Transmitting, commenting and translating: an analysis of yanyi beyond the narrative paradigm

Researches on the category of yanyi have primarily focused on the corpus of fictionalized histories and historical narratives elaborated within early modern vernacular fiction and narrative. Studies in this field have privileged the relation that links the development of narrative and fiction during the Ming dynasty to the tradition of historical storytelling of earlier dynasties, to the point that the narrative paradigm has become prevalent in the definition of yanyi. While acknowledging the role played by the concept of yanyi in the narrative tradition, in my paper I will try to highlight its configuration within a “(intra-)translational” paradigm that served the pedagogical demand for a mediated form of transmission and interpretation of earlier sources directed toward a target audience. In my analysis, I will primarily focus on the definition of yanyi that can be evinced from literary sources up to the Ming dynasty, and I will then turn to the analysis of the early Ming work Shi yanyi (An Explanation of the Odes, Preface 1383) by Liang Yin (1303-1390) as a case study. This text was written by Liang Yin as a simplified version of Zhu Xi (1130-1200)’s Shi jizhuan and was addressed to young or inexperienced learners of the Odes. My analysis of this work aims at considering which principles guided the cultural transmission of its multiple sources (Shijing and Shi jizhuan) not only across the temporal dimension but also within different levels of readerships.