Chu Ci Bu Zhu

Author: Hong Xingzu (Song Dynasty)
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2007-01-01
Features: A research work on the Chuci. 17 volumes. Written by Hong Xingzu (1070–1135) of the Song Dynasty. Hong Xingzu, styled Qingshan, was a native of Danyang (now part of Jiangsu Province) and served as a Zhengzi (a junior official position) in the Secretariat Department during the early Southern Song Dynasty. This book is a work to supplement and correct Wang Yi's Commentary on the Chuci. Its format is to first list Wang Yi's annotations, followed by "Supplementary Remarks" to express his own views. It not only supplements the details Wang Yi omitted but also corrects his errors. The supplementary annotations include not only glosses on terms and objects but also extensive citations of historical legends and mythological stories, making them quite detailed. Additionally, Commentary on the Chuci often cites classical texts without mentioning their titles, whereas this book always cites the sources of its references. Old annotations after Wang Yi, such as Guo Pu's Commentary on the Chuci and Xu Miao's Pronunciation of the Chuci, are mostly lost today, but their traces can still be seen in the citations of this book. For example, in the supplementary annotations of Seven Admonitions, it cites Guo Pu's saying: "□, wild goose." In the supplementary annotations of Encountering Sorrow, it cites Xu Miao's pronunciation of "" as "Su Guo Qi." Overall, although there are inevitable errors and omissions, the attitude is rigorous, and the analysis is precise. Therefore, the General Catalogue of the Four Treasuries praises it as "a particularly excellent edition among the annotations of the Chuci." After this book was published, the standalone editions of Commentary on the Chuci gradually became rare. In addition to Supplementary Annotations on the Chuci, Hong Xingzu also wrote Investigations into Variations in the Chuci, 1 volume. According to Annotations on the Catalogue of Books by the Zhi Zhai Library, the original Investigations into Variations in the Chuci was a standalone work, but it has now been scattered into the "Supplementary Remarks" section of Supplementary Annotations on the Chuci. According to Records of Books Read in the Jun Zhai Study, the original Supplementary Annotations on the Chuci had a preface, but it has also been lost in the current edition. The better-preserved versions of this book include the 17-volume reprinted Song Dynasty edition from the Jiguang Pavilion. The more common version is the Complete Collection of the Four Divisions, which was reprinted by the Zhonghua Book Company in 1957. In the 1980s, the Zhonghua Book Company also published a new typeset edition.