A Linguistic-Literary Approach to Ch`ien Chung-shu's Novel Wei-ch`eng

Author(s): Dennis T. Hu
Source: The Journal of Asian Studies , May, 1978, Vol. 37, No. 3 (May, 1978), pp. 427-443
Published by: Association for Asian Studies

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VOL. XXXVII, NO. 3 JOURNAL OF ASIAN STUDIES MAY I978

A Linguistic-Literary Approach to
Ch'ien Chung-shu's Novel Wei-ch'eng
DENNIS T. Hu

It may seem somewhat ridiculous that students of Chinese literature should fur-
ther their education overseas. But of course they were the only ones who had to
take up studies abroad. Other fields such as mathematics, physics ... were all im-
ported, and therefore already brimming with Western flavor. Chinese literature
stood alone in being a thoroughly native product in need of a foreign brand name to
maintain its status.
Ch'ien Chung-shu

WVJEI-CH'ENGa (hereafter referred to by the translated title Fortress Besieged)' by

Ch'ien Chung-shub (igIo?-) has been hailed as the most "carefully wrought
novel in modern Chinese literature" and "perhaps also its greatest."2 Despite such
distinction, however, neither this work nor any other of Ch'ien's creative writings
has been widely studied.3 This paper is an initial exploration directed at investigating

Dennis T. Hu is Lecturer in the Department of P'an-ku, No. 37 (I97I), pp. 26-32. For supple-
Asian Languages and Literature, University of mentary biographical information, see Tsou Wen-
Washington. hai, "I Ch'ien Chung-shu" (Ch'ien Chung-shu re-
He wishes to acknowledge his indebtedness to membered), Chuan-chi wen-hsieh (Biographical
Professors Tse-tsung Chow, C. T. Hsia, and Wil- literature), I, I (I962), pp. 23-24. Occasional
liam H. Nienhauser, Jr. for critical readings of the mention of Ch'ien has occurred in non-scholarly
first draft of this essay, written in fall I97 3, and its contexts; this seems to indicate recognition at least
several revisions since. The paper in its present in some quarters, but still does not explain why he
form has benefited immensely from their valuable has escaped serious critical attention until recently.
comments and suggestions. Mai Ping-k'un's "Ch'ien Chung-shu te sheng-p'ing
1 Written during an approximately two-year pe- ho chu-shu" (Ch'ien Chung-shu's life and works),
riod toward the end of World War II, and first seri- (Ming-pao yieh-k'an, XI, 8 [I976], pp. 50-54) is
alized in Wen-i fu-hsing (Renaissance), the work the first two sections from his Master's thesis (Chi-
was published in book form in 1947 (Shanghai: nese University of Hong Kong) "Lun Ch'ien
Ch'en-kuang). Throughout this paper, page refer- Chung-shu te san-wen ho hsiao-shuo" (On Ch'ien
ences to the novel are based on a reprint (Hong Chung-shu's essays and fictional writings); I have
Kong: Chi-pen Shu-chii, I969) of the 3rd edition not had access to the rest of that study. Also, it has
(Shanghai: Ch'en-kuang, I949). All quotations in been reported that Theodore Huters is writing a
English are my renderings. A complete translation dissertation at Stanford entitled "The Literary and
by Jeanne Kelly is currently under consideration Social Significance of Ch'ien Chung-shu's Wei-
for publication; her first chapter appeared in Ren- ch'eng." My Ph.D. dissertation (University of Wis-
ditions, No. 2 (Spr. 1974), pp. 65-80, under the consin-Madison, Dept. of E. Asian Languages and
title The Besieged City. My own translation, begun Literature, I977), "A Linguistic-Literary Study of
in early I973, is as yet unfinished. Ch'ien Chung-shu's Three Creative Works," de-
2 C. T. Hsia, A History of Modern Chinese Fiction,velops the themes of this present paper, as well as
2nd ed. (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, I971), p. other topics.
44I. Hsia's quotations from the novel are based on In addition to the novel discussed in this paper,
the original 1947 edition, which was paginated dif- Ch'ien's published creative prose consists of the
ferently from the one I used; see n. I above. anthology of vignette-satires Hsieh tsai jen-sheng
3 The most readily available treatment of Ch'ien pien shangc (Marginalia of life) (I94I; reprinted
Chung-shu is the chapter on him in Hsia (n. 2 Hong Kong: Wen-ch'ang Shu-chii, n.d.); and the
above), pp. 432-60. Another source is Mu-jung collection of short stories Jen shou kueid (Men,
Lung-t'u, "Lun Ch'ien Chung-shu te hsiao-shuo" beasts, ghosts) (Shanghai: K'ai-ming Shu-tien,
(On the fictional writings of Ch'ien Chung-shu), I 946).

427

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 428 DENNIS T. Hu

the above claims from

tive language, of whic
340 pages, one page having as many as nine. (Approximately seventy-four percent
of these figurative uses are similes.) Though in the absence of norms it is difficult to
make a relative statement, in absolute terms this is rich usage.
A brief summary of the novel will provide context for the analysis following it.
The study will begin with consideration of the symbolism inherent in the title itself.
This leads to a demonstration of how, through the use of imagery and figurative
language,4 the themes of the novel are advanced. On a different level, a number of
the most significant passages are put through close linguistic analysis, so as to dis-
cover the craft in Ch'ien's language and gain an understanding of its vital role. In
motivation and approach as well as in general philosophy, this inquiry owes alle-
giance to the expanding field of criticism sometimes identified as "linguistics and
literary studies." The guiding principles in descriptive and interpretive linguistics
subscribed to here are the work of pioneers such as M. A. K. Halliday.5

The Story Line of Fortress Besieged

The novel opens with the protagonist Fang Hung-chien's return to China from
France, in the summer of 1937. Fang, now twenty-seven, had four years earlier
graduated from college and left for Europe to further his studies. But having accom-
plished nothing whatsoever, he eventually bought a doctorate by mail from New
York and returned home. In Shanghai, he takes up the offer of a sinecure. Lonely
and restless, he renews his acquaintance with a classmate from his undergraduate
days, Su Wen-wan; unmarried in her mid-twenties, she at once becomes interested
in him. But while Su tries to steer him into marriage, Fang falls in love at first sight
with her sly cousin T'ang Hsiao-fu. Su's drive to secure Fang is given impetus by her
misinterpretation of several crucial events. The most ironic of these is a showdown
staged by her bona fide suitor Chao Hsin-mei, from which Fang emerges even more
firmly lodged in Su's heart than before. Meanwhile, his infatuation with T'ang rapid-
ly grows; but he fails to indicate to Su his heart's true leanings, for fear of hurting
her. Finally alarmed by the prospects of hopeless entanglement, Fang hastily de-
clares his lack of affection for her. Su thereupon tells her cousin malicious tales
about him. Vehemently, T'ang accuses him of being an academic fraud and a fickle
lover, actually hoping to provoke him into self-defense. Fang, however, misses her
real intent. Two subsequent gestures by T'ang that could have saved the relationship
are frustrated by an interplay of misfortune and irony. Fang's innocent first romance
thus ends in total defeat. Shattered, he accepts a professorship in an inland province.
The unhappy T'ang also leaves town, and Su quickly marries.

