A T’ang Adventurer in Inner Asia

T'angStudies 6 (1988) A New Ch'iian T'ang shih JOSEPHJ. LEE MICHIGAN Sf ATE UNIVERSITY A project to make a new compilation of T'ang and FiveDynasties poetry, entitled Ch'uan T'ang Wu-tai shih, was launched in early 1989 in China. At a workshop conference held in Kaifeng in April an editorial board was organized and a draft proposal discussed. A revised draft will be adopted at a forthcoming meeting of the editorial board in late 1989. The project will take approximately five years to complete and is divided into three phases: phase I (1990-1992) will cover the poetry of the Early and High T'ang; phase II (1993-1994), the poetry of the Middle and Late T'ang; and phase III (1995), the poetry of the Five Dynasties. The Ch 'uan T'ang Wu-tai shih is part of a series of similar works planned for completion by the mid-1990s. Among the projects already completed are Hsien-Ch'in Han Wei Chin Nanpei -ch'ao shih, Ch'uan Sung tz'u, and Ch'uan Chin-Yuan tz'u. Among those currently underway are Ch 'uan Sung shih, Ch 'uan Chin shih, Ch 'uan Yuan shih, Ch 'uan Ming shih, Ch 'uan Ming tz'u, and Ch 'uan Ch'ing shih. It is expected that by the middle of the coming decade, when all these compilations are completed, scholars will have at their disposal source materials on shih and tz'u from the pre-Ch'in period through the Ch'ing. The Ch 'uan T'ang Wu-tai shih aims to be comprehensive in coverage, thorough and informative in textual study, and up to date in biographical and bibliographical treatment. Some of its guidelines are: 1) A consistent chronological scheme for arranging the authors throughout the entire compilation. 2) All biographical accounts are to be brief, informative, and complete with bibliographic references. 3) In cases where collected works are extant, the earliest, most reliable and complete edition will be used as the primary 99 Lee: A New Ch'ilan Tang shih text. Textual study and comparison will be made against other editions and T'ang and Sung anthology sources. In cases where no collected works are extant, T'ang and Sung anthology sources will be used as primary, and textual comparison and study made against Yuan and Ming anthology sources. In cases where the original collection has become fragmented or lost and is not included in the Ch'uan T'ang Shih, as with, for example, the poetry of Wang Fan-chih, use will be made of texts reconstituted by modern scholars. 4) Sources from which a poem is drawn are to be clearly indicated. Textual variations shall be duly noted and reconciliations , if any, briefly but fully explained. 5) Authentication of individual poems and attribution of authorship must conform to the highest standards of scholarship. 6) Identification and inclusion of poets and poems from sources either overlooked by or unavailable to the editors of the Ch'uan T'ang shih. 7) Inclusion of an author index and a poetry index. The launching of the project represents the culmination of over thirty years of discussion and painstaking work. That the Ch'uan T'ang shih is seriously flawed is common knowledge. Its failure to consult many major sources was recognized almost as soon as the work was presented to the K'ang-hsi emperor in 1707. Scholarly research since the beginning of this century has revealed even more serious shortcomings. A proposal in 1956 to update and revise the Ch'uan T'angshih was greeted with universal approval and support. A research unit was organized soon thereafter to work in close collaboration with Chung-hua Book Company. A punctuated edition with minor corrections was published by Chung-hua in 1960. After a pause of almost twenty years, work for the revision of the Ch 'uan T'angshih resumed in 1979and proceeded on several fronts. Among the major accomplishments of the last ten years are: 1,An Index to Duplicate Poems in the Ch'uan T'ang shih (published); 2, Poetry Index (in press); 3,A Biographical Study of 100 T'ang Studies 6 (1988...