Giappone*, edited by Barbara Bisetto and Andrea Maurizi, 59-77. Eterotopie 521. Milano: Mimesis.

Børdahl, Vibeke. 2003. "The Storyteller's Manner in Chinese Storytelling." *Asian Folklore Studies* 62 (1): 65-112.

—. 2010a. "Dialectal and Normative Registers in Yangzhou Storytelling." *Chinese Language and Discourse* 1 (1): 94-123.

—. 2010b. "Storytelling, Stock Phrases and Genre Conventions: The Case of 'Wu Song Fights the Tiger.'" In *The Interplay of the Oral and the Written in Chinese Popular Literature*, edited by Vibeke Børdahl and Margaret B. Wan, 83-156. NIAS Studies in Asian Topics 46. Copenhagen, Abingdon: NIAS Press.

—. 2013. *Wu Song Fights the Tiger: The Interaction of Oral and Written Traditions in the Chinese Novel, Drama and Storytelling*. Nordic Institute of Asian Studies Monograph Series 122. Copenhagen: NIAS Press.

Børdahl, Vibeke, and Liangyan Ge. 2017. *Western Han: A Yangzhou Storyteller's Script*. Nordic Institute of Asian Studies Monograph Series 139. Copenhagen: NIAS Press.

Børdahl, Vibeke, and Margaret B. Wan, eds. 2010. *The Interplay of the Oral and the Written in Chinese Popular Literature*. NIAS Studies in Asian Topics 46. Copenhagen: NIAS Press.

Chan, Hing-Ho. 1995. "Un Recueil de contes retrouvé après trois cents ans : Le Xing shi yan." *T'oung Pao* 81 (1/3): 81-107.

Chan, Leo Tak-hung. 1997. "Text and Talk: Classical Literary Tales in Traditional China and the Context of Casual Oral Storytelling." *Asian Folklore Studies*, 33-63.

Coblin, W. South. 2000. "A Brief History of Mandarin." *Journal of the American Oriental Society* 120 (4): 537-52.
Coblin, Weldon South. 2015. “Guānhuà 官話, Historical Development.” *Encyclopedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics*. http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopedia-of-chinese-language-and-linguistics/guanhua-historical-development-COM_00000173?num=0&s.f.s2 parent=s.f.book.encyclopedia-of-chinese-language-and-linguistics&s.q=guanhua*.

DeFrancis, John. 1985. "China's Literary Renaissance: A Reassessment." *Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars* 17 (4): 52-63.

Feng, Menglong. 2005. *Stories to Caution the World*. Translated by Shuhui Yang and Yunqin Yang. A Ming Dynasty Collection 2. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

——. 2009. *Stories to Awaken the World*. Translated by Shuhui Yang and Yunqin Yang. A Ming Dynasty Collection 3. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

Fuller, Michael A. 2020. "Digital Humanities and the Discontents of Meaning." *Journal of Chinese History* 4 (2): 259-75.

Hanan, Patrick. 1967. "The Early Chinese Short Story: A Critical Theory in Outline." *Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies* 27: 168-207.

——. 1973. *The Chinese Short Story. Studies in Dating, Authorship, and Composition*. Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series 21. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.

——. 1981. *The Chinese Vernacular Story*. Harvard East Asian Series 94. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.

——. 1988. *The Invention of Li Yu*. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.

Hegel, Robert E. 1985. "Introduction: An Exploration of the Chinese Literary Self." In *Expressions of Self in Chinese Literature*, edited by Robert E. Hegel and Richard C. Hessney, 3-30. New York: Columbia University Press.

Hu Haiyi 胡海義. 2019. *Ming mo Qing chu Xihu xiaoshuo yanjiu* 明末清初西湖小說研究 (A Study of the West Lake Novels of the Late Ming and Early Qing). Boya wencong 博雅文叢. Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe.

Hu Shiying 胡士瑩. 1980. *Huaben xiaoshuo gailun* 話本小說概論 (General Treatise on the Vernacular Short Story). 2 vols. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

Huang, Martin W. 1995. *Literati and Self-Re/Presentation: Autobiographical Sensibility in the Eighteenth-Century Chinese Novel*. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

Idema, Wilt L. 1973. "Storytelling and the Short Story in China." *T'oung Pao, Second Series* 59 (1/5): 1-67.

