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Strange Stories from the Lodge of Leisures
This Warbler Classics edition includes a detailed biographical note on the lives of the author and the translator.
Strange Stories from the Lodge of Leisures gathers twenty-five stories from Pu Songling’s collection of more than four hundred short stories—exquisitely amusing miniatures that are regarded as the pinnacle of classical Chinese fiction. His work departed from the prevailing literary fashion that was dominated by more realistic stories written in the colloquial language. Pu instead wrote his stories in the classical idiom, freely adopting forms and themes from the old “marvel tales” of the Tang and Song dynasties. Although Pu lived and died as an obscure provincial schoolteacher, his work gained fame when it was first printed in 1766, some fifty years after his death, inspiring many imitations and creating a new vogue for classical stories. His tales have not only spawned translations, adaptations, and sequels, but have also inspired world-renowned writers such as Franz Kafka, Lafcadio Hearn, Jorge Luis Borges, and Mo Yan.
Pu’s tales are populated with ghosts, foxes, immortals, and demons, but he focused on the everyday life of commoners. He used the supernatural and the unexplainable to illustrate his ideas of society and government, to criticize the corruption and injustice in society, and sympathized with the poor. Pu is concerned with four main the skewed feudal system, the corrupt examination system of his day, the love between poor scholars and powerless women, and reforming bad behavior. He embedded Confucian-styled moral standards and Taoist principles into parables but the enduring genius of his writing is that it never fails to entertain even as it aims to enlighten.
Pu Songling (1640–1715) was a Chinese writer during the Qing dynasty, best known as the author of Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio (Liaozhai zhiyi), a collection of four hundred and thirty-one classical Chinese stories.
Strange Stories from the Lodge of Leisures gathers twenty-five stories from Pu Songling’s collection of more than four hundred short stories—exquisitely amusing miniatures that are regarded as the pinnacle of classical Chinese fiction. His work departed from the prevailing literary fashion that was dominated by more realistic stories written in the colloquial language. Pu instead wrote his stories in the classical idiom, freely adopting forms and themes from the old “marvel tales” of the Tang and Song dynasties. Although Pu lived and died as an obscure provincial schoolteacher, his work gained fame when it was first printed in 1766, some fifty years after his death, inspiring many imitations and creating a new vogue for classical stories. His tales have not only spawned translations, adaptations, and sequels, but have also inspired world-renowned writers such as Franz Kafka, Lafcadio Hearn, Jorge Luis Borges, and Mo Yan.
Pu’s tales are populated with ghosts, foxes, immortals, and demons, but he focused on the everyday life of commoners. He used the supernatural and the unexplainable to illustrate his ideas of society and government, to criticize the corruption and injustice in society, and sympathized with the poor. Pu is concerned with four main the skewed feudal system, the corrupt examination system of his day, the love between poor scholars and powerless women, and reforming bad behavior. He embedded Confucian-styled moral standards and Taoist principles into parables but the enduring genius of his writing is that it never fails to entertain even as it aims to enlighten.
Pu Songling (1640–1715) was a Chinese writer during the Qing dynasty, best known as the author of Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio (Liaozhai zhiyi), a collection of four hundred and thirty-one classical Chinese stories.
80 pages, Kindle Edition
Published June 12, 2021
About the author
Pu Songling
438 books94 followersPu Songling (simplified Chinese: 蒲松龄; traditional Chinese: 蒲松齡; pinyin: Pú Sōnglíng; Wade–Giles: P'u Sung-ling, June 5, 1640—February 25, 1715) was a Qing Dynasty Chinese writer, best known as the author of Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio.
Pu was born into a poor landlord-merchant family from Zichuan (淄川, now Zibo, Shandong). At the age of nineteen, he received the gongsheng degree in the civil service examination, but it was not until he was seventy-one that he received the xiucai degree.
He spent most of his life working as a private tutor, and collecting the stories that were later published in Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio. Some critics attribute the Vernacular Chinese novel Xingshi Yinyuan Zhuan to him.
Pu was born into a poor landlord-merchant family from Zichuan (淄川, now Zibo, Shandong). At the age of nineteen, he received the gongsheng degree in the civil service examination, but it was not until he was seventy-one that he received the xiucai degree.
He spent most of his life working as a private tutor, and collecting the stories that were later published in Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio. Some critics attribute the Vernacular Chinese novel Xingshi Yinyuan Zhuan to him.
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