Abstract
The Xunzi is widely recognized as a book of well-developed expository prose and hailed as a breakthrough in philosophical cogency and rigorous argument. As such, its twenty-four core chapters are attributed to a single author, Xun Kuang. The present essay challenges these views through a close examination of the Xunzi’s style and rhetoric, including its use of poetic diction, quotations of traditional, authoritative wisdom, metaphors and analogies, rhetorical catalogues, and other features. Focusing specifically on chapter 1, “Quan xue,” the essay unfolds how some of the most prominent parts of the Xunzi are built not as compositions of linear argument but, instead, as collections of mutually independent, modular, and movable units that in their loosely integrated accumulation represent a repertoire of images and expressions associated with particular ideas such as the importance of learning or the moral quality of the noble man (junzi). As such, a chapter such as “Quan xue,” which is largely void of an identifiable authorial voice, may best be seen as a compiled text instead of an original creation. By contrast, chapter 23, “Xing’e,” despite its own problems of textual incoherence and possible corruption, presents an example of stringent expository prose and hard-charging logic, representing a fierce and genuine authorial statement. It is here—in the very chapter for which the Xunzi was rejected by later imperial readers—that we may finally distinguish Xun Kuang the individual thinker. Considering the differences between chapters 1 and 23, with references to a number of other chapters along the way, the essay suggests that as a whole, the Xunzi does not represent the writing of a single person but is an anthology of authored and compiled writings that vary greatly not merely in their themes and philosophical outlook but, even more fundamentally, in their very modes of argumentation.
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Notes
- 1.
Paul Rakita Goldin expresses a common attitude toward the text: “Xunzi’s writing is succinct and lucid, his philosophical positions original and reasoned” (Goldin 1999: xiii).
- 2.
The only chapters that include mention of Xunzi (in the form of Sun Qing 孫卿, Sun Qingzi 孫卿子, or Xun Qingzi 荀卿子) are 8 (“Ru xiao” 儒效), 15 (“Yi bing” 議兵), and 16 (“Qiang guo” 彊國). In addition, the “Eulogy” (Knoblock ) on Xunzi that may have come from a disciple or later scholar and is appended to the final chapter 32 (“Yao wen” 堯問) mentions him as Sun Qing. Because they speak of Xun Kuang in the third person, these chapters are often taken as the works of his disciples.
- 3.
See also William G. Boltz: “[L]iterary or essay-like texts, authored by a single writer, in the way we typically think of a text in the modern world, do not reflect the norm for early China but were, at best, the exception” (Boltz 2005: 59).
- 4.
Denecke might be overstating the case for the Xunzi when noting that its “new rhetorical format, the expository essay, constituted a radical change, an innovation that was to fundamentally alter the face of Masters Literature” (Denecke 2010: 180).
- 5.
Here, I disagree with Denecke ’s analysis as well as with Knoblock’s translation.
- 6.
In his introduction, Knoblock offers an extensive discussion of the textual history of the text (K I.105–28).
- 7.
In this respect, the Xunzi is not different from many, if not most, other texts of the early philosophical tradition.
- 8.
For a detailed analysis of the fu poems see Knechtges (1989: 1–31); for a brief discussion of both the “working songs” (cheng xiang 成相) and the fu , see Denecke (2010: 188–95); for the “Cheng xiang” chapter alone, see Malmquist (1973b: 63–91) and Malmquist (1973a: 352–58). Scholars disagree as to whether the content of these chapters is “philosophical” (Knoblock ) or not (Knechtges ). For discussions of rhyme in the “Cheng xiang” chapter, see Li (2010: 89–93); Zhu (1957: 42–47).
- 9.
That parallel is the brief phrase zhi zhi yue zhi zhi 知之曰知之 (Knoblock 29.6) that appears as zhi zhi wei zhi zhi 知之為知之 in Lunyu 2.17 (“Wei zheng” 為政). By contrast, the four Xunzi chapters of Kongzi lore have numerous parallels especially in Hanshi waizhuan 韓氏外傳 and Kongzi jiayu 孔子家語, and to some lesser degree in Da Dai Liji 大戴禮記 and Shuiyuan 說苑.
- 10.
The Hanshu bibliographic monograph “Yiwenzhi” 藝文志, which in abbreviated form represents the catalogue of the imperial library at the end of the first century BCE, attributes twenty pieces of fu to Xunzi.
- 11.
The arrangement of presumed “inauthentic” material at the end of a Masters text is, of course, standard procedure and hence expresses unambiguously what both Liu Xiang and Yang Liang thought of the closing chapters.
- 12.
For a more contextualized discussion of the term cheng xiang, see Kern (2003: 407–9).
- 13.
Simply put, there was no literary “genre” called fu 賦 in Xun Kuang’s time; see Kern (2003: 391–95).
- 14.
The quote is in the chapter “Chu ce si” 楚策四, “Ke shui Chunshen jun” 客說春申君.
- 15.
- 16.
