A Discussion Of Women’s Writing Arose In Late Ming Dynasty

As a brief but comprehensive introduction of ancient women’s anthologies compiled by Hu wenkai -《历代妇女着作考》was published in 1980s, people found it was amazing that there were a large quantity of women wrote poems and articles in Ming and Qing dynasties than ever. More and more researchers whose field are classical literature have been interested in describing the theme, content and image of these women’s works, but their study also left a series of problems to be resolved, such as how to explain the phenomenon that so many women writers arose in the two special dynasties, and how to judge the value of their works in historical orientation.This paper mainly using prefaces, postscripts and comments of women’s anthologies; history, epitaph and birthday congratulations wrote by male scholars; try to reveal that the prosperous publication of women’s anthologies was driven by complex forces. Even not the aesthetic value, but the commercial benefit, cultural reputation and political metaphor were the true goals of what people wanted from women’s anthologies. People also used some strategies to praise women’s works and pushed them to the audience. Of course, literature is attractive to women who had opportunity to approach it, to certain extent, they were the subject of the writing activity.Chapter Ⅰ clarify the new popular gender concept in Ming and Qing dynasties. Many people regarded female as superior than male, not only because female persons could sacrifice themselves bravely in the crucial juncture, but also because they could endure the hardship of the daily life, while male persons usually behaved so badly. Correspondingly, literature critics thought female’s work had different nature from the male’s, they called this nature "Qing", which means natural, clear and not from simulation. But by interpreting of a preface of an anthology called 《名�'诗�'》, we can find it had logic bugs, women’s works could impossible be the way out of the dilemma of the poet writing in Ming dynasty.Chapter Ⅱ reveal the background of publication, including advanced print technology, lower print cost and people’s willing of broadcasting and reserving women’s works. Women’s anthologies first appeared as popular books to satisfy the public curiosity, then some male literati began to boast their female family members’ writing abilities, and some female literati also collected contemporary writers’ works, but they were not meant to emphasize the writers’ gender. After the ending of Ming dynasty, female writers and their works became the signs of the golden time in the past. Actually, most of the male and female compilers admitted that women’s works were not perfect, but they alleged that female writers were different from male ones in every aspect, so their poems and articles should be forgiven and understood.Chapter III discuss the difficulties which women usually faced in reading and writing. Female person’s life cycle and responsibility as daughter, wife and mother can’t permit them to spend much time to learn and write. For example, two women Xuyuan and Luqingzi gained great fame, but people had completely different opinions toward their poems. By analyzing the comments and learning their study process from their husbands, we can easily see the true situation of the feminist literature in Ming dynasty.Chapter Ⅳ give five outstanding examples, Fang Mengshi, Gu Ruopu, Shang Jinglan, Huang Yuanjie and Li Yin, to illustrate although women had different experiences and writing had different meaning to them, writing had been an important part of some women’s lives.