Love in a confucian climate: The perils of intimacy in Eighteenth-century China

NAN NU

Volumn 11, Issue 2, 2009, Pages 197-233

  Theiss, Janet ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF UTAH   (United States)

Author keywords

Adultery; Companionate marriage; Love; Marriage; Scandal; Sentiment

Indexed keywords

EID: 77951072840     PISSN: 13876805     EISSN: 15685268     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1163/138768009X12586661922983     Document Type: Article

References (101)

1. With deep gratitude I would like to acknowledge the critical advice and suggestions I have received while trying to plumb the complexities of this case from Katherine Carlitz, Maram Epstein, Robert Hegel, Kathryn Lowry, Tobie Meyer-Fong, William Rowe, Paola Zamperini, Harriet Zurndorfer, and two reviewers who remain anonymous. Despite all of their expert advice, I am sure there are still plenty of mistakes and misinterpretations for which I will have to answer myself. Hereafter Yongzheng will be abbreviated to YZ in rendering the reign year.
2. Hereafter Qianlong will be abbreviated to QL in rendering the reign year.
3. All quotations from case testimony and letters are from one case file, preserved as a Board of Punishments routine memorial, Xingke tiben, Qianlong (QL) 5.7.8. Xingke tiben, preserved in large numbers for the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in the Number One Historical Archives in Beijing, are documents that present cases involving serious crimes, deserving of sentences of banishment, exile, or death, to Board of Punishment of ficials and then to the emperor for review. These documents typically contain testimonies from all parties to the case, the confession of the guilty person, and judicial interpretations of the case by the county magistrate who first tried it and the prefectural and provincial officials who reviewed it prior to its being sent to the capital. They may also include other documents relevant to the case, like contracts, or in the Fei case, the letters, which are copied into the file by a scribe. Xingke tiben are not paginated so quotes from the case are referenced to the relevant section of the file. I have not been able to establish precise birth or death dates for most of the principal players in this case.
4. Testimony of Fei Li Shi, Xingke tiben, QL 5.7.8.
5. Although conflicts over property and its management are an integral part of Fei family disputes in ways that will be explained later in this article, there is no clear evidence that Fei Qianliu's goal was to take property from his brother's branch. Later renderings of the case in the materials on Lu Zhuo's (d. 1767) impeachment mention only the accusation of illicit sex, not the property dispute. That said, I will explore the economic component in greater depth in future publications.
6. The complex of cases surrounding Fei Li Shi's adultery and Lu Zhuo's impeachment is the focus of a book-length project. This article is my first publication on the Fei case. A second article that mirrors this one, using the love letters to examine the case from the perspective of the history of sexuality, is forthcoming in The Journal of the History of Sexuality.
7. Susan Mann, "Grooming a Daughter for Marriage: Brides and Wives in the Mid-Qing Period," in Rubie S. Watson and Patricia B. Ebrey, eds., Marriage and Inequality in Chinese Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), 204-30;
8. reprinted in Susan Brownell and Jeff rey N. Wasserstrom, eds., Chinese Femininities, Chinese Masculinities: A Reader (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), 93-119.
9. Mann, "Grooming a Daughter," 94.
10. Among the most prominent of these handbooks were Chen Hongmou (1696-1771), Jiaonü yigui in Wuzhong yigui (1742, reprint; Shanghai: Jing-wei jiaoyu lianhe chubanshe, 1935)
11. and Wang Huizu, Shuangjietang yongxun (1794, reprint; Taibei: Huawen shuju, 1970).
12. The scholarly literature on qing is vast and continues to grow. For a seminal exploration of the implications of qing for gender discourse, see Dorothy Ko, Teachers of the Inner Chambers: Women and Culture in Seventeenth-Century China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994), 179-190.
13. For discussion of the concept of qing in late imperial fiction, see, for example, Maram Epstein, Competing Discourses: Orthodoxy, Authenticity and Gendered Meanings in Late Imperial Chinese Fiction (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001)