4 For the case for joint consideration of imagery
and figures of speech, see inter alia Archibald A.
Hill, "Analogies, Icons and Images in Relation to
Semantic Content of Discourses," Style, II (I968),
pp. 203-27.
5 Particularly relevant and inspiring, among oth-
ers, have been "Descriptive Linguistics in Literary
Studies" in Donald C. Freeman (ed.), Linguistics
and Literary Style (N.Y.: Holt, Rinehart & Win-
ston, I970), pp. 57-72 and "The Linguistic Study
of Literary Texts" in Seymour Chatman & Samuel
Levin (eds.), Essays on the Language of Literature
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, I967), pp. 2I7-23.
Also Roger Fowler, "Linguistics, Stylistics; Criti-
cism?", Lingua, XVI (1966), pp. I53-65. Thus far,
very little has been published on linguistic-literary
criticism of Chinese literature. Exceptions in the
Western world are the impressive examples set by
Tsu-Lin Mei and Yu-kung Kao: "Tu Fu's 'Autumn
Meditations': An Exercise in Linguistic Criticism"
(HarvardJournal of Asiatic Studies, XXVIII [I968],
pp. 4-80) and "Syntax, Diction, and Imagery in
T'ang Poetry" (HJAS, xxxi [I97I], pp. 49-I 36).

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CH'IEN CHUNG-SHU'S NOVEL WEI-CH'ENG 429

It was Chao who had earlier recommended Fang for the teaching post, so as to
rid himself of a presumed rival. Now reconciled, Fang and Chao set off together
with several other recruits for the remote campus. Thus, about a year after his return
to China, Fang finds himself off on another journey. At this point, he has already lost
whatever interest he had in the new job, and he regrets having accepted it. Their trip
to the interior is a month of miseries made even more anguishing by war conditions.
With endless transferring from one means of transportation to another, and fre-
quent periods of distressed waiting in between, the experience is an ordeal for body
and soul. From time to time, when the agony and frustrations of the moment ease
up, memories of T'ang return to haunt Fang.
On arrival at the newly founded university, Fang is first greeted by a demotion to
associate professorship, as he had not listed his doctorate in his resume. Next he
finds himself without a department to belong to. His colleagues-anything but
scholars-are an assortment of mean, vain, and devious hypocrites each out to fur-
ther his own interests. A virtual zoo of lowly characters, the small and closed com-
munity quickly becomes a rumor-trap and a proving ground for campus politics. The
helpless Fang gets unwittingly embroiled in factional disputes and maneuvers, end-
ing up as both pawn and incidental victim. Meanwhile, he fails to command either
attention or respect from his students. The conduct of human affairs is further com-
plicated by a futile matchmaking attempt, involving both Fang and Chao, that leaves
all parties concerned embittered. As Chao finds himself drawn to the wife of a fellow
professor, Wang, Fang gradually awakens to his feelings for Sun Jou-chia-a young,
seemingly guileless teaching assistant who was one of his group traveling to campus
from Shanghai. Caught in a compromising though actually innocent scene with Mrs.
Wang, Chao flees the university. This seriously demoralizes Fang. Taking advantage
of his consternation, Sun initiates an entrapping conversation in which she exerts
upon him pressures of nonexistent gossip and fictitious inquiries from her father.
Then, artfully turning two colleagues into witnesses, she manipulates Fang into com-
mitting himself to her; soon this is made official by an engagement party. Not long
after that, a rejected suitor of Sun's slanders Fang, thus supplying the university
president with the excuse he has been seeking to not renew Fang's contract after his
first year.
Fang and Sun therefore have no choice but to beat a humiliated retreat. They go
to Kweilin, from where they fly to Hong Kong. As previously arranged, Chao meets
them there for a reunion. Sun's nausea from the air trip and the fact that she and
Fang share a room in the hotel prompt Chao to warn Fang of her possible pregnancy,
and to suggest their immediate marriage. The couple follows his advice. Thus Fang
gets married without ever having courted or been in love with the bride. Meanwhile,
Sun dislikes Chao more and more, irritated especially by Fang's closeness to him.
The Fangs then return to Shanghai. Sun's parents, never having cared very much
for her, receive Fang with indifference. The person who really loves Sun is her aunt
Mrs. Lu, a domineering, arrogant business executive openly contemptuous of Fang.
And because of her breeding and temperament, Sun is not accepted by the old-
fashioned Fang household; Fang's two sisters-in-law are particularly hostile. Al-
though the couple live by themselves, problems with in-laws begin to generate fric-
tion between them, leading to occasional quarrels. Sun has been given a well-paying
job by Mrs. Lu and remains close to her. However, all Fang manages to obtain-and
that only through Chao's connections-is an unimportant position with a newspa-
per. Because of the deteriorating war situation, Chao writes Fang urging him to join

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 430 DENNIS T. Hu
him in Chungking; but
under wartime politica
disagreement over his
festival day, when they
Sun's bad humor. The c
eager to reconcile. Unfo
cidents, and fueled by
their conflicts explode th
marriage. The fatal blow
own hands; the situation
numb despondence, ma

Imagery and Symbolism

The very words of the

quarter the way into t
marriage is like afortere
in, while those inside t
another one that imme
cage in which birds who
those who are entrapped
situations is, of course,
cumstances wherein th
follows marriage and m
names of protagonist F
t'uf and Fang Feng-i,g
mean, respectively, a ty
images of the bird and
hero's relationships with
to its dissolution-in fac
Fang is by no means un
his friend Chao that if C
ment of it all would soon
looking into a pool of w
the bone has all been sw
is going to just stare in
again" (p. I34).
In a different way, this dilemma presents itself not only in marriages but also in
other human affairs. Fang generalizes the simile while on his way to entering i
one commitment:
"Remember something like a 'fortress besieged' that. . . Miss Su talked about the
other day? Lately I've been feeling that everything in life's just that. You see, at the
time, I was so eager to be working at San-hi University that I accepted the appoint,
ment. But recently this situation's been gradually losing its flavor-and now I could
kick myself for not having the guts to just take this same boat on its return trip back
to Shanghai." (pp. I33-34)
The idea recurs near the end of their journey to the inland provinces. Close to
graveyard in a wild and desolate countryside stands an idle, broken and empty doo
frame left over from a demolished house. In another of his more perceptive m
ments, Fang sees it as a symbol: "an entry way that leads to gorgeous palaces an

