The Death of Woman Wang

This chapter explores how Spence’s sources talk about T’an-ch’eng. The historian Feng K’o-ts-an, author of Local History of T’an-ch’eng, notes the many disasters that hit the area; while one might expect an equal number of “Blessings” and “Catastrophes” (2), T’an-ch’eng had far more catastrophes than blessings. Feng’s own time in the area was unlucky. Although he had the highest rank in literary education one could receive, chin-shih, professional failures dogged him. He moved to T’an-ch’eng to serve as magistrate but was fired for “incompetence” (2), taking work instead as a teacher and as the chief editor of the Local History. For 50 years before Feng’s time, T’an-ch’eng had suffered a long series of disasters, including the White Lotus revolts, famine, earthquakes, poverty, and bandits. The overthrow of the Ming Dynasty and the conquest of the country by the Manchus, who reached T’an-ch’eng in 1644, did nothing to improve the region.

Spence’s second major source is Huang Liu-hung—another man who passed China’s exam and subsequently became the magistrate of T’an-ch’eng. In his later memoir and handbook, “[H]e wrote movingly of his attempts to come to terms with the misery that once surrounded him” (13).