Let’s talk about Ji Xiaolan. Nowadays, there are endless TV series about Ji Xiaolan and He Shen. In the drama, Ji Xiaolan is upright, witty, handsome, and free and easy, which is in sharp contrast to the slippery, unlearned and unskilled He Shen. Ji Xiaolan gets along well with He Shen, always teasing his opponent and making him make a fool of himself, and is always able to turn danger into safety and successfully avoid retaliation from He Shen. The audience couldn't help laughing and felt deeply happy after watching it. But, what is Ji Xiaolan’s true appearance in history? Ji Xiaolan (1724-1805), named Yun, Xiaolan is his given name, was born in Xian County, Hejian (now Cang County, Hebei). According to historical records, he was witty, funny, agile, and talented throughout his life. He left many funny words to future generations and was known as a "romantic talent" and a "humor master." He was a famous scholar, poet, bibliographer and novelist in the Qing Dynasty. Overall, his life differed greatly from his folklore and screen image. In popular folklore and TV dramas, the relationship between Ji Xiaolan and Qianlong is very harmonious, full of trust, ridicule and humor. This is an embellished description, and this was not the case historically. In fact, Ji Xiaolan was just a literary poet cultivated by Qianlong. This starts with Ji Xiaolan’s appearance. In folklore, Ji Xiaolan's image is suave and talented; on the screen, Ji Xiaolan's image, which is basically "monopolized" by Zhang Guoli, is quite reasonable. This is not the case at all. According to historical records, Ji Xiaolan was "ugly and short-sighted." The so-called "sleeping" means ugly appearance; the so-called "short-sighted" means short-sightedness. In addition, Zhu Gui, who has been friends with Ji Xiaolan for decades, once wrote a poem describing Ji Xiaolan like this: Zong Bocha from Hejian stuttered and was good at writing books. Immerse yourself in the four libraries and draw thousands of records. So, Ji Xiaolan still has a stuttering problem. Of course, since Ji Xiaolan was able to pass all levels of imperial examinations, during which an interrogator checked her physical appearance and speaking ability through dialogue, visual inspection, etc., so as not to affect the "image" of the court ceremony when she went to court, she should not be so ugly that she can't be seen. But no matter what, there is no doubt that Ji Xiaolan is not good-looking. Ugly, short-sighted, and stuttering, these physical characteristics have become important reasons why Ji Xiaolan has been separated from Qianlong throughout