——. 1974. *Chinese Vernacular Fiction: The Formative Period*. Sinica Leidensia, v. 13. Leiden: Brill.

Idema, Wilt L., and Lloyd L. Haft. 1997. *A Guide to Chinese Literature*. Ann Arbor: Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan.

Jia Feng 賈峰. 2011. "Sanyan Erpai zhong de jinshi kaoshi yu Mingdai jinshi kaoshi zhi bijiao" "三言二拍"中的進士考試與明代進士考試之比較 (Comparison of jinshi examinations in Sanyan and Erpai with jinshi examinations in the Ming Dynasty). *Jiaoyu yu kaoshi* 教育與考試, no. 4: 38-42.
K'ung, Shang-jen [Kong Shangren]. 1976. *The Peach Blossom Fan: Tao-Hua-Shan* [Taohua shan].
Translated by Harold Acton and Shih-hsiang Chen. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Kaske, Elisabeth. 2015. “Báihuà 白話 (Vernacular Written Chinese).” *Encyclopedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics*. http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopedia-of-chinese-language-and-linguistics/baihua-vernacular-written-chinese-COM_00000031?num=1&s.f.s2 parent=s.f.book.encyclopedia-of-chinese-language-and-linguistics&q=Diglossia.

Lamarre, Christine. 2015. “Lánqīng Guānhuà 藍青官話 and Non-Standard Varieties of Standard Mandarin.” *Encyclopedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics*. http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopedia-of-chinese-language-and-linguistics/lanqing-guanhua-and-non-standard-varieties-of-standard-mandarin-COM_000209?num=1&s.f.s2 parent=s.f.book.encyclopedia-of-chinese-language-and-linguistics&q=guanhua.

Lan Yonghui 藍勇輝. 2017. “Fangyan zai Ming Qing huaben xiaoshuo zhong de duozhong yiyi chulun”
方言在明清話本小說中的多重意義芻論 (Significance Analysis of Dialects in Vernacular Novels of
Ming and Qing Dynasties). *Nanhua daxue xuebao (Shehui kexue ban)* 南華大學學報 (社會科學版)
18 (01): 113-20.

Lanselle, Rainier. 2006. “12 Notices du Doupeng Xianhua 豆棚閒話 (ca. 1668, par Aina Jushi 艾衲居士) (12 chapitres, complet).” In *Inventaire analytique et critique du conte chinois en langue vulgaire*, edited by André Lévy, Michel Cartier, Rainier Lanselle, Hing-ho Chan, et al., VIII-5: 197-242. Paris: Collège de France, Institut des Hautes Études Chinoises.

———. 2013. “Écriture du message amoureux – À partir de L’Éventail aux fleurs de pêchers de Kong Shangren.” *Études Chinoises* 32 (2): 101-39.

———. 2018. “IntraTexTT (Intralingual Textual Transformation Tool): Élaboration d'un outil numérique de comparaison textuelle pour l'analyse des procédés de réécriture et de traduction intralinguale dans les textes de la Chine prémoderne (Document de travail).” Paris. https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01863346.

———. 2021. “Histoire et philologie de la Chine classique: Fiction et réécriture de l'histoire sous les Ming et les Qing : autour de L'Éventail aux fleurs de pêcher (2). — I. Fictions historiques : textes, pratiques, enjeux (2). — II. Lecture du Taohua Shan 桃花扇 de Kong Shangren 孔尚任 (1648-1718) (2).” *École Pratique des Hautes Études. Section des sciences historiques et philologiques. Livret-Annuaire*, no. 152 (January): 411-47. https://doi.org/10.4000/ashp.4848.

Lei Changjiao 雷昌蛟. 2003. “Yuan Ming Qing baihua ciyu lishi” 元明清白話詞語例釋 (Studying Vernacular Words of the Yuan and Ming Dynasty). *Qiannan minzu shifan xueyuan xuebao* 黔南民族師範學院學報, no. 01: 46-48.

