Chinese Rhetoric and Writing - An Introduction for Language Teachers, 2012a
Chinese Rhetoric and Writing - An Introduction for Language Teachers, 2012a
Chinese Rhetoric and Writing - An Introduction for Language Teachers, 2012a
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
3 THE RULES OF WRITING 9<br />
IN MEDIEVAL CHINA AND<br />
EUROPE<br />
The Rules of <strong>Writing</strong> (Wen Ze, ) has been called the first systematic<br />
account of <strong>Chinese</strong> rhetoric (Yancheng Liu ). 10 Its author, Chen Kui (<br />
) (1128-1203), was born at the beginning of the Southern Song dynasty<br />
(1127-1279). He lived at a time of great change, being born one year after<br />
the beginning of the Southern Song period. The Northern Song emperors had<br />
ruled from 960, but had been <strong>for</strong>ced to flee south in 1127 in face of invasion<br />
from the north.<br />
Chen Kui was a member of the intellectual elite <strong>and</strong> passed the extremely<br />
prestigious <strong>and</strong> competitive metropolitan exam to become a jinshi () at<br />
the comparatively early age of 24. This was no mean feat. John Chaffee has<br />
eloquently recorded the trials <strong>and</strong> tribulations of being a scholar in Song China.<br />
During the Song dynasty, the number of people taking the series of exams that<br />
culminated in the jinshi exam increased dramatically. There were two major<br />
reasons <strong>for</strong> this. First, the Song emperors desired to create a meritocracy by<br />
increasing the number of able men in the civil service. Exams replaced privilege<br />
as the main gateway into the civil service. Second, the advent of printing opened<br />
up education to more people: “The spread of printing trans<strong>for</strong>med <strong>Chinese</strong><br />
book culture” (Cherniack 5). The Rules of <strong>Writing</strong> may thus well have been<br />
stimulated to provide a writing <strong>and</strong> rhetorical guide <strong>for</strong> the many thous<strong>and</strong>s of<br />
men who were now preparing <strong>for</strong> one of the imperial civil service exams.<br />
Chen Kui himself held a number of senior official positions. In 1190,<br />
during the reign of the Emperor Guang Zong, he was appointed secretary of<br />
the Imperial Library <strong>and</strong> was the author of The Record of the Library of the<br />
Southern Song.<br />
Here, we first briefly summarise how <strong>Chinese</strong> scholars have evaluated The<br />
Rules of <strong>Writing</strong> <strong>and</strong> then focus on three topics that we hope will be of particular<br />
51