Selected Dunhuang Bianwen

AnonymousJul 2024

4.2

Word count: 92K words
Chapters: 9

Summary

Traditional Chinese thought and culture have a long history and are highly original, inventive, and literary. Early forms of thought are especially distinctive: religious theology, classical Chinese medical texts, ancient military writings, Confucian, Daoist, Buddhist, and Hundred Schools thought, feng shui and metaphysical studies, the Twenty-Four Histories, and local customs and geography are all vast and profound in content. This series, "Essence of Chinese Classics: Original Texts," preserves the appearance of the original books and focuses on preserving and transmitting traditional Chinese thought and culture. By reading the literary essence left by ancient sages, readers can cultivate their temperament and subtly appreciate the classics of Chinese learning.

Editor's review

Selection of Dunhuang Bianwen belongs to the series "Essence of Chinese Classics: Original Texts" and presents Dunhuang bianwen, a distinctive type of document, in a way that preserves the appearance of the original texts. Bianwen is a popular genre in Dunhuang manuscripts that combines chant-fable narration with religious preaching. Its language is close to colloquial speech and its stories are strong, making it markedly different from orthodox poetry and prose; it is an important window into ancient vernacular language and narrative methods. This book selects bianwen works through which readers can experience the genre's features of alternating verse and prose and of preaching interspersed with singing, and feel the vivid atmosphere of ancient popular literature as it spread in monasteries and among the people. For readers interested in popular literature, Dunhuang studies, or the evolution of ancient vernacular Chinese, this book offers direct access to the original texts. It should be noted that this series emphasizes fidelity to the original rather than popularization, and annotation and guidance are limited. Readers encountering bianwen for the first time should read it alongside relevant scholarly works or annotated translations in order to better understand the textual background and genre terminology.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Literature and history enthusiasts interested in Dunhuang manuscripts and popular literature
Students studying the evolution of ancient vernacular Chinese and chant-fable genres
Readers of traditional culture who wish to encounter original texts and build a corpus of source material
Readers who enjoy story-rich ancient texts and are not deterred by a mix of classical and vernacular Chinese

Not a good fit for

Complete beginners with no background in classical Chinese or popular literature
Specialist readers expecting detailed collation, annotation, and line-by-line translation
Readers who prefer only orthodox poetry and prose and have no interest in chant-fable popular literature

Reading tips

First understand the chant-fable nature of bianwen and its combination of verse and prose, then move on to specific pieces.
Read alongside scholarly works on Dunhuang popular literature or annotated translations to reduce difficulty.
Read passages aloud to experience the rhythm of preaching and singing; this makes the genre's features easier to feel than silent reading.
Read one piece at a time, and after each, briefly note the plot summary and linguistic features.

版权信息
敦煌变文选五代
一
二
舜子至孝变文一卷
茶酒论一卷
破魔变一卷
大目干连冥间母变文并图一卷
大目犍连变文一卷。

FAQ

What kind of genre is bianwen?

Bianwen is a type of popular genre in Dunhuang manuscripts that combines chant-fable and narrative functions. It was mostly used for monastic preaching and folk storytelling, and often takes the form of alternating verse and prose and of preaching interspersed with singing. Its language is relatively close to colloquial speech and its stories are strong; it differs markedly from orthodox poetry and prose and is important material for studying ancient vernacular Chinese and popular literature.

Can I understand this book without a background in Dunhuang studies?

There may be some difficulty. This book belongs to a series that preserves the appearance of the original texts, and its annotation and guidance are relatively brief, while bianwen involves specific genre terminology and religious-cultural background. It is advisable to first read one or two introductory works on Dunhuang popular literature or annotated translations, establish basic background knowledge, and then read the original texts; understanding will be smoother.

How is this book different from other Chinese classics readers in the series?

It belongs to the same series, "Essence of Chinese Classics: Original Texts," and follows the same editorial principles, all emphasizing preservation of the original appearance. However, Selection of Dunhuang Bianwen focuses on bianwen works unearthed at Dunhuang, which belong to popular literature and chant-fable documents. Both language and genre are closer to colloquial speech than the orthodox classics, histories, philosophical works, and belles-lettres, and the reading experience and required background knowledge also differ.

Comments

Find this book

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Anonymous Author

Anonymous is not a real personal name but a general Chinese designation for authors whose names are unknown, lost, or unsigned. Neither nationality nor dates of birth and death can be verified, and available public information is limited, so the works attributed to this name are the only basis for description. The collection holds 2,078 works under Anonymous, spanning medicine, classics, historical readings, ancient poetry, classical literature, and philosophy. Representative works include The Yellow Emperor's Inner Canon: Lingshu, Mencius, The Book of Documents, Nineteen Old Poems, Complete Song Ci, and The Peacock Flies Southeast. Most of these works took shape through long transmission and editing, emerging either from collective folk creation or from authors whose names were lost over time. In ancient China, the Book of Songs, the Great Learning, and many popular storybooks and plays were signed Anonymous because their authors could not be traced. Anonymous works cross the classics, histories, philosophical writings, medical texts, and poetry; their subjects are broad, and their styles vary from archaic simplicity to clear naturalness, making them important and influential sources for understanding ancient Chinese thought, medicine, and literature.