Lévy, André (as Lei Wei'an 雷威安). 1968. “Huaben dingyi wenti jianlun” 話本定義問題簡論. Edited by Xianggang daxue xueshenghui zhongwen xuehui 香港大學學生會中文學會. *Dongfang* 東方 (Zhongguo xiaoshuo xiqu yanjiu zhuanhao 中國小說戲曲研究專號): 25-27.

Lévy, André. 1965. “Études sur trois recueils anciens de contes chinois.” *T'oung Pao* 52 (1): 97-148.
—. 1971. "Un Aspect de la problématique de l'histoire littéraire dans la Chine actuelle : le cas du conte en langue vulgaire." In *Études sur le conte et le roman chinois*, 23-46. Publications de l'École Française d'Extrême-Orient, LXXXII. Paris: École Française d'Extrême-Orient.

—. 1976. "Pour une problématique chinoise de la nouvelle." *Revue de littérature comparée*, 50(4).

—. 1981. *Le Conte en langue vulgaire du XVIIe siècle*. Bibliothèque de l'Institut Des Hautes Études Chinoises. Paris: Institut des Hautes études chinoises, PUF.

—. 1985. "Hua-Pen 話本 (Vernacular Short Story)." In *The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature* (I), edited by William H. Nienhauser, Yau-Woon Ma, Stephen H. West, and Charles Hartman, 442-45. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

—. 2010. "Jin Ping Mei and the Art of Storytelling." In *The Interplay of the Oral and the Written in Chinese Popular Literature*, edited by Vibeke Børdahl and Margaret B. Wan, 13-29. NIAS Studies in Asian Topics 46. Copenhagen, Abingdon: NIAS Press.

Lévy, André, Michel Cartier, Rainier Lanselle, Hingho Chan, et al., eds. 1978-2006. *Inventaire analytique et critique du conte chinois en langue vulgaire*. 5 vols. Paris: Collège de France, Institut des Hautes Études Chinoises.

Li Guikui 李桂奎. 2013. *Chuanqi xiaoshuo yu huaben xiaoshuo xushi bijiao* 傳奇小說與話本小說敘事比較 (A comparison of the narrative of *chuanqi* and *huaben* stories). Shanghai: Fudan daxue chubanshe.

Li, Chris Wen-chao. 2015. "Diglossia." In *Encyclopedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics*., edited by Rint Sybesma, Wolfgang Behr, et al., 11-15. Leiden; Boston: E.J. Brill.

Li Qian 李茜. 2013. "*Lun Erpai zhenghua de xuancai yu gaibian*" 論“二拍”正話的選材與改編 (On Source Selection and Adaptation of the Main Stories in the “Two Slapping” Collections). Master thesis, Beijing: Zhongyang Minzu Daxue 中央民族大學.

Liu Yongqiang 劉勇強. 2009. "West Lake Fiction of the Late Ming: Origin, Development, Background and Literary Characteristics." Translated by Roland Altenburger. *Asiatische Studien* 63 (1): 135-96.

—. 2015. *Huaben xiaoshuo xulun: wenben quanshi yu lishi goujian* 話本小說敘論：文本詮釋與歷史構建 (Assessing Huaben Stories: Textual Interpretation and Historical Construction). Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe.

Lu Dan'an 陸澹安. 1979 (1964). *Xiaoshuo ciyu huishi* 小說詞語匯釋 (Lexicon of Fiction Vocabulary). Shanghai: Shanghai Guji chubanshe.

—. 2009. *Xiaoshuo ciyu huishi* 小說詞語匯釋 (Lexicon of Fiction Vocabulary). Kang Lu 陸康, ed. Lu Dan'an wencun 陸澹安文存. Shanghai: Shanghai Jinxiu wenxian chubanshe.

Lu, Tina. 2001. *Persons, Roles, and Minds: Identity in Peony Pavilion and Peach Blossom Fan*. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

Lucas, Aude. 2018. "L'expression subjective dans les récits oniriques de la littérature de fiction des Qing (Subjective Expression in Dream Accounts from Qing Fictional Literature)." PhD Diss., Paris Diderot. https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/tel-02126767.

