Two 2017 Books in English About Chinese Literature

choi

Peter Neville-Hadley, Two Doors to the Temples; A pair of enlightening reference works that open Western minds to the best in Chinese literature. Wall Street Journal, May 27, 2017
(a review on two books: Frances Wood, Great Books of China. BlueRidge, 2017, and David Der-wei Wang (ed), A New Literary History of Modern China. Harvard University Press, 2017

Note:
(a)
(i) The article, as well as its URL, is locked behind paywall.
(ii) This WSJ review opened by stating, "Frances Wood, a distinguished former curator at British Library and author of several erudite volumes on Chinese culture and history * * * Some of her choices [in the book] will feel familiar at least as ideas, such as sayings of Confucius. the divination manual known as the 'Book of Changes' (I Ching' 易经) and the texts that inspired the popular television series 'Money' and 'The Water Margin' and Ang Lee's film 'Lust, Caution.' There is also inevitable mention of Mao Zedong's 'Little Red Book,' which little read now."
(A) series (n, plural is also "series")
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/series
(B) I try but fail to find out what TV series "Money" is.
(C) The Water Margin (1973 TV series)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Water_Margin_(1973_TV_series)
(水滸伝 (Japanese pronunciation: suikoden); based on Water Margin [without 'The;' 水滸傳: (元末) 施耐庵] )
(iii) David Der-wei Wang  王德威
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Der-wei_Wang

(b) "Ancient texts of abiding influence include the 'Book of Songs [among other English translations of the title; 诗经],' a collection of poems from as early as 1000 BCE used in schools until the late 19th century. The 'Twenty-Four Exemplars of Filial Piety [there are other English translations; 二十四孝: (元)郭居敬 编],' a moral tract from the 14th century, was used well into the 20th, and versions of the 13th-century 'Three-Character Classic 三字经' [ (宋) ] -- 200 three-character lines stressing Confucian ideas -- are still in use in Hong Kong and Taiwan.are still in use in Hong Kong and Taiwan. [It was never 'in use' in Taiwan, after 1949 at least.]  Ms Wood makes the poetry seem both accessible and universal. Du Fu's lines 'I'm about to scream madly i office/ They keep bringing more papers to pile on my desk' were written in the eighth century uet sound strikingly modern. Du Fu's contemporary Li Bai muses on the globally popular vice of solitary drinking: 'Raising my cup, I invite the bright moon/ Together with my shadow it makes three people. / The moon, sadly, doesn't drink.' "
(i)
(A) 杜甫, 早秋苦熱堆案相仍.
http://cls.hs.yzu.edu.tw/TWSLDH/ ... spx?tid=05082250536
(758年; 七言律詩; 自注：時任華州司功; "束帶發狂欲大叫，簿書何急來相仍")
(B) 相仍: "相繼；連續不斷"
www.chinesewords.org/dict/216380-971.html
(ii) 李白, 月下独酌 (~744 AD; 长安): " * * * 举杯邀明月，对影成三人。 月既不解饮 * * * "

(c) "One volume [of Chinese 'Almanac'?] I [the reviewer] shall seek out is 'Tracks of a Wild Goose in the snow [鸿雪因缘图记 (1849); "生平雪泥鸿爪之印痕": 百度百科],' an account by Linqing 麟庆[1791－1846; 1832-1833 贵州布政使、护理贵州巡抚], a Manchu of the mid-19th century, of his extensive travels throughout  China, punctuated with scenes from his life as a high-level official. When he was governor of Guizhou Province, a cow entered his office complex and lay down in the main hall as if it had come to present a petition. 'I ordered it to be brought in,' he recounted, 'and it shook its tail as in supplication. I learned that it belonged to a local man named Cai, a butcher, who had planned to slaughter it that day but it had escaped. I paid Cai the price for the cow, telling him not to kill it. It was set free in Jiuping [sic; should be Cuiping] Hill.' "
(i) "鸿雪" 二字出于苏东坡, 和子由渑池怀旧. 1061 AD.
(ii) 护理巡抚 护理布政使 是什么官职  百度知道, Sept 7, 2011
https://zhidao.baidu.com/question/316648780.html
("总督一般管辖两省至三省，但四川总督就只管四川一省。 * * * 巡抚为一省的最高军政长官 * * * 督、抚之下设布政使，掌管一省的财赋、民政。 * * * 本任的巡抚或者布政使因为各种因素不能理事,就由其他官员来代其处理公事叫护理,理论上巡抚由布政使护,布政使由按察使护,按察使由首道护等等")
(iii) 鸿雪因缘图志 定贵阳八景, the third of which is 翠屏放牛. The term is from the atlas: "《图记》云：'布政司署在翠屏山麓，自门至堂凡七重，因山势为之，愈后愈高，中有紫薇堂。'  翠屏山后来被挖平，仅今飞山街口尚可看到一壁残崖。图中故事系记麟庆赎放东门屠户蔡某之牛，放诸山下。"
Quoting 清代《鸿雪因缘图记》里的八处贵阳名胜.

(d)  "Those in search of an understanding of China's ruling class should read Wu Jingzi's 'Unofficial History of the Grove of Literari [儒林外史: (清)吴敬梓], an 18th-century precursor to what today’s Chinese call ‘official lit’ -- supposedly insider accounts of cadre corruption in high and low places. The current powers-that-be regard this as threat and kidnap those who publish them. "

literati (plural noun)
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/literati
(e) "Editor David Der-wei Wangm a professor of Chinese and comparative literature at Harvard, offers 161 short and often sparkling essays by a multinational array of writers and academics in what seems the most exhaustive introduction to modern Chinese writing possible in a single volume.

(f) "As Ms Wood points out, recent archaeological discoveries have confirmed the existence of two Sunzis more than a century a part, one the author of 'Master Sun's Art f War,' the other of 'The Art of Warfare,' which have sometimes been mixed together."

1972年山东临沂市银雀山汉墓群落; 一号墓出土竹简包括孙子兵法 (by 孙武) and "失传了1700多年" 的 孙膑兵法.