Taoyan Dreams of Memory - (Illustrated Treasure Edition)

Author: Zhang Dai
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-05-01
Features: The small book before the readers now is a compilation of two works: Zhang Dai of the Ming Dynasty's Dream of Tao'an and a selected edition of the woodblock print Ten Bamboo Studio Sketchbook published the year the Ming Dynasty fell. It is somewhat unconventional to call it a compilation, as the two works are interwoven without clear boundaries. However, it cannot be said that the Sketchbook is merely providing illustrations for Dream of Tao'an, or that Dream of Tao'an is serving as textual commentary for the Sketchbook. There is no mutual explanatory relationship between the two. But they share a deep kinship—so deep that calling them conjoined twins would not be an exaggeration. If I were to introduce Dream of Tao'an and the Sketchbook here, it would undoubtedly be beyond my capabilities. Yet, there is one point worth mentioning: Dream of Tao'an is the crystallization of the two major literary schools of the time—Gong'an and Jingling. It stands unashamedly at the pinnacle of late Ming prose, while Hu Ruzong, the master of Ten Bamboo Studio, a native of Huizhou, spent his later life in Nanjing, and is considered the pinnacle of Chinese woodblock print history. The highest achievements of these two art forms are all rooted in the soil of Ming Dynasty scholar culture. But can this be the reason for printing them together? This inevitably brings up the question of "emotion" and "context." Emotion is subjective, while context is objective. When emotion and context blend, whether one captures the context with emotion or transmits emotion through the context, it deepens the reader's experience.