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CH'IEN CHUNG-SHU'S NOVEL WEI-CH'ENG 431

fabulous mansions. But after you get lured into it, you find absolutely nothing there.
An entrance into nothing to enter for, a place to go that goes no place" (p. I83). The
aptness of this comparison is as uncanny as the actual scene. Toward the close of the
story, he is deeply entrenched in resettling in Shanghai. He cannot help but contrast
his regret over this relocation with his aversion to moving into the interior the year
before:
While in the small town, he felt threatened by [campus] politics. But what now in
the big city? He resented people's indifference to him so much that being dragged
into power strife seemed after all an indication that at least he commanded a
certain amount of respect. (p. 308)
This is one of the most direct statements of internal conflict, an important theme
which will be further illustrated in the later discussion.
But the perennial dilemma of attachment/detachment is not the only human
condition dealt with in the work. The author's statement in the preface that he was
attempting to depict certain aspects of life and society in the China of his time
suggests a wider scope. This depiction impresses upon the reader that Ch'ien sees
little difference between human beings and beasts. In this regard, his preface to the
anthology Jen shou kuei (Men, Beasts, Ghosts) published a year earlier, in I 946, is
illuminating.
As is customary, I have to warn my readers that the characters and incidents in this
book are entirely fictitious. Not only are the men law-abiding citizens and the beasts
domesticated animals, but even the ghosts are not wild unfettered spirits: they live
only within the confines of this book and will positively not stray outside. If any
person identifies himself with some man, beast, or ghost in this collection, it
amounts to saying that a character in my book, which I have imagined, has walked
away, taken on blood and flesh, mind and body, assumed his shape, and now freely
moves about in the real world.... I have to disclaim this possibility beforehand . ..6
This mock-apology is a thinly disguised declaration of Ch'ien's attitude toward hu-
manity. Indeed, the same view of mankind as subhuman persists throughout Fortress
Besieged. A significant portion of the figurative language used in the novel associates
humans with animals, most frequently the dog. That such association is pejorative is
obliquely but unequivocally asserted in some lines Fang reads in a manual: "In order
to insure proper growth and the safety of life, ignoble names are usually chosen as
the intimate forms of address for babies. Examples are 'Dog,' 'Sheep,' 'Hound,'
'Horse,' etc." (p. I I4). The dog, branded "ignoble," is no cherished pet. Rather, it is
a lowly creature which exists but does not live, which deserves contempt and ridi-
cule. This is precisely the object with which Ch'ien equates mankind. In the trau-
matic end to Fang's romance with T'ang, he is given a thorough and severe scolding
by her. Forlorn and heartbroken, he leaves her house and lingers in the street, numb
and motionless in a downpour. Finally deciding to go, he "wriggled his body like a
dog shaking its fur" (p. I05). In this case, the dog is being chased out of its master's
house; and its vain gesture is one of helplessness, of total defeat.
Some two hundred pages later, at the end of the novel, Fang's troubled marriage
at last falls to pieces and his wife abandons him. The rupture of this relationship
bears, in many respects, a haunting resemblance to his earlier failure symbolized by
the humiliated dog. As indicated in the summary of the story given above, both
sequences of events are "comedies" of errors, with misunderstandings-voiced or

6Jen shou kuei (n. 3 above) p. i; translation by Hsia (n. 2 above), p. 437.

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 432 DENNIS T. Hu

muted-piling up in the manner of typical tragic irony.7 In the first instance Su plays
agitator; in the second, Mrs. Lu and the meddling servant have a similar role. In both
cases, the naive characters on either side are privately anxious to make an effort for
compromise, but do not have a chance to. Thus, the dog here functions also as a
foreshadowing of the hero's ultimate defeat.
Of course, not every experience is as disastrous as those described above, but it
appears that human degradation does span the same range as a dog's. Shortly before
he leaves for the interior, Fang is virtually driven out of the house he is living in, and
has no recourse but to stay with his parents. The author likens this disgraceful home-
coming to a dog which, on being beaten, dashes for home with its tail between its
legs (p. I I 2). On another occasion, Fang reflects upon his unwillingness to complain
and air grievances. In unknowing self-mockery, he compares such stifling experi-
ence to a dog's being muzzled (p. 280). While traveling in the inland provinces, Fang
and his companions become financially stranded and are in dire need of assistance
from a new acquaintance and her friend. Only after a seemingly endless wait do the
saviors finally appear on the scene. Ch'ien describes the warmth of the welcome
given them as that shown by a dog upon its master's arriving home (p. 177). Among
the group of travelers is a person who constantly goes out of his way to fawn on
one of the others in the most brazen fashion. Following one of these shows of in-
gratiation, the detached narrator coldly comments that "at this juncture, the Lord
our God would surely regret having not bestowed upon man the wagging tail of the
dog, thereby considerably reducing his powers of self-expression" (p. I87). Human
indignity and obsequiousness, so the reader finds, are no different from the canine
variety. When a dog does appear to be dignified, that attitude may, unfortunately
enough, be unwarranted. Thus, in describing some French passengers aboard an
ocean liner approaching Saigon (Vietnam then being a French colony), the author
says of them, "Like dogs in sight of home, they instantly put on an air of presump-
tuousness, amply shown by the way they act and by the level of their voices" (p. I 5).
Like the sense of security a dog derives from mere closeness to home, these passen-
gers' exultation over their colonies is not a matter of intrinsic merit. Their misguided
pride is dealt a further blow through the very way the parallel is drawn. It is not the
colonized but the colonialists, masters of the native subjects' fate, who are compared
to dogs. Why is the usual analogy reversed here? One explanation is that only some-
thing less than human could be shameless enough to become excited over colonial-
ism.
Posturing is not necessarily supported by true physical strength either, as there
are "those dogs the foreigners talk about-they bark like mad, but when it comes to
biting are in fact quite harmless" (p. 2I8). Bobby, an actual Pekinese that enters the
story toward the end of the novel, does not belong to the meek category, however.
This puppy, kept by Mrs. Lu, is used effectively by the author to make two points.
Firstly, Bobby provides live and climactic underscoring of the idea of human debase-
ment that references to dogs have been used to assert throughout. Fang's malicious
remark to his wife, "Your aunt loves that dog more than she loves you" (p. 307), not
only rates her below a pet but also lashes out at her aunt at the same time. "If she's so
fond of a dog's companionship," he continues, "she's got to be unfit for human
company" (pp. 307-o8). And then all three of them are lumped together: "I'm sure

7The irony of the finale is discussed in more detail in Hsia (ibid.), p. 459.