14. and Martin W. Huang, Desire and Fictional Narrative in Late Imperial China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001).
15. The interdisciplinary scope and complexity of the concept of qing are explored in Paolo Santangelo, Sentimental Education in Chinese History: An Interdisciplinary Textual Research on Ming and Qing Sources (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2003)
16. and the many essays in several edited volumes: Xiong Bingzhen and Zhang Shouan, eds., Qingyu Mingqing - Da qing pian (Taibei: Maitian, 2004);
17. Halvor Eifring, ed., Love and Emotions in Traditional Chinese Literature (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2004);
18. and Paolo Santangelo and Donatella Guida, eds., Love, Hatred, and Other Passions: Questions and Themes on Emotions in Chinese Civilization (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2006).
19. Paul Ropp was one of the first scholars to explore expressions of marital intimacy in elite women's poetry and to note its complicated implications for Confucian patriarchal family structure. See his "Love, Literacy, and Laments: Themes of Women Writers in Late Imperial China," Women's History Review 2.1 (1993): 107-141
20. See also, Susan Mann, Precious Records: Women in China's Long Eighteenth Century (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), 22, 111-112
21. Shen Fu's (b. 1763) memoir, Six Records of a Floating Life documents well the tensions between conjugal love and filial duty. An anonymous reviewer for this article notes that the expression of marital intimacy through shared literary pursuits could take on an erotic tone even in the eighteenth century as evidenced by the sexually explicit commentary on Mudanting (The Peony Pavilion) by Wu Zhensheng and Cheng Qiong.
22. See Hua Wei, ed., Caizi Mudanting; (Taibei: Xuesheng shuju, 2004).
23. Lan Dingyuan, Nüxue (Prefaces dated 1712, 1717, and 1718;
24. reprint, Siku quans-hu edition, Jingshi n.p, 1897), 5: 2b-3a.
25. Janet M. Theiss, "Managing Martyrdom: Female Suicide and Statecraft in Mid-Qing China," in Paul S. Ropp, Paola Zamperini, Harriet T. Zurndorfer, eds., Passionate Women: Female Suicide in Late Imperial China (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2001), 47-66.
26. Lu Weijing, True to Her Word: The Faithful Maiden Cult in Late Imperial China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008).
27. Zhang Shouan, "Shiba, shijiu shiji Zhongguo chuantong hunyin guannian de xiandai zhuanhua", Jindai Zhongguo funüshi yanjiu (2000): 47-87.
28. Zhang Shouan, "Shiba, shijiu shiji Zhongguo chuantong hunyin guannian de xiandai zhuanhua," 75. The original text is Wang Zhong, "Nüzi xujia er xu si congsi ji shou zhi yi" in Shuxue nei pian (Taibei: Shangwu, 1967), 1:14.
29. Zhang Shouan, "Shiba, shijiu shiji Zhongguo chuantong hunyin guannian de xiandai zhuanhua," 87.
30. On incest cases see Janet Theiss, Disgraceful Matters: The Politics of Chastity in Eighteenth-Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004), 98-117.
31. On disputes over widow property see Kathryn Bernhardt, Women and Property in China, 960-1949 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999), 62-72;
32. and Matthew H. Sommer, Sex, Law and Society in Late Imperial China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000), Ch. Five.
33. Sommer, Sex, Law and Society, 308-316, and passim.
34. Theiss, Disgraceful Matters, Ch. Five.
35. Guo Songyi, "Qinglifa de maodun: Qing Qianlong chao funü bentao anjian zhong de qingyu yinsu" in Xiong Bingzhen and Zhang Shouan, eds., Qingyu Mingqing - Da qing pian, 155-191
36. See also Lai Huimin and Zhu Qingwei, "Funü, jiating yu shehui: Yong Qian shiqi guaitaoan de fenxi", Jindai Zhongguo fünushi yanjiu 8 (2000): 1-42.
37. See for example, Mann, Precious Records, 13, 93, 114-115, and 221.
38. One eighteenth-century text that exemplifies this phenomenon is Shi Zhenlin's Random Notes from Xiqing (Xiqing sanji) which is examined in depth in Paul S. Ropp, Banished Immortal: Searching for Shuangqing, China's Peasant Woman Poet (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2001). I am very grateful to an anonymous reviewer for suggesting this text.
39. Haiyan Lee, Revolution of the Heart: A Genealogy of Love in China, 1900-1950 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007), 9.
40. Lee, Revolution of the Heart, 36.
41. Lee, Revolution of the Heart, 15.
