Nianlou Xue Duan

Author: Zhong Shuhe
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2002-08-01
Features: Xue Qi Jian was published in Beijing Chuban Xinwen Bao from 1991 to 1994, with ninety-six articles. Originally, it was written for my granddaughter, but as she did not pursue literature, it was discontinued. From 1999 to 2001, it was published in Nanning Chuban Guangjiao, with two hundred sixty-six articles. This was due to the encouragement of my classmate Liu Shuoliang. Later, when Liu left his retirement, I also gradually lost interest in the laborious and unprofitable task of translating classical Chinese into modern language, and it was discontinued again.
This book includes one hundred ninety articles, all of which are articles I love to read. These articles are divided into twenty units, with eight to ten articles per unit. Except for Liu Xianting’s Nan Yue (one hundred and one characters) and Zhuangzi’s Ying Ren (one hundred and two characters), none of the other articles exceed one hundred characters.
When someone wrote a preface for a book titled One Hundred Characters of Beautiful Literature Through the Ages, they said that if one insists on the exact number of characters, "it’s called quibbling or being overly detailed." It is certainly true that the selection of articles does not need to be constrained by the number of characters. But if so, why should the book be named One Hundred Characters of Beautiful Literature and use one hundred characters as a selling point? In fact, there are many classical Chinese articles of one hundred characters, and I still have two or three hundred articles published in newspapers and magazines that have not been included in this book. If one wants to highlight one hundred-character articles, there is no need to pad the length of the articles.
Take the so-called One Hundred Characters of Beautiful Literature Through the Ages as an example. The concluding piece, Hong Xiuquan’s Proclamation to the Whole Army to Fight Bravely and Kill Enemies, does not exceed one hundred characters either. There are still many articles like this that are considered "beautiful literature."