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 CH'IEN CHUNG-SHU'S NOVEL WEI-CH'ENG 433

you'll want to keep a dog too some day, just like your aunt" (p. 308). This identifica-
tion of the trio is vehemently reiterated in the final confrontation:
"She's keeping two 'running-dogs': Bobby and you, Sun Jou-chia. Aren't two
enough? You just go ahead and tell her that Fang Hung-chien ... isn't going to be
made a 'running-dog' of a 'running-dog' of a capitalist!"8 (p. 338)

"You might as well move to her place and settle on letting her keep you, just like
Bobby."9 (p. 339)
Sun's retort is no less vituperative, "[You,] clinging to [Chao] for the rest of your
life, holding on fast to his apron with your teeth-what do you think you yourself
really are but his 'running-dog'?" (p. 339).1O In an earlier clash, Fang exploded, "All
of the Sun household, all of you, are like that goddamned skunk of a bitch!" (p.
320)."1 The author explains the invective through a description of Sun's unspoken
reaction: "Ignoring biological impossibilities, [Fang] had made a dog fissipedic to
compare to her family" (p. 320). Such trenchant directness should dispel any doubt
in the reader's mind that people rank above the dog. However, the most specific
charge yet made by Fang comes in a sad commentary on one kind of human frailty:
"That aunt of yours has all those employees at the factory dancing attendance on her
... but still keeps a 'running-dog' to have it wag its tail at her. That shows a person
can take unlimited boot-licking" (p. 308).
Bobby's secondary function is to dramatize human weaknesses by way of con-
trast. The helplessness of Fang becomes absurdly realistic in the following:
That dog bit at Hung-chien every time it saw him. And the mistress's frequently
repeated comment, "Dogs are really sharp; they can tell between good and bad," only
added to his exasperation. But then because of the owner's stature, a dog gained its
own; ... thus he did not dare beat it. Jou-chia, in order to ingratiate her husband
with her aunt, constantly made Hung-chien walk Bobby out to the street to take a
crap. This, however, failed to improve Hung-chien's feelings for the dog. (p. 307)
And his wife's alternately blunt and sarcastic outbursts are no help either. "I think
dogs are sometimes nicer than people; well, at least Bobby's nicer than you. He's
grateful, has a lot of sense, and doesn't bite at just anybody. Somebody like you,
though, he should bite" (p. 308). Certainly, when it comes to a coward like Fang,
Bobby has both the temerity and strength to make a prey of him.
But the dog is not the only animal mentioned in suggestive insult to humans. At
one point, the author describes the human buttocks as "the small area where the
monkey, before it had evolved into man, grew its tail" (p. 149). This periphrasis
comes in a portrayal of a bus overcrowded with passengers vying for room. The
reference to evolution theory here is hardly fortuitous; a much later passage is a
sonorously disturbing echo:
Trams and buses wished they could post "Full House" signs, like cinemas and hotels.
... If people could be sent just like letters, the painful struggle to cram into public
vehicles would be spared. Competition for survival was gradually divested of its
adornments and disguise, thus betraying the relentless brutality characteristic of
primitive times. (p. 309)
Related to this are two mentions, about two hundred pages apart, of Adam. Fang,

8 "Running-dog" may perhaps be more idiomati- 11 In an attempt to reproduce the vulgarity and
cally rendered "lackey." This passage is also trans- word-play of the original, minor liberties have
lated in ibid., p. 453. been taken in the translation of this and the next
9 See ibid., for another translation. quoted lines.
10 See ibid., pp. 453f., for another translation.

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 434 DENNIS T. Hu
before he finally purchases a doctorate, is troubled over not having a degree from a
foreign university. A diploma, he muses, functions "somewhat like the leaf on the
lower organs of Adam and Eve, covering shame and wrapping up the ugly-a small
sheet of a paper that could shield all of a man's shallowness, ignorance, and stupidi-
ty" (p. 9). Later, while calling roll in his logic class, Fang the instructor is described as
being "like Adam in Genesis singing out the names of freshly created animals" (p.
205). There is good reason for this analogy. Roll-calling in college verges on being
an uncivil practice, but for Fang it is unfortunately a demonstrated necessity: his
students, like animals, lack discipline and motivation. On the other hand, his own
failure both as student and as teacher can be traced back to serious scholarly in-
competence; in this respect at least he is as untutored and defenseless as that primor-
dial man.
Noted immediately above is the regression of some of the Fortress Besieged char-
acters along the axis of time. Down the scale of species, Man is identified with a
variety of subhuman forms. "In a fit of temper, you're just like a charging beast,
irrational and merciless" (p. 306), Sun once accuses her husband, half-jokingly. In
reaction to a servant's senseless behavior, Fang "stared at [her], startled like a child
encountering a monster in the zoo" (p. 340). Malevolent rejoicing comes in the
manner of people who are "jumping around like frogs and bugs" (p. 266); and in
the context of a conversation about professorial ranks, the author brings up generic
classification of bugs and fleas (p. I 98). Wartime opportunists operate underground
as "reptiles that were insidious, without declared loyalties, yet having assumed the
shape of man" (p. 3o9). The most biting yet in this category is the following image of
a police officer in the French Concession of Shanghai:
The face that used to be pallid was now red as raw beef.... His belly protruded like
a frog pumping itself with air, true to the international name for the French-
"Frogs." What was more dreadful now was an added look of cruel bestiality. This
place, Shanghai, was just like Circe's Island: a perfectly good-natured man came only
to be transformed into a beast. (p. I29)
Thereupon follows description of a guard in that officer's command crudely ex-
torting a bribe.
Ch'ien's use of imagery concerning lower beings makes the area of human rela-
tionships an inhuman one. For example, to describe the manipulation of subordi-
nates by their superiors, he cites the treatment of the donkey by its keeper: carrots
dangling closely in front but forever out of reach will make the animal carry its load
as far as the master desires (p. 267). In the world of politics, when bureaucrats fall
they always manage to do so like a cat-landing with feet on the ground, never
unduly embarrassed (p. 222). And even when no manipulation is involved, human
relationship is not always smooth and harmonious. The following interior mono-
logue takes place immediately after Fang's visit to his confidant Chao has been
abruptly cut short by an unexpected argument.
In low spirits, Hung-chien returned to his room. Only once in a great long
while does one get into a good mood. Why should it then be destroyed upon looking
up a friend? Well, maybe people are created to be lonely. Each one of them should
just keep to himself and not communicate with any other till the day he dies.
Whether our system digests or eliminates the things that the body doesn't have
room for is an entirely personal matter. Why then should sentiments that the heart
doesn't have enough room for be shared with your pals? Closeness means that you
can easily hurt others, and you can just as easily get hurt yourself. There's no
choice but to keep one another at a distance, just like porcupines. As soon as you get