In discussing the fallacies of the “rambling mode” in translations of the Zhuangzi , A. C. Graham has offered the most cogent critique of negligence toward the poetic features of early “expository prose,” summarized in the sentence “The effect of assimilating the verse to prose is almost always catastrophic”; see Graham (1991b: 119–44, esp. 130–43). The groundbreaking work on rhyme in early expository prose is Jiang (1993); see also Long (1962–63, repr. 2009: 182–283), and Tan (1995: 12–19). The gradually increasing body of scholarship on the formal aspects of early Chinese philosophical texts includes Rudolf G. Wagner’s analysis of “Interlocking Parallel Style,” see Wagner (2000: 53–113), Dirk Meyer (2011), Raphals (1994: 103–16), Roth (1999), Queen (2008: 201–47), Baxter (1998: 231–53), Fischer (2009: 1–34), Boltz (2005: 50–78), Liu (1994), LaFargue (1994); see also Kern (2014), Xu (1990: 58–64), and Morrison (1981: 391–420). Aside from Knoblock’s translation of the Xunzi, Hutton’s new Xunzi translation also marks off the poetic parts of the text, as does the translation of the Huainanzi by John S. Major et al. (Major et al. 2010).
- 17.
Here, I allude to Ernst H. Gombrich for the power of formal structure in argument (Gombrich 1979); see also Bagley (1993: 34–55). For early Chinese rhetoric, see further Schaberg (2001: 21–56). As Schaberg observes, the “rhetoric of good order ” applies to both speech and written prose; I would add that expository prose with its implied authorial voice is indeed built upon the techniques of persuasion that are first visible in discursive speech.
- 18.
See Knoblock’s appendices “Composition of Each Book” in each of his three volumes.
- 19.
On “composite texts” as a common phenonemon during the time of the Xunzi, see Boltz (2005: 50–78). In saying “truly authored and original,” I do not overlook that many scholars (e.g., Knoblock ) have noticed what they call “borrowed” elements in the text. But to consciously borrow existing language is an intense form of authorship as it implies thoughtful and intentional decisions on the side of the author.
- 20.
- 21.
In the present essay, I do not always follow the divisions into sections as given in the CHANT version (which is also largely coherent with Knoblock’s division). I indicate where I differ from CHANT or Knoblock .
- 22.
My translation follows Yang Liang’s commentary and the parallel in Lunyu 1.4 (“Xue er” 學而): “Zengzi said: I inspect myself daily on three counts” (曾子曰:「吾日三省吾身」); later commentators on the Xunzi have interpreted the word can 參 (*N-sʕrum) not as san 三 (*srum; “on three counts”) but as yan 驗 (*m-qʰr[a]m-s; “to examine”) and have further argued that the two characters xing hu 省乎 (“inspect” plus directional preposition “at”) are an interpolation. Thus, Knoblock translates as “the gentleman each day examines himself” (135). I see no need for this emendation, nor can I think of a good explanation for the purported interchangeability of can and yan.
- 23.
Personal communication, January 2012.
- 24.
On different types of quotation (and pertinent references), see Kern and Hunter (forthcoming).
- 25.
Here, I differ from Knoblock’s assessment which is purely based on the comparison of the Xunzi with other transmitted sources. To say that these sources—especially the Da Dai Liji and the Hanshi waizhuan —seem to be quoting from the Xunzi and not vice versa is not the same as saying that whatever they quote did actually originate with the Xunzi.
- 26.
As reflected in the CHANT edition as well as in Knoblock ’s translation.
- 27.
Clearly, the metaphor refers to the “height of the sky,” yet at the same time, the two sentences here invoke the “heaven/earth” cosmology .
- 28.
The absence of rhyme, however, does not mean the absence of poetry; Baxter notes that “both rhyme and semantic patterning,” especially including semantic parallelism, “are used as poetic devices” in the Laozi (Baxter 1998: 237).
- 29.
Goldin sees this as the theme of the entire Xunzi: “The overarching preoccupation that binds together the diverse arguments and reflections in the text is the role of the noble man” (Goldin 1999: xi).
- 30.
“Still another characteristic, finally, which separates the Lao-tzu from much of early Chinese philosophical discourse, is that it is entirely free of narration, in the sense that its statements are general and not anchored to any particular persons, times, or places. There is no indication of who is speaking, no direct reference to historical events. This contrasts strikingly with typical Confucian discourse” (Baxter 1998: 240).
- 31.
In my representation of the rhyme pattern, the small letter “x” represents a non-rhyming line. My simplified representation of the rhymes is derived from William H. Baxter and Laurent Sagart , Baxter-Sagart Old Chinese Reconstruction (Version 1.00), online at http://crlao.ehess.fr/document.php?id=1217. Accessed January 23, 2012.
- 32.