MacDonald, Alastair Ewan. 2016. "Reimagining the Vernacular Story: Textual Roles, Didacticism, and Entertainment in Erpai." Ph.D. thesis, London: SOAS.

McLaren, Anne E. 1998. *Chinese Popular Culture and Ming Chantefables*. Leiden, Boston: Brill.
Ōta Tatsuo 太田辰夫. 1958. *Chūgokugo rekishi bumpō* 中國語歷史文法 (A historical grammar of modern Chinese). Tōkyō: Kōnan shoin 江南書院.

—. 2003. *Zhongguoyu lishi wenfa* 中國語歷史文法 (A Historical Grammar of Modern Chinese). Translated by Jiang Shaoyu 蔣紹愚 and Xu Changhua 徐昌華. Yuyan yu wenzi xilie, Weiming yiku 語言與文字系列, 未名譯庫 (Weiming Translation Library). Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe.

Pavis, Patrice. 1989. "Problems of Translation for the Stage: Interculturalism and Post-Modern Theatre." In *The Play Out of Context: Transferring Plays from Culture to Culture*, edited by H. Scolnicov and H. Peter, 25-44. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Picard, François, and Kar Lun Alan Lau. 2016. "Qupai in Kunqu (Chap. 6)." In *Qupai in Chinese Music: Melodic Models in Form and Practice*, edited by Alan R. Thrasher, 119-54. Routledge Studies in Ethnomusicology 6. New York: Routledge.

Průšek, Jaroslav. 1970. "The Creative Method of Chinese Medieval Story-Tellers." In *Chinese History and Literature: Collection of Studies*, 366-84. Prague: Academia.

Rao Daoqing 饒道慶. 2006. "‘Yang Jiao’ai sheming quanjiao’ benshi kaobian" 《羊角哀捨命全交》本事考辨 (Examination and Identification of the Source Story of “Yang Jiao’ai Lays Down His Life for the Sake of Friendship”). *Wenxue yichan* 文學遺產, no. 05: 143-145.

Ren Minghua 任明華. 2014. "Xihuerji sucai laiyuan kaobu" 《西湖二集》素材來源考補 (*The Second West Lake Collection*: An Investigation into the Sources of Material). *Zhongguo dianji yu wenhua* 中國典籍與文化, no. 4: 88-99.

Rolston, David L., and Shuen-fu Lin, eds. 1990. *How to Read the Chinese Novel*. Princeton Library of Asian Translations. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.

Sibau, Maria Franca. 2018. *Reading for the Moral: Exemplarity and the Confucian Moral Imagination in Seventeenth-Century Chinese Short Fiction*. SUNY Series in Chinese Philosophy and Culture. Albany: State University of New York Press.

Simmons, Richard VanNess. 2015. "Mandarin, Varieties Of." Encyclopedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics. http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopedia-of-chinese-language-and-linguistics/mandarin-varieties-of-COM_00000238?num=3&s.f.s2Parent=s.f.book.encyclopedia-of-chinese-language-and-linguistics&s.q=guanhua.

—. 2021. "What Was Standard Chinese in the Nineteenth Century? Divergent Views in the Times of Transition." In *Language Diversity in the Sinophone World: Historical Trajectories, Language Planning, and Multilingual Practices*, edited by Henning Klöter and Mårten Söderblom Saarela, 13-38. Routledge Studies in Sociolinguistics. New York, NY: Routledge.

Sturgeon, Donald. 2018. "Unsupervised Identification of Text Reuse in Early Chinese Literature." *Digital Scholarship in the Humanities* 33 (3): 670-84.

Tan, Zhengbi 譚正璧. 1980. *Sanyan Liangpai ziliao* 三言兩拍資料 (Materials related to “Three Words” and “Two Slappings” Stories). 2 vols. Shanghai: Shanghai Guji chubanshe.