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 CH'IEN CHUNG-SHUS NOVEL WEI-CH'ENG 435

close, either you rip somebody's skin or you get pricked yourself. Hung-chien was
only too anxious to unload these emotions to an understanding soul. ... But then,
since it's been decided that personal contacts are to be avoided, why talk about
calling on [Miss Sun] now? (p. 204)
In tracing the history of the interior monologue, Robert Scholes and Robert Kellogg
state, in The Nature of Narrative,'2 that the technique's "refinement and develop-
ment . .. in narrative literature really begins when the narrative artist chooses to
focus on a mind tormented by a dilemma." Indeed for Fang, "the mind is confronted
by unsolvable problems" and he is forced to provide a solution. If no satisfactory
way can be found for the conduct of person-to-person relationships, he makes the
only available choice: he avoids them. But such negativism proves in the end to be
no escape. Just moments later in the same thought process, the dilemma surfaces
again; and it becomes all the more tormenting because Fang himself realizes it full
well.
Scholes and Kellogg further note that in the most substantial interior monologue
of Apollonius' Argonautica, where the technique is thought to have first been used,
six characteristics can be identified. It is noteworthy how well three of these apply to
the present case. The first characteristic, that the monologuist "can confide in no
one," is amply clear from the last lines in the quoted passage itself. The second is
that he is "torn between what is 'right' and what [he] is driven to do." Fang has
bitterly concluded that the "right" course to follow is self-imposed isolation; yet
immediately afterwards, the impulse comes to him-quite in spite of himself-to
seek solace from a fellow human being. In addition to this obvious conflict is a more
subtle one, its inverse: gregariousness is apparently what is naturally "right" for
human society, but personal experience has driven him to decide against it. A chord
largely in tune with the "fortress-under-siege" idea is sounded here. The third char-
acteristic, that "the moment is a moment of crisis," is closely related to the second.
Compared with Fang's other emotional upheavals, this incident cannot be counted
as a crisis of major proportions. Yet it certainly is a critical moment of reflection and
introspection. There is disillusionment, too: incompatibility is inherent in a commu-
nity of human beings, as it is in a community of porcupines. In short, therefore, this
piece of interior monologue is a classic.
Though the monologue itself ends soon enough, the imagery of porcupines in-
troduced there lingers on in the work. In a subsequent minor conflict with his wife,
Fang assumes a defensive attitude "like a porcupine on alert against an enemy, every
one of its spines taut and ready" (p. 320). Again, during one of the more-and-more
alienated couple's brief but uneasy exchanges, they call each other "porcupine" (p.
329).
Ch'ien's other images may be less lively, but are just as incisive. One example is
an attack on traditional Chinese matchmaking, in which the male party has all the
say. A disgusted character refers to such an undertaking as the sale of poultry in a
marketplace, as far as the females are concerned (p. 230). The idea is repeated when
the pinkish face of a husband-hunting girl is compared to the veal on display at a
Western meat dealer's (p. 244). One forward and scantily clad woman is nicknamed
Charcuterie,'3 since "there alone can one find so much warm-colored flesh put on

12 N.Y.: Oxford Univ. Press, I966; the follow- p'u-tzu (a small shop selling cooked food) is
ing quotations are from pp. I8I-83. followed by this French equivalent in parenthe-
13 In the Chinese original, the term shou-shih
ses.

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 436 DENNIS T. Hu

open exhibit" (pp. 4-5). Chao's early attitude toward Fang, whom he mistakenly
assumes to be his competitor for Su's hand, is characterized as that a visitor holds
for microscopic germs, even when it is a friend who has the contagious disease:
contemptuous yet cautious (p. 52).
The above discussion demonstrates that, in Fortress Besieged, symbolism and im-
agery are used in a sustained manner to depict subhumanness and the tragic human
condition. The vehicle of this depiction is largely satire. Another perceptive Scholes
and Kellogg observation is that there are "paradoxical assumptions implicit in all
satire: a particular society is being ridiculed for having fallen away from a golden
ideal, but the possibility exists that the ideal itself was only an absurdly inverted
version of the true reality."'4 The vivid, yet chilling, manner in which these assump-
tions are given life in his novel speaks eloquently for Ch'ien Chung-shu's imagina-
tion and his skill in satire.

Linguistic Manipulation with a Literary Purpose

It is from passages of deft, sustained linguistic manipulation and dense figurative

language that the artistic cleverness behind Fortress Besieged can be best appreciated.
The interrelation between ideas and meaning often requires deep, intense reflec-
tion for a thorough understanding, which then adds new life not only to that particu-
lar passage but to the work as a whole. The very beginning of the novel demon-
strates this point well.
The ship was sailing on the Indian Ocean. Although the Red Sea had been left
behind quite some time ago, the sun was still setting late and rising early, inexorably,
eating into most of the night.... [The night] was embraced by the sun, unable to
disentangle itself; enchanted perhaps, blushing with a faint inebriated red even after
rays at dusk and evening clouds had long faded away. As the red disappeared and the
night sobered up, the perspiring passengers awoke. (p. i)
This is most easily seen as extended personifications of the sun and the night. But
there is more to it. As a word in itself, the component tsui, which occurs in the
compound t'ao-tsuih (enchanted), means "drunk"; this leads by associative synonymy
to t'o (inebriated) of the compound t'o-hungi (inebriated red). Thus tsui functions as
an important pivot word: the punning on it effects a smooth, well-tempered transi-
tion from enchantment to red coloration. Immediately'5 following this are hung-
hsiaoi (red disappeared) and tsui-hsingk (sobered up; literally "drunkenness awak-
ened"), which not only reinforces the ideas both of redness and of the drunken state,
but also lead the language naturally out of the figurative mode, since the reddish
glow does accurately describe the evening scene. Moreover, considerations similar
to those for tsui apply also to hsing. Soberness is not necessarily an immediate and
direct consequence of one's waking up, and being awake certainly does not imply
being sober. But here tsui-hsing is indeed used to introduce hsing-lai (awoke).
Double personification is also clear in the following passage:
The ship reliant on human craftiness, loaded with human encumbrance, and fraught
with human aspiration steamed ahead spiritedly. Every minute, it returned a small
patch of water contaminated by the presence of humankind to the relentless, time-
less, boundless sea. (pp. 1-2)
Syntactically, the triple occurrence of jen-tel (human) is paralleled by the triple oc

