A Study On The Spreading And Impact Of The Novel "Romance Of The Three Kingdoms" In The Ming And Qing Dynasties

Many scholars have enthusiastically researched the novels of the Ming andQing periods since the time of the Middle Qing Dynasty, the late Qing Dynastyand the early Republic of China. The study of Ming and Qing novels has graduallybecome a burning subject for both Chinese and foreign scholars in the early20thcentury. Various universities and research institutes have initiated scrupulousresearches on Ming and Qing literature especially after the beginning of thereform and open policy and have attained plentiful substantial results. Numerousmasterpieces have come one after another to lay a solid foundation for researchon Ming and Qing novels, and even for the study of ancient novels of other periods.“Romance of the Three Kingdoms” is one of the four greatest classicalChinese novels which was accorded great importance by the scholarly world. Itseminent place in the history of popular Chinese novel is hardly paralleled, as“Three Kingdoms” is a novel of outstanding research significance and, thus,is highly regarded by the majority of scholars. Just as Liu Ang from Jin Dynastysays in one of the two poems on “Reading the Three Kingdoms’ Records”(in volume8of the poetical collection “Zhong Zhou Ji”):“Unremitting in belligerenceand conquests, how infinitely outstanding this epoch’s men are!”The versions of “Three Kindgoms” disseminated during the Ming and Qingperiods, the respective channels, its reception and feedback have indeedcomplicated the picture. The historical longevity of this novel and the lossand extinction of many of its copies have further made its profound scholarlyresearch an arduous task. For this reason, even employing the Western scienceof communication and using as a viewing angle the dissemination, criticism andmeticulous study of this masterpiece, has invariably yielded sparse results.This is really not a feasible task in a country where these are still in theinceptive stage of education and cultivation. As a result, the relevantliterature and the academic works available in print are rather desultory asyet, and insufficient to help form an integral theory and an academic documentarysystem.The author has made an earnest enquiry into a significant number of relevantancient documents, and has also explored thoroughly the Western scientific workson the versions of “Romance of the Three Kingdoms”, spreading in the Ming andQing periods, their dissemination channels, reception and feedback, as well asthe impact thereof. He has carried out a profound research and discerning analysis of the numerous extant versions, dissemination influences and relevantliterature.The present study comprises five parts touching on the creation process ofthe Romance, its author and his artistic accomplishments, and offers a detailedscientific research on the novel’s dissemination and versions, the channels ofits dissemination in the Ming and Qing epochs, as well as its perception, variousresponses and influence.The disputes in the academic circles regarding the versions of “Romanceof the Three Kingdoms” have been quite intense–only the Ming Dynastyversions existing in China and abroad are over forty and those from the QingDynasty are yet innumerable. In order to outline clearly the version types ofthe novel and its dissemination pathways, the author has thoroughly investigatedtheir spread as well as the various categorizations assigned to them by theacademic world. He has managed to divide them according to the time and orderof their publication into four main categories:“The Vernacular RomanceVersion” type,“The Historical Legendary Version” type,“The CriticalVersion”type, and “The Mao Version”type. He demonstrates that the editionof the First Year of Emperor Jiajin (1521)“A Vernacular Version of the Recordsof the Three Kingdoms”was“the earliest, the best and the closest” to theoriginal old edition of“Romance of the Three Kingdoms”by Luo Guanzhong, andthat the commented version of Mao Zonggang represented the highestaccomplishment of literary art value and creative mastery, being also the mostwide-spread and popular version during the Ming and Qing epochs.The pathways of distribution of “Three Kingdoms” in Ming and Qing Chinaare also fairly complicated. The paper presents a thoroughgoing research on thenovel dissemination, and summarises the following five most significantdistribution channels:“Official editions by the ruling class”,“sales ofinscriptions”,“borrowing, reading, copying and spreading”,“dramatizationsand professional narrations”, and “commentaries of scholarly bureaucrats”.It offers a diligent study and analysis of the complicated attitude of the Mingand Qing ruling classes toward the novel, defines it as an attitude of “loveand hate commingled”, and makes a meticulous classification of the indeliblycrucial role that the ruling classes play in the dissemination of the “ThreeKingdoms”.The readership range of “Romance of the Three Kingdoms” during the Mingand Qing Dynasties was no less complex. It included almost the entire rulingclass headed by the Emperor, the highly educated class of scholarly bureaucrats, as well as the majority of commoners. The author proves that there were variationsin the novel’s perception, depending on the social status of the target audience,their value orientation and difference in predispositions, basically definableas the following three types:“acceptance by the ruling class for the sake ofamusement and appreciation, also for the sake of material gain”,“acceptanceby the scholarly bureaucrats for the sake of enhancing social morals, also forthe sake of artistic aesthetics”,“acceptance by the common people for thesake of amusement and appreciation, also for the sake of practicality”. Theauthor thoroughly estimates the circumstances of the novel’s feedback and makesan objective analysis of the three utterly different types of reception, namelypositive, negative and dialectical; he offers a very pertinent evaluation ofits supreme literary value as well as its flaws.The present work offers a deep research and analysis of the spreading processand huge impact of “Romance of the Three Kingdoms” on all aspects of China’ssociety in the Ming and Qing periods, especially the four general aspects ofthe novel’s substantial influence on China’s national spirit, literature, dramaand military affairs. This novel has created the embodiment of“righteousloyalty”and“outstanding valour” in the person of the “military sage” GuanYu, the people’s worshipped hero, and has laid a beginning for the creation ofmany continuations in its wake. At the same time, it has exerted a powerfulinfluence on the creation of poetry and oral literature. The military strategiesand practical battle experience accumulated in the novel, have also had theirimportant impact on the military affairs of both Ming and Qing dynasties.Therefore,“Romance of the Three Kingdoms”is a pearl of unparalleledvalue in the treasury of our national literature.