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Appendix: Instances of the Use of Qi, Yi, and Guaiin Sobriquet Dictionaries
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appendix Instances of the Use of Qi, Yi, and Guai in Sobriquet Dictionaries In Chinese language dictionaries, qi 奇 is commonly defined as yi 異 “unusual ” and guai 怪, “strange.” As noted throughout this book, though guai ”strange” is an important concept to literary critics and authors in the seventeenth century,1 critics and theorists rarely talk about visual art or artists as guai or even yi, but they frequently discuss them as qi. And, just as there is increased use of qi in the critical literature from the fifth through seventeenth centuries (as demonstrated in Chapters 5, 6, and 7), there is a similar increase in use of qi for artist’s sobriquets. This is most notable in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Artists, many of whom were also theorists and critics, chose names for themselves that reflected values they supported. As tabulated from a representative selection of artists’ sobriquets dictionaries in the following tables, artists used the term qi in the first name of their sobriquets (i.e., someone might call himself “Qiren,” or “Qiweng,” etc.) far more frequently than they chose yi/unusual or guai/strange in their names—even allowing for overlap between the sources. (For feasibility’s sake, this study looked only at the first character in an artist’s sobriquet, not its use as the second or later characters in a name.) In fact, overall, there are 98 entries in which artists chose qi for the first character of their sobriquet, whereas only 13 selected yi, and 8 used guai. For the Ming and Qing dynasties, the comparisons are even more striking. In the Ming period, artists chose qi as the first name of their sobriquets 28 times, whereas they chose yi only 3 times, and once only for guai. During the Qing period, the contrasts are more salient still: 61 entries use qi, whereas there are only 7 using yi, and none using guai. It seems clear, therefore, that it was not the strange and unusual these artists valued and wished to identify themselves with, but rather, a special kind of difference and originality. 332| appendix Table I Number of Entries Beginning with qi 奇 in a Representative Selection of Artists’ Sobriquet Indices TEXT TITLES TOTAL NUMBER OF ENTRIES PER INDEX NUMBER OF ENTRIES BY DYNASTY OR PERIOD pre-Song Song Yuan Ming Qing Period Republican Bieming yinde2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Biehao suoyin3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Gujin renwu bieming suoyin4 21 0 2 0 4 13 2 Lidai renwu shiming biehao tongjian5 5 0 0 0 1 4 0 Mingdai zhuanji congkan suoyin6 9 0 0 0 9 0 0 Mingren zhuanji ciliao suoyin7 6 0 0 0 6 0 0 Qingdai zhuanji congkan suoyin8 27 0 0 0 0 27 0 [3.12.41.106] Project MUSE (2024-04-17 19:54 GMT) appendix| 333 TEXT TITLES TOTAL NUMBER OF ENTRIES PER INDEX NUMBER OF ENTRIES BY DYNASTY OR PERIOD pre-Song Song Yuan Ming Qing Period Republican Shiming biehao suoyin9 5 0 0 0 1 4 0 Yuanren zhuanji ziliao suoyin10 2 0 0 2 0 0 0 Zhongguo lidai shuhua chuankejia zihao suoyin11 11 0 0 0 4 7 0 Zhongguo meishujia renming dacidian12 11 1 0 0 3 6 1 Zhongguo renming dacidian13 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 Total number of entries 98 2 2 2 28 61 3 Table I Number of Entries Beginning with qi 奇 in a Representative Selection of Artists’ Sobriquet Indices (cont’d) 334| appendix Table II Number of Entries Beginning with yi 異 in a Representative Selection of Artists’ Sobriquet Indices TEXT TITLES TOTAL NUMBER OF ENTRIES PER INDEX NUMBER OF ENTRIES BY DYNASTY OR PERIOD pre-Song Song Yuan Ming Qing Period Republican Bieming yinde14 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Biehao suoyin15 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Gujin renwu bieming suoyin16 9 2 1 0 3 3 0 Lidai renwu shiming biehao tongjian17 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Mingdai zhuanji congkan suoyin18 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Mingren zhuanji ciliao suoyin19 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Qingdai zhuanji congkan suoyin20 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 [3.12.41.106] Project MUSE (2024-04-17 19:54 GMT) appendix| 335 TEXT TITLES TOTAL NUMBER OF ENTRIES PER INDEX NUMBER OF ENTRIES BY DYNASTY OR PERIOD pre-Song Song Yuan Ming Qing Period Republican Shiming biehao suoyin21 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Yuanren zhuanji ziliao suoyin22...