42. Lee asserts in contrast that the notion of a structure of feeling, a concept borrowed from Raymond Williams, "captures social consciousness as lived experience in process, or in solution, before it is 'precipitated' and given fixed forms." The concept thus assumes that "feeling has structures that can be subjected to rational analysis." Lee, Revolution of the Heart, 10-11. The problem here, as this article will show, is that human emotional experience, even in the pre-modern era, is far too diverse to be captured by a unitary structure.
43. For a discussion of the workings of gender orthodoxy in the eighteenth century, see Theiss, Disgraceful Matters, 4 and passim.
44. Kathryn Lowry "Three Ways to Read a Love Letter in Late Ming," Ming Studies 44 (2001): 48-77. See page 58.
45. Testimony of Fei Li Shi, Xingke tiben, QL 5.7.8.
46. Testimony of Fei Yuyou, Xingke tiben, QL 5.7.8.
47. Testimony of Fei Qianliu, Xingke tiben, QL 5.7.8.
48. Testimony of Xu Yantan, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
49. Testimony of Fei Yuyou, Xingke tiben, QL 5.7.8.
50. Letter from Fei Yuyou to Fei Shupian, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
51. Letter from Fei Yuyou to Fei Shupian, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
52. Letter from Fei Yuyou to Fei Shupian, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
53. Letter from Fei Yuyou to Fei Shupian, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
54. Qian Chenqun, Xiangshuzhai wenji xuchao in Xiangshuzhai quanji (n.p. 1885 ed.), 2:25a-26b.
55. See Wang Liang's biography in Shi Shuyi, ed., Qingdai guige shiren zhenglue
56. in Zhou Junfu ed., Qingdai zhuanji congkan, xuelin lei 34 juan 3:3b
57. and Tongxiang xianzhi (1887 ed.), 18:3a-b.
58. Jiaxing xianzhi (1878 ed.), 79:16.
59. Tongxiang xianzhi (1887 ed.),18:3a-b.
60. Lufu zouzhe, File copy of a memorial of Depei, QL 6.6.23. Before being returned to their senders all rescripted memorials were copied for the Grand Council archives. These documents are housed in the Number One Historical Archive in Beijing.
61. Letter from Xu Yantan to Fei Li Shi, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
62. Letter from Fei Li Shi to Xu Yantan, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
63. The family matriarch, Fei Fan Shi is also said to have "read" the love letters before ordering Fei Li Shi's expulsion. In the context of the original lawsuit, the only evidence of the alleged adultery was the love letters, so proof of Fei Li Shi's chastity turned ultimately on an assessment of both her literacy and that of the servant Wang Wancheng said to have forged them. The transcript of the interrogation of Wang about his literacy is one of the most problematic sections of the case file. The magistrate asks him to reproduce the handwriting in the courtroom with very imperfect results. Despite this, he concludes with certainty that Wang was capable of writing the love letters. The explanation of the case in Lu Zhuo's indictment describes this conclusion as "extremely unbelievable," character izing Wang as a servant who "only knows a few characters." (Lufu zouzhe, Memorial of Depei, QL 6.6.23).
64. Wang Liang's mother is, inexplicably, referred to as both Wang Sun Shi and Wang Qian Shi in the memorial indicting Lu Zhuo. But in Qian Chenqun's eulogy for Shupian, she is a Sun.
65. Lufu zouzhe, File copy of a memorial of Depei, QL 6.6.23.
66. Indeed, their branch of the Fei lineage appears to have been excised from the Fei family geneaology, Shecun Feishi zupu compiled in 1764.
67. Qian Chenqun, Xiangshu zhai, 2:25a.
68. Qian Chenqun, Xiangshu zhai, 2:25a.
69. Qian Chenqun, Xiangshu zhai, 2:25a.
70. Qian Chenqun, Xangshu zhai, 2:25a.
71. Qian Chenqun, Xangshu zhai, 2:25a.
72. Qian Chenqun, Xangshu zhai, 2:25a.
73. Zhang Geng, Guochao huazheng lu, juan xia, 18a.
74. The Qing Gate is a reference to the scholar Dong Ling Hou Shao Ping who lived outside the Qing Gate of the capital Changan after the fall of the Qin dynasty where he grew melons. 'Melon field' is one of Zhang Geng's style names.
75. Xu Shao of the Han Dynasty devoted the first day of each month to writing criticisms of the world around him. Similarly, Zhang Geng's Huazheng lu is a collection of his critical commentaries on the evils of his day.
76. Wanyan Yun Zhu, comp. Guochao guixiu zhengshiji, (Hon-gxiangguan ed., 1831), 9:14a-b.