14 The Nature of Narrative, p. I 54. 15 Immediately in the original, though not in the
translation.

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 CH'IEN CHUNG-SHUS NOVEL WEI-CH'ENG 437

currence of wum ("-less"). On the semantic level, these two structures are linked by
the phrases jen-ch'in (presence of humankind)'6 and shui-mien (patch of water;
literally "water surface"). Set against the negative double meanings of craftiness and
encumbrance is the positiveness of aspiration, spiritedly, and steamed ahead: an audible
echo of the besieged-fortress theme. In later pages of the novel the reader is soon to
see "human aspiration" pursued with gusto, the same way the ocean liner here
"steamed ahead spiritedly." Despite much "human craftiness" such hopes are dashed,
ending up as nothing but an "encumbrance." Every minute and relentless convey a
sense of perpetual inevitability; and the futility of human endeavors is heightened by
the contrast between timeless, boundless sea on the one hand and smallpatch of water
on the other. Again, the unfolding of the story portrays human designs as being
consistently powerless to change courses of events.
Ian Watt, comparing symbolic prefiguration in several English writers (in "The
First Paragraph of The Ambassadors: An Explication"), wrote:
In Dickens, characteristically, we get a loud note that sets the tone, rather than a
polyphonic series of chords that contain all the later melodic developments, as in
James.... Conrad's sardonic force [in the beginning of An Outcast of the Islands] has
enormous immediate impact; but it surely gives too much away.17
What is said here regarding the opening paragraph of Henry James's novel is cer-
tainly true also of those early lines in Fortress Besieged analyzed just above. While
Ch'ien Chung-shu's chords might not be loud, the distinct stylization is no soft
note. There is indeed immediate sardonic impact, but the force is far from being
enormous enough to give everything away.
The prenotion contained in the following passage is much more obvious. A ro-
mantic scenario devised by Su achieves the forcing of Fang's hand-or, more cor-
rectly, his lips-as
Hung-chien had no choice but to turn around and kiss her. This peck was so light-
weight and localized that it resembled a practice in Ch'ing Dynasty officialdom: to
suggest to his visitors that they were wearing out their welcome, a host would lift the
tea cup as if to drink but his lips would barely touch the cup's edge. (pp. 97-98)
The mechanical ring of lightweight and localized is quite appropriate, for the kiss is so
insincere that it amounts to nothing more than formality. Fang's supposedly af-
fectionate gesture is therefore an ironic affirmation-in fact, the first concrete and
physical affirmation up to that point in the story-of the distance that exists between
the couple. More importantly, the perfunctoriness of the kiss, through association
with the Ch'ing Dynasty practice, gains extraphysical significance, namely, dismissal
and estrangement. Moments after this, Fang and Su bid one another goodbye for the
night; and such intimacy is never repeated. In fact, not long afterwards, the tenuous
relationship itself breaks up for good. Each gets married within about a year; and
they meet again only once, a very unpleasant occasion. The kiss thus forewarns of a
separation that for all practical purposes is permanent.
Plurisignation is employed in varying degrees of explicitness in Fortress Besieged.
The following passage illustrates sophisticated, interacting use of this technique:
The Frenchmen ... gathered around the young coquettish Jewish woman to flirt.
... The woman's not unhandsome husband, observing nearby, was amused, since in

16 This is an admittedly inadequate translation.

connotations of ch'i in the context of jen-ch'i.
The nonphysical associations of presence are not 17 In Howard S. Babb (ed.), Essays in Stylistic
anywhere as strong and immediate as those called Analysis (N.Y.: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich,
forth by ch'i; among the losses are the unpleasant I972), pp. 290f.

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 438 DENNIS T. Hu

recent days he had had quite a few favors of cigarettes, beer, and lemonade. The Red
Sea having been passed, the heat was no longer intense enough to start a con-
flagration. Therefore, side by side with bits of peel, paper, and cork, there would
soon be a litter of cigarette butts everywhere upon the deck. The French were
known for their disciplined thinking; so too was their style of writing clean and
lucid. For all that, the way they went about doing things was always disorderly,
dirty, and noisy-as evidenced by the mess on board.' (p. i)
The Red Sea is supposedly the hottest portion of the journey. Being past that
potential fire hazard is the ostensible reason for the reappearance of the cigarette
butts. But the closeness of the word-elements in cigarette-butt, beer-cork, and lemon-
ade-peel suggests that the meaning here is: the favors will continue to be offered and
accepted. The implication then is that in return for free drinks and tobacco, the
husband will continue to permit the flirtation to go on. Under this interpretation,
heat has less to do with environmental temperatures than with human desire, fire
less to do with combustion than passion. Likewise, Red Sea'8 seems not so much a
geographic-spatial reference as a temporal marker, for as the journey is nearing its
end, there is not sufficient time for prolonged or serious romantic entanglement.
This is why the husband can afford to be "amused." Also, therefore explains a cheap
deal rather than a relaxing of caution. Given such a reading, the double meanings of
disciplined, clean, disorderly, dirty, noisy, and mess become transparent. As mentioned
above, in their display of presumptuously noisy enthusiasm for their colony Viet-
nam, the French prove themselves worthy of these slurs. (And later, one of them,
while on policy duty, further shows his lack of sense of discipline by conniving at
subordinates' wrongdoing.)
Contrast the above with the direct, straightforward lexico-semantic correspon-
dence in this passage:
Nine out of ten of his county-folk who moved to the big cities were in three lines of
business: ironmongery, bean-curd production, and sedan-chair bearing. As for na-
tive products, dolls made out of clay were the best-known handicraft. The young
people who went to college mostly majored in civil engineering. As inflexible as
iron, as insipid as bean-curd, as narrow as the inside of a sedan-chair, complete with
earthiness: such was their native temperament.19 (p. 6)
Whatever their degree of explicitness, instances of plurisignation in literature
usually carry two, or at most three, meanings. In the few lines cited below, there are
four.
Hung-chien reclined on the seat. Miss Su asked whether his tie should be loosened
for him. He shook his head. She then told him to close his eyes and relax. In this
self-made world of pitch-darkness, he felt Miss Su's cool fingers touch his forehead,
and heard her murmur to herself, "Pauvre petit!"20 However, he was too weak to
jump in protest. (p. 96)
Hun-t'ien hei-ti,0 translated above as "world of pitch-darkness," has a most superfi-
cial meaning of "not being able to see anything," simply because Fang's eyes are
closed. Even if they were open he could not have seen much, as he is inside a car at
night. Less literally, the reference is to his drunken state. On a still more metaphori-
cal level, the darkness is the result of having made a mess of a dinner party; he puts

18 It is not clear how significant the amorous earthiness is much more immediate in the original
connotations of red are here. than can be conveyed in the translation.
19 The Chinese for "civil engineering" is "earth- 20 The French phrase, which means "poor little
wood engineering"; thus its correspondence with thing," is given within parentheses in the original.

