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Yunxi youyi 雲谿友議

Aug 28, 2013 © Ulrich Theobald

Yunxi youyi 雲谿友議 "Amical Discussions in the Clouded Valley" is a collection of stories compiled by the Tang period 唐 (618-907) scholar Fan Shu 范攄. He lived during the reign of Emperor Xizong 唐僖宗 (r. 873-888) and came from Wu 吳 (modern Wuxian 吳縣, Jiangsu).
The 3 juan "scrolls" long book is a collection of 65 stories of the history of the Tang dynasty since the Kaiyuan reign 開元 (713-741). It includes several paragraphs on poetry critique that are a valuable addition to Meng Qi's 孟棨 book Benshishi 本事詩. Other stories show the influence of phantastic stories (zhiguai 志怪) that were very popular during that time. The imperial bibliography in the official dynastic history Xintangshu 新唐書 and the bibliography Junzhai dushu zhi 郡齋讀書志 list the Yunxi youji with a length of 3 juan, but the Zhizhai shulu jieti 直齋書錄解題 says it was 12 juan long. It might be that there were two different versions of the book during the Song period.
The Yunxi youyi is to be found in the reprint series Baihai 稗海, Biji xiaoshuo daguan 筆記小說大觀, Congshu jicheng 叢書集成 (all 12-juan versions), Sibu congkan xubian 四部叢刊續編 (with a critical apparatus by Zhang Yuanji 張元濟) and Jiayetang congshu 嘉業堂叢書 (with a critical apparatus by Liu Chenggan 劉承干, all 3-juan versions). In 1957 the Shanghai guji wenxue press 上海古典文學出版社 reproduced the Sibu congkan version.

Source:
Li Xueqin 李學勤, Lü Wenyu 呂文鬰 (1996). Siku da cidian 四庫大辭典, Changchun: Jilin daxue chubanshe, vol. 2, p. 2140.