On Jun 9, 2021, at 1:08 AM, Chiu-Duke, Josephine <Josephine.ChiuDuke@ubc.ca> wrote:

Dear Beverly and Shaoyun,

Not at all! And my thanks to Shaoyun as well for providing further insightful information about this text. 

Best wishes indeed, 

Josephine

On Jun 8, 2021, at 7:45 PM, Beverly Bossler <bjbossler@ucdavis.edu> wrote:

[CAUTION: Non-UBC Email]

Dear Josephine and Shao-yun,

  Thank you both very much for this highly enlightening information. At the very least, I will have to alert my students to the controversies around the text.  I do hope someone will explore the question further, especially in view of the findings of the epitaph.

  Thanks again for your help, I very much appreciate it.

Best wishes,

Beverly

On Tue, Jun 8, 2021 at 10:31 PM Shao-yun Yang <yangs@denison.edu> wrote:

If I may build on Professor Chiu-Duke's message: a position similar to Chen Wenhe's appears to have been presented by Gao Shiyu in 2003 and may be the basis for Chen's interpretation.

高世瑜, 《宋氏姐妹與《女論語》論析——兼及古代女教的平民化趨勢》, in 鄧曉南 ed., 《唐宋女性与社會》 (2003)

Incidentally, Gao's essay is followed in this volume by one by Yamazaki, in which he restates his theory that the received text was written by Xue Meng's wife: 山崎純一 ,《關於唐代两部女訓書《女論語》、《女孝經》的基礎研究》.

I'm no expert in the text of the 女論語, but the last two chapters don't seem significantly different from the others to me. It feels like Gao Shiyu and Chen Wenhe mainly argued that they were in order to explain why the received version has twelve chapters not ten. This issue would seem to have been rendered moot now by the Song Ruozhao epitaph stating that the text had twenty chapters.

I wonder if anyone has subjected the 女論語 text to linguistic dating to see if it looks more like a post-Tang text?

Shao-yun

Shao-yun Yang (he/him/his)
Associate Professor
Department of History

Denison University

yangs@denison.edu

Frontiers of the Tang and Song Empires: A digital map project

Journeys to the West: Kitan and Jurchen Travelers in Thirteenth-Century Central Asia

A Chinese Gazetteer of Foreign Lands: A New Translation of Part 1 of the Zhufan zhi (1225)

On Tue, Jun 8, 2021 at 8:46 PM Chiu-Duke, Josephine <Josephine.ChiuDuke@ubc.ca> wrote:

Dear Beverly (If I may),

A 2005 MA study of this text by Chen Wenhe from Fengjia University in Taiwan is available online, though I cannot access the whole study. However, in the abstract the author states that based on his study, he believes that the former 10 chapters of the extant text should be the commentaries to the text completed by Song Ruozhao, and since the content of the last two chapters is quite different from that of the former 10 chapters he believes they should have been produced after the rise of Song Neo-Confucianism. You can check the abstract through this link:

 https://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/cgi-bin/gs32/gsweb.cgi/login?o=dnclcdr&s=id=%22094FCU05045009%22.&searchmode=basic

Hope this is helpful, and best wishes,

Josephine

Josephine Chiu-Duke

Professor, Asian Studies Department

University of British Columbia

1871 West Mall

Vancouver, BC

chiuduke@mail.ubc.ca

 

On Jun 8, 2021, at 12:42 PM, Beverly Bossler via tangstudies <tangstudies@mailman.xmission.com> wrote:

[CAUTION: Non-UBC Email]

Dear Colleagues:

 In a 1994 article on Wu Zhao that appears in Imperial Rulershp and Cultural Change in Traditional China, Chen Joshui mentions the late Tang Song sisters and the composition of the 女論語. Then in a footnote he says, "This text is apparently a later forgery," explaining that the Xin Tangshu and Jiu Tangshu both say the work was "written in the form of dialogues between ancient learned and virtuous women," (which is not true of the existing version) and adding that the "present version contains twelve chapters, whereas the original work had ten."

   Does anyone know more about this?  I have looked online (in English and Chinese) and in sourcebooks that include translations of the 女論語, and have seen no other mention that it may be a forgery. But I have to say that, looking at it that with that perspective, there are some good reasons (especially its emphasis on chastity) to think it might well be. Any insights would be appreciated!

   Best,

Beverly

--

Beverly Bossler

Chair, Department of East Asian Studies

Professor of East Asian Studies and History

Brown University

Box 1850

(401) 863-9764

Providence, RI  02912

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