Working in the library.

I've managed to get succesfully onto the wi-fi at the SOAS library! Third attempt at a very interesting article about writing on women in the Tang by Confucian revivalists. This might have been my favorite story out of the bunch:

Liu Tsung-Yuan’s second essay is called, Ho-Chien Chuan, A biography of a woman from Ho Chien.

“According to Liu, Ho-Chien was originally a woman of fine virtue. She was filial to her mother-in-law and careful not to involve herself in street gossip. She respected her husband and his friends, and had a very close relationship with him. However, some of her wicked neighbours could not bear to see HO-Chien’s virtues, and they tried to find a way to ruin her. They invited Ho-Chien to go out with them. The specified reason was that they wanted to model themselves upon her virtuous conduct. Ho-chien refused their invitation, but her mother-in-law eventually forced her to go out with these “admiring” neighbours.
To make a long story short, once Ho-Chien went out with these neighbours, in Liu’s view, she eventually became a fallen woman. She not only enjoyed having a sexual affair with a handsome young mane who originally raped her, but also successfully plotted to have her husband put to death by the local government. She later opened a wine shop and began to select all sorts of young men as sexual partners. Liu’s description of Ho-Chien’s sexual activities are probably the most explicit one we can trace among scholar-official’s writings of the mid Tang.
Liu Tsung-yuan tells us further that Ho-Chien eventually died of over indulgence in sexual activity. After her death, when her name was mentioned even her wicked neighbours felt disgusted and tried to avoid the topic. Liu’s final comment is hat if a wife who had originally been as good and respectable as Ho-Chien can fall to such a low point, it is obviously difficult to depend upon the support of a mere friend when one is in danger, not to mention depending upon a ruler’s favour." (Chiu-Duke Asia Major 1999 p82-82, This story is not included in the CTW it is in the second chapter of “Liu Ho-Tung wai chi” which is included in the Liu Ho-Tung ch’uan Chi SPPY edn. Vol 2 Taipei: Chung-hua shu-chu reprint 1970)

I foung this very interesting as it struck me as very similar to Dangerous Liaisons, but with a happier ending. It was also noteworthy as this is the 3rd reference I have come across of a woman running a wine shop. It ties in with both the picture of drunken women, and the women going out to drink in a wine shop, and the woman running the wine shop to raise money to start her nunnery, the last two examples both from the Taoist Hagiography. In this case, it is portrayed as a negative thing, with the implication that such a position leads to unbridled sexual wantonness. It is also interesting to add that sexual overindulgence leading to death was not just limited to women, but was also considered bad for men as well.

I really want to be able to read the story in the original.