77. On Wang Liang's association with Chen Shu's circle of painters, see Marsha Weidner, "The Conventional Success of Ch'en Shu," in Marsha Wei-dner, ed., Flowering in the Shadows: Women in the History of Chinese and Japanese Painting (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1990), 123-156. See pp. 145-146
78. Qian Chenqun, Xiangshu zhai, 2:26a.
79. Qian Chenqun, Xiangshu zhai, 2:26a.
80. Qian Chenqun, Xiangshu zhai, 2:26a.
81. Shen Fu's memoir of his marriage to Chen Yun presents a parallel case of marital love and devotion intensified by conflict with the husband's parents, economic adversity, and social disgrace. Shen Fu portrays his conflict with his parents as a result of his intimacy with his wife, whom his parents came to dislike. Although we do not know about Fei Shupian and Wang Liang's relationship with his parents, the hints of Fei Li Shi's dislike of Wang Liang suggest that here too, a young husband's prioritizing of his marriage to a daughter-in-law who does not get along well with his parents leads to a breach in the filial relationship. See Shen Fu, Fusheng liuji (Tainan: Xinshiji chubanshe, 1981).
82. The English version is Shen Fu, Six Records of a Floating Life, translated by Leonard Pratt and Chiang Suhui (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1983).
83. Shen Fu's portrayal of his marital life has been explored in Harriet Zurndorfer, "The 'Constant World' of Wang Chao-yüan: Women, Education, and Orthodoxy in 18th Century China," in Institute of Modern His tory, ed., Family Process and Political Process in Modern Chinese History (Taibei: Academia Sinica, 1992), vol.1, 581-619.
84. In her later years, Wang Liang formed a close bond as literary friend and mentor with at least one woman poet, the much younger Shen Cai (b. 1752). Grace Fong explores this friendship in Herself An Author: Gender, Agency, and Writing in Late Imperial China (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008), 124-125, 128. Liang's portrait of Shen Cai, the only extant example of her painting and calligraphy, provides the frontispiece image for Fong's book. Fong elaborates on the very different approaches to poetry writing taken by the two women. Liang, who is praised by her various biographers for her unfeminine, unsentimental style, suggests in a letter to Shen Cai that to produce great poetry, women must "wash away the habits of silk and perfume." Cai replies that since the best poetry reflects "one's nature and feeling" women should fully express their femininity in their poetry. Although this is the only female friendship of Liang's documented thus far, it is not unlikely that she like many accomplished women poets cultivated other such motherly ties with talented young women.
85. Testimony of Xu Yantan, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
86. Lowry, "Three Ways to Read a Love Letter," 49.
87. Letter from Xu Yantan to Fei Li Shi, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
88. Letter from Xu Yantan to Fei Li Shi, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
89. Letter from Fei Li Shi to Xu Yantan, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8. These comments hinting at her close involvement in her sons' education may also support the idea that she was highly literate.
90. Letter from Fei Li Shi to Xu Yantan, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
91. My very literal translation of this phrase comes out of extensive examination of its use in criminal cases. It was commonly used by women to describe their feelings in the wake of sexual insult, harassment, or assault. See Theiss, Disgraceful Matters, 198.
92. Letter from Fei Li Shi to Xu Yantan, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
93. Theiss, " Disgraceful Matters," Chapter 6.
94. On wife-selling, see Matthew H. Sommer [Su Chengjie, "Qingdai xianyade mai qi anjian shenpan: Yi 272 jian Ba xian, Nanbu, yu Baodi xian anzi wei lizheng trans. by Lin Wenkai in Qiu Pengsheng and Chen Xiyuan, eds., Ming Qing falü yun-zuo zhong de quanli yu wenhua & (Taipei: Lianjing chuban gongsi, 2009), 345-396
95. Lowry, "Three Ways to Read a Love Letter," 52.
96. Letter from Xu Yantan to Fei Li Shi, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
97. Letter from Fei Li Shi to Xu Yantan, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
98. Letter from Xu Yantan to Fei Li Shi, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
99. Letter from Xu Yantan to Fei Li Shi, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.
100. Epstein, Competing Discourses, passim.
101. Letter from Xu Yantan to Fei Li Shi, Xingke tiben, QL5.7.8.