Feng Menglong (Feng Meng-lung) 1574-1646

The best-known compiler of anthologies of popular literature in the Ming dynasty. Born into a scholarly family in present-day Suzhou, he was recognized as an outstanding literary talent in his youth, but repeatedly failed to pass the civil service examinations. He held two minor posts between 1630 and 1638, before retiring from official life. In the middle years of his life he began to collect and edit popular fiction, poetry and jokes, and was also a respected playwright and editor of plays. His publications include collections of jokes, collections of classical-language stories and anecdotes, some revised versions of novels, and the San yan collections of stories: Yushi mingyan, Jingshi tongyan and Xingshi hengyan. These consist of 120 huaben stories, some of them written by Feng and his friends, others dating from earlier periods, which made an enormous contribution to the preservation of popular literature of the time. In his last years, saddened by the uprising of Li Zicheng and the rise of the Qing dynasty, he edited anti-Manchu books.

Works available in English:

  • Chinese Love Stories from "Ching-shih" (Li Huayuan Mowry). Hamden, Conn.:
       Archon Books, 1983.
  • Four Cautionary Tales from a Collection (ed. by Feng Menglong) (Harold
       Acton and Lee Yi-hsieh). New York: Ace Books, 1931; London: J. Lehmann,
       1947.
  • Lazy Dragon: Chinese Stories from the Ming Dynasty (by Feng Menglong and
       Ling Mengchu) (Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys Yang). Hong Kong: Joint Publishing
       Co., 1981.
  • Stories from a Ming Collection: Translations of Chinese Short Stories Published
       in the Seventeenth Century     (compiled by Feng Menglong) (Cyril Birch). New
       York: Grove Press; London: Bodley Head, 1958; New York: Grove Press, 1968;
       Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1978.
  • Stories Old and New: A Ming Dynasty Collection (compiled by Feng Menglong)
       (Shuhui Yang and Yungin Yang). Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2000.
  • The Chinese Femme Fatale: Stories from the Ming Period (Anne E McLaren).
       Broadway, New South Wales: Wild Peony, 1994.
  • The Courtesan's Jewel Box: Chinese Stories of the Xth-XVIIth Centuries (by
       Feng Menglong and others) (Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys Yang). Beijing: Foreign
       Languages Press, 1957.
  • The Perfect Lady by Mistake and Other Stories (William Dolby). London: P.
       Elek, 1976.
  • Wisdom's Way: 101 Tales of Chinese Wit (Walton C. Lee). Jamaica Plain,
       Mass.: YMAA Publication Center, 1997.

    Studies and Biographies:

  • Shuhui Yang, Appropriation and Representation: Feng Menglong and the Chinese
       Vernacular Story    . Ann Arbor, Mich.: Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan, 1998.
  • Huayuan Li Mowry, Ch'ing-shih and Feng Menglong. Ann Arbor, Mich.: UMI, 1983.

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