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CH'IEN CHUNG-SHU'S NOVEL WEI-CH'ENG 439

up no defense against host Chao's planned offensive aimed precisely at rendering

him a fool. The scene climaxes in his vomiting violently right beside the dinner
table. The deepest, and fourth, level of meaning has behind it a piece of dramatic
irony par excellence. For some time now Fang has been trying, unsuccessfully, to
back away from Su's advances. Throughout the dinner, his embarrassment as the
underdog writhing from Chao's attacks gains for him-alas-her sympathy, atten-
tion, and support. Her care for him is most concretely shown in her volunteering to
escort him home in her car, wherein the affectionate scene quoted above ensues.
Thus the scheming host's "success only proved to himself his failure" (p. 96). On the
other hand, Fang's apparent failure, which would appear to the unsuspecting Chao a
hard-earned success, remains in the end a much worse failure than Chao's. In other
words, Fang's new-found but unwanted closeness with Su is the ultimate "world of
pitch-darkness" he has made for himself. That world is miserable enough without
endearments such as "pauvre petit." Is it any wonder then, that Fang is too weak,
physically as well as spiritually, to protest? Poor little thing, indeed.
As remarkable as the complexity of meaning set into this mere handful of words
is the absence of any trace of conscious craftsmanship. In fact the phrase hun-t'ien
hei-ti is used so naturally that its hierarchy of meanings could very well not be fully
appreciated on a first reading. As soon as its meanings are grasped, however, Su's
line can be seen to work as its chorus in the following manner. That Su's com-
passionate words are a genuine and spontaneous reaction to Fang's plight-as she
understands it-is almost a re-presentation of the second and third meanings of the
phrase. Meanwhile, the fourth meaning is the basis of the irony in her exclamation.
As in any ironic situation, there is here a disparity of knowledge: Su is unaware of
the fact that further entanglement with her is the last of Fang's desires. This is pre-
cisely why her words carry a penetrating aptness unknown to her. The relationship
between "world of pitch-darkness" and "pauvre petit" is therefore a complex one
worth setting down. Firstly, to the set of meanings of the former phrase, the latter is
a reprise. Secondly, while an ironic situation external to the immediate narrative is
the key to the fourth meaning of the first phrase, this meaning in turn forms the
ironic element in the second phrase. Thirdly, in a reciprocal manner, so to speak, the
second ironic situation (involving Su) reinforces the irony of the first (involving
Chao). To achieve the interweaving of irony and plurisignation in so intriguing yet
seemingly unlabored a way is a marvelous feat.
One further example will suffice to illustrate Ch'ien Chung-shu's mastery in se-
mantic manipulation.
And then Britain and America, which had been "fighting back to back" with China,
wanted to take only a neutral stand. Neutral they were not; neither were they able to
stand. Finally the neutral stand degenerated into merely trying to find some stand in
China. Outside of these footholds, the Japanese could trample on full-scale. (p.
308)
Here the compound chung-li (neutral stand) starts out innocently enough designat-
ing a policy in international power politics. Then it gets taken apart into its com-
ponents. Li is subsequently used twice, as the verb "to stand" and in the sense of
"maintaining a viable presence." This latter instance is correlated with the use of the
first component chung of "Chung-kuo" (China): "tsai Chung-kuo yu ke li-tsu chih-ti"
(to find some stand in China). Here Ch'ien artfully capitalizes on the coincidental
equivoke chung; but since the name "China" is nowhere close to the English word
neutral, readers of the English translation are denied full appreciation of this point.

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 440 DENNIS T. Hu
The sarcastic message
neutrality are merely th
China are couched in. A
in the additional rende
between the passive, de
atrociousness of the Ja
tion, the figurative ide
otherwise: they are intruders all.
Verbal paradoxes abound in Fortress Besieged. For example, let us look at a line
cited earlier in this paper, "i-wu-k'o-chin te chin-k'ou, i-wu-k'o-ch'ii te ch'ju-ch'u"q
(an entrance into nothing to enter for, a place to go that goes no place; p. I83). The
two phrases share the syntactic formula "i-wu-k'o- . . . (x) te (x) . . .," carrying the
negation wu and the immediate repetition, following the marker te, of the word just
before it. It is this structure that makes for the paradox in each phrase: the phrasal
modifier preceding te is in direct semantic conflict with the noun it modifies. For
example, in the case just cited, an entrance "into nothing to enter for" is not much
of "an entrance." Likewise, how does "a place to go" justify being called that if it
"goes no place"? The paradoxical effect is amplified not only by the duplication of
syntax but also by two other linguistically significant factors: the grammatical roles
of the repeated words chin (enter) and ch'iu (go) are parallel, but their meanings are
antithetical.
A paradox in which context plays a critical role occurs when, at a point in their
journey, Fang and his group have to cross a flimsily built suspension bridge with no
railings. As he hesitates, Sun offers to go before him so that if he follows closely
enough he will see neither the surrounding emptiness nor the discouraging re-
mainder of the way ahead. After they have crossed the bridge,
Hsin-mei jokingly asked, "Hey, Miss Sun, was it that you were in front to lead him
or was he behind just to take care of you?" It thus dawned on Hung-chien that his
cowardice might not have been detected; being behind Miss Sun after all admitted
of two explanations. So he hurriedly answered, "Oh yes, Miss Sun led me across."
For her, this was not a lie, so she was not about to debate it. But to the others, it
seemed more like humbleness on Hung-chien's part. Vanity had prodded him to
make a statement of fact in order to cover up the truth. (p. I44)
The last sentence, ridiculous at first sight, is nevertheless a totally accurate observa-
tion. Fang's trick is not verbal but situational:2' volunteering the true answer is all it
takes to lead the listeners onto the wrong track. Thus, what he wants to hide he
shows, and ultimately succeeds in hiding.
What appear to be minor linguistic twists sometimes have resounding effects. In
indirectly bragging about his "professional" standing by explaining his relationship
with Bertrand Russell, a quack philosopher declares at a party, "Yes, we're friends.
Actually, he thinks enough of me to have me answer quite a few of his queries." To
this, the narrator adds the comment: "Heaven knows that was not just a lot of bull
from Ch'u Shen-ming" (p. 89). The most common usage of the construction "Heav-
en knows," by itself or followed by a noun clause embodying a question, is that the
object (expressed or implied) of knows remains an unknown. The reader encounter-

21 For a brief treatment of context of situation, kvist et al. (eds.), Linguistics and Style (London:
see, e.g., John Spencer & Michael J. Gregory, "An Oxford Univ. Press, I964), pp. 99-I02; also in
Approach to the Study of Style" in Nils Erik En- Freeman (n. 5 above), pp. 9I-93.

