Collection of Eastern Ou anecdotes

Author: Chen Ruizan, Compiler and Annotation
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-11-01
Features: The anecdotes included in this book cover all aspects of Wenzhou history, and the people described are basically limited to the period before the Republic of China. The content is sourced without restriction, with over 600 books cited throughout the entire work. The scope of collection includes the Four Books, but the main focus is on the notes and treatises of past dynasties, particularly the works of the Song and Ming dynasties. The title of this book is "Collected Anecdotes of Dongyou," and the term "anecdotes" actually refers to a quite broad range. The anecdotal materials included in this book include some stories that fall into the category of "things beyond the scope of polite discourse" in nature, such as "strange, powerful, chaotic, and supernatural" tales. These stories are scattered, their content trivial, and they are also difficult to possess academic value as systematic historical sources. However, in the current era of academic openness, people's use of historical sources has become increasingly broad. Many materials that were previously difficult to enter the academic field now hold new significance with the improvement of scholars' interpretive abilities. Based on this understanding, this book adopts a relatively broad standard in the selection of materials, and it can even be said to be "prioritizing quantity over quality."