Vedal, Nathan. 2022. *The Culture of Language in Ming China: Sound, Script, and the Redefinition of Boundaries of Knowledge*. New York: Columbia University Press.
Wan, Margaret B. 2020. "Drum Ballads and Northern 'Vernacular' in the Qing and Early Republic." *CHINOPERL: Journal of Chinese Oral and Performing Literature* 39 (1): 59-89.

Wang Meng 王猛. 2012. “*Gudai xiaoshuo zuopin 'shiming' xianxiang shulun*”古代小說作品“失名”現象述論 (A discussion of the phenomenon of “missing names” in ancient works of fiction). *Lantai shijie 蘭臺世界*, no. 09: 35-36.

Wang Pijiang 汪辟疆, ed. 1958. *Tangren xiaoshuo* 唐人小說 (Stories of Fiction from the Tang Period). Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju.

Wang Xiaoran 王曉冉. 2018. “*Yuanzhu zhiyu Xuechuang tanyi yanjiu*”《鴛渚志餘雪窗談異》研究 (Research on the *Strange Discourses at the Window of the Remaining Snow from the Record of the Duck Islet*). Master thesis, Qufu: Qufu Normal University 曲阜師範大學.

Wivell, Charles Joseph. 1969. "Adaptation and Coherence in Late Ming Short Vernacular Fiction: A Study of the 'Second West Lake Collection'." PhD Diss., Seattle: University of Washington.

Wu, Huiyi. 2017a. "Alien Voices under the Bean Arbor: How an Eighteenth-Century French Jesuit Translated *Doupeng Xianhua* 豆棚閒話 as the 'Dialogue of a Modern Atheist Chinese Philosopher.'" *T'oung Pao* 103 (1-3): 155-205.

—. 2017b. *Traduire la Chine au xviiiᵉ siècle. Les Jésuites traducteurs de textes chinois et le renouvellement des connaissances européennes sur la Chine (1687 - ca. 1740)*. Littératures étrangères. Paris: Honoré Champion.

Wu, Pei-yi. 1990. *The Confucian's Progress: Autobiographical Writings in Traditional China*. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Yang, Yichen. 2020. "From Speakability to Hypothetical Mise En Scène: A Chinese Rendition of Monologues from Peter Shaffer's *Amadeus* from Page to Stage." *Journal of Adaptation in Film & Performance* 13 (1): 79-90.

Ye Chuyan 葉楚炎. 2009. *Mingdai keju yu Ming zhongqi zhi Qing chu tongsu xiaoshuo yanjiu* 明代科舉與明中期至清初通俗小說研究 (Study on the examination system of the Ming Dynasty and the novel from the mid-Ming to the early Qing). Dengxia xueshu wencong 燈下學術文叢. Nanchang: Baihuazhou wenyi chubanshe.

Zhang Yongwei 張永葳. 2008. “*Baishi wenxin — Lun Ming mo Qing chu baihua xiaoshuo de wenzhanghua xianxiang*”稗史文心 — 論明末清初白話小說的文章化現象 (Popular History and Literary Mind - On the Influence of Classical Essays on Vernacular Novels of the Late Ming and Early Qing Dynasties). PhD Diss., Hangzhou: Zhejiang University.

—. 2010. “*Baguwen dui nihuaben wenti de suzao*”八股文對擬話本問題的塑造 (Bagu Essay Shaped the Style of Nihuaben). *Fujian shifan daxue xuebao* 福建師範大學學報 (哲學社會科學版) 160 (1): 111-15.

Zhao Yishan 趙義山 et al. 2013. *Mingdai xiaoshuo jisheng ciqu yanjiu* 明代小說寄生詞曲研究 (Studies in commensal poetry in Ming fiction). Beijing: Shangwu yinshuguan.

Zhu Ping 朱萍. 2004. “*Ming shi wuming zi wu zi*” — *Ming Qing zhiji xiaoshuo zuojiade “wuming” xianxiang* ““名是無名字無字”——明清之際小說作家的“無名”現象 (“My Name is No-Name, My Courtesy Name is No-Courtesy-Name”: The Issue of Anonymity in Ming-Qing Authors of Fiction). *Zhongguo dianji yu wenhua* 中國典籍與文化, no. 01: 69-72.