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 CH'IEN CHUNG-SHU'S NOVEL WEI-CH'ENG 441

ing this clause anticipates uncertainty. However, if the noun clause involves no in-
terrogative element, the reader expects what "Heaven knows" to contradict some
alleged "fact" stated previously. For, Heaven, being omniscient, knows better. In
the above passage, the narrator does not leave the truth unrevealed; he surprises his
reader by apparently confirming a preceding claim. What is more, explicit proof is
given, for the text goes on to read: "Russell did ask him when he had arrived in
England, what his plans were, and how many cubes of sugar he would like in his
tea-the sort of questions that he alone could answer" (p. 89). The statement that
Ch'u has not lied is therefore seen to be true only in a strictly technical sense. For it
is plain that, although not deceiving by word of mouth, Ch'u is indeed short of being
truthful at heart. In other words, the statement has in effect been made in the affirm-
ative: Heaven knows that was just a lot of bull from Ch'u Shen-ming. What then, the
question must arise, has been gained here in not phrasing it directly? In answer,
several points have to be noted: The narrator has first created tension on a linguistic
level, then immediately resolved it by supplying material external to the context.
The resolution itself is at face value an attempt to support a character; yet it is this
very defense that exposes him. On the other hand, Heaven knows seems at first sight
to be vouching for the veracity of an assertion, in the name of Heaven; it is as if
Heaven itself were brought to bear, were marshaled as witness. But the assertion
turns out to be a vacuous truth. All this works together to multiply the impact of the
mockery. The truly brilliant touch in the passage is the simple negation not. To see
its role, one has only to read the passage again with that one word deleted: what is
left is nothing more than the bland facts.
To be sure, narrator intrusion also figured prominently in the success of the
above passage. Here is an example of the technique of self-conscious narration
being similarly used to heighten satirical effects:
Kao Sung-nien, president of San-hi University, was an old science scholar. The posi-
tion of the word old here is extremely embarrassing; it could qualify science and it
could qualify science scholar just as well. Unfortunately the two are drastically dif-
ferent: a science scholar is like wine; the older, the more treasured. But science is
like a woman; once aged, worth hardly anything. As Chinese grammar heads toward
full development, there'll certainly come a day when "a science scholar who is old"
and "a scholar of an old science" can be clearly differentiated.... Since that point's
going to be a long time in coming, there's no harm in sloppy address at the mo-
ment. (p. I 84)

In today's parlance, the issue here is "immediacy of constituents." The possibility of

parsing the phrase lao k'o-hsii chiar in two ways is called into the narrator's literary
service to present two polar images for a character. After having made this point
clear, the narrator conservatively opts for "sloppy address." Kao is thereby denied
the likely benefit of the doubt as to which image might suit him better, his high
academic post notwithstanding. The reason for this becomes clear in the next few
lines. The readers are told that Kao is not old at heart, and that it has been some
twenty years since he last conducted research in his field of specialization. Only one
of the alternatives is left open then: Kao is a worthless scholar. Thus the narrator's
technique is to first use a purposely ill-defined label for the character; then confide
to readers the vital ambiguity; and finally, drop strong hints that resolve the formal
equivocation. While syntactic duplicity is made use of elsewhere with no accom-
panying note, here theoretical considerations are explicitly drawn into the picture,
thereby imparting a mock-seriousness to the passage.

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 442 DENNIS T. Hu

Concluding Remarks

This paper has presented an analysis of the key imageries found in Fortress Be-
sieged, showing, in the process, how the use of such imagery succeeds in bringing out
the main themes of the novel. Concentration on a small sampling of passages has
illustrated how the linguistic intricacy of the work serves crucial functions such as
thematic anticipation and multiplicity of meaning. Aside from interest in and of
themselves, both techniques-the imagery and the skillful manipulation of lan-
guage-have contributed substantially to intensifying sarcasm, satire, irony, and wit.
The above, then, could be proposed as a first characterization of the linguistic and
stylistic means whereby Ch'ien Chung-shu achieves his literary end: a caricature of
society.
Characterizing a work through its use of metaphorical language-among other
devices-is no novelty in criticism. For example, in "Fiction and the 'Analogical
Matrix,'" an acknowledged pointer in the field of linguistic-literary scholarship,
Mark Schorer concludes that "metaphorical language reveals to us the character of
any imaginative work."22 Though short of being spectacular in the present day,
Schorer's other conclusions in this essay of twenty-five years ago are remarkably
relevant to the case at hand:
Metaphorical language gives any style its special quality, and one may even suggest
... that this quality derives in part from the content of the metaphors, that quantity
shapes quality.... Metaphorical language expresses, defines, and evaluates
theme.... Metaphorical language, because it constantly strains toward symbolism,
can be in novels as in poems the basis of structure.23
The validity of the last point could well have been extended. Remarking on this and
another essay by the same author, Howard S. Babb considers Schorer's contention
to be "that the verbal texture of fiction deserves the same sort of precise analysis that
is normally reserved for poetry. "24 Essentially the same observation is made by Glen
A. Love and Michael Payne in their comments on the Watt paper mentioned above
(p. 437): "Watt applies to prose the techniques of close explication usually applied
only to poetry. "25
While these scholars have admirably demonstrated their point for samples of
Western literature, I hope this paper has shown how the same line of inquiry can be
pursued in the case of the novel Fortress Besieged. Undoubtedly, for an investiga-
tion has thus far not been fully established. This paper modestly performs, there-
fore, a task long to be accomplished in the study of significant Chinese fiction. In
the process of doing that, it has also found independent and substantial justification
for Hsia's two claims that opened this essay.
If Ch'ien Chung-shu's language virtually cries out for criticism through descrip-
tive and interpretive linguistics, and in so demanding a way that the material might
as well have been made for the method, it is tempting to suggest that this approach
may be the approach to writers of his caliber. In a much broader perspective, then,
one implication of this study is that linguistic-literary techniques are more than
useful in Chinese prose criticism. Thus, there are distinct advantages to availing
oneself of Western learning in the study of Chinese literature. Fortuitously, this

22 In Babb (n. 17 above), p. 352. 25 Contemporary Essays on Style: Rhetoric, Linguis-

23 Ibid., pp. 35If tics, and Criticism (Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Fores-
24 Ibid., p. 338. man, I969), p. 266.

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CH'IEN CHUNG-SHU'S NOVEL WEI-CH'ENG 443

would answer, at least in part, the query so well posed and sharply put by Ch'ien
Chung-shu in the passage quoted as epigraph to this paper.26

26 The passage is found in Wei-ch'eng, p. 8.

GLOSSARY

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