For a convenient survey of such passages, see the appendices “Composition of Each Book” in each of Knoblock’s three volumes. For materials shared between the Xunzi and various pre-Han or early Han texts, Knoblock likewise notes that “there is no reason to consider the possibility of direct quotation since we are probably dealing with traditional material ancestral to both the Xunzi and these texts” (K I.125). However, Knoblock does seem to assume that where such material is present in the Xunzi, it was consciously selected by Xun Kuang and hence was under his authorial control.
- 33.
- 34.
In CHANT; Knoblock’s section eight.
- 35.
In social terms, shi 士 refers to the lowest aristocratic rank; in the present context, it implies the learned man of low aristocratic status (still above the unranked commoners) who is associated with military or other service.
- 36.
On the rhetorical use of such markers of direct speech, see Kern and Hunter (forthcoming).
- 37.
The various commentators cannot agree on the meaning of ru 入 (“enter”) here; see Wang (2005 vol.1: 26–27).
- 38.
Here and elsewhere, I translate the term li 禮 in two different ways: when standing alone, as general “ritual precepts”; when being part of a list of what are clearly the liu yi 六藝 (“six arts”), or some of them, as the title of a text (i.e., the Rites ). By the time of Xunzi, this canon of learning was well-established, as is now proven by the manuscripts from Guodian 郭店 of around 300 BCE.
- 39.
I borrow the term from Owen (2001: 175–91).
- 40.
Once again, the commentators do not agree on the meaning of these words and lines; see Wang (2005 vol.1: 30). The choices in translating duan 端 (interpreted as chuan 喘) and ruan 蝡 come down to the question of whether the two terms are similar (Yang Liang , whom I follow here) or opposite (Wang Tianhai , who understands them as “urgent” versus “slow”).
- 41.
Commentators disagree on the meanings of ao 傲 and za 囋; see Wang (2005 vol.1: 32–33).
- 42.
Here, I disagree with Wang Tianhai who glosses gu er bu qie 故而不切 as chen jiu er bu qiehe xianshi 陳舊而不切合現實 (“[they] array old precedents but do not conform to present reality”). Instead, bu qie zhi 不切直, of which I take bu qie to be the abbreviated form, is a way of indirect (and ineffective) speech, as attested in Hanshu 51.2329.
- 43.
See the summarizing comments in his “Composition of Each Book” appendices.
- 44.
See p. 6 above.
- 45.
I do not follow Wang Tianhai , who reads shuo/shui gu 說故 as yue ku 悅苦 (“happiness and bitterness”), as proposed earlier by Qing commentators (Wang 2005 vol.2: 897). First, happiness is already included in the complete catalogue of emotions here; second, by accepting the characters (and words) shuo/shui gu 說故 I suggest that “explanation and precedent,” which are clearly outside the catalogue of emotions, are purposefully added to the latter to claim that these modes of speech, too, are governed by the heart.
- 46.
Compare, e.g., the passage in chapter 3, “Bu gou” 不苟, that enumerates the qualities of the junzi; see HKCS 3/9/15–17, K I.175.
- 47.
Chapter 5 is unusual in containing many references to historical precedent, always connected to well-known figures from the past. The chapter also contains a larger than usual number of quotations from the classics and anonymous sayings.
- 48.
As noted above, Knoblock has pointed out the problems with the textual integrity of the chapter. For challenges to the relevance of the claim “human nature is bad” in the Xunzi’s overall philosophical system, or for the argument that the claim does not even belong to the original Xunzi, see Robins (2001–02: 99–100). Robins himself, while firmly holding on to Xunzi’s authorship of the “core” of the chapter, argues that it contains not one continuous argument but ten separate essays, possibly reflecting Xunzi’s different ideas over the stretch of his long life. Whatever one might think of that, the point is not relevant to my argument here, which is strictly on the stylistic level of the text.
- 49.
On being responsible and punishable as a hallmark of authorship, see Foucault (1979: 141–60).
- 50.
As it happens, this is one of the characteristics of the early fu 賦 (“poetic exposition”) for which the Hanshu , as noted above, names Xunzi an exemplary early proponent; see Kern (2003: 383–437). I am grateful to Eric Hutton for raising the bar here and below, as I discuss the issue of authorship.
- 51.
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Acknowledgments
I thank Paul Rakita Goldin, Wolfgang Behr, Willard Peterson, Michael Hunter, and Christoph Harbsmeier for their comments and bibliographic help. Only after the present essay was already in proofs, I took note of an excellent study of the first chapter of the Xunzi (and related early texts on the topic of learning): Oliver Weingarten ’s MA thesis, submitted to the University of Hamburg (Weingarten 2004). Its analysis of the composition of the chapter (p. 46–59) reaches many conclusions similar to my own, and it includes a superb, carefully annotated German translation of the entire chapter (p. 103–14). In addition, Weingarten recently presented a paper in English where he further extended his findings (Weingarten 2014).
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Kern, M. (2016). Style and Poetic Diction in the Xunzi . In: Hutton, E. (eds) Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Xunzi. Dao Companions to Chinese Philosophy, vol 7. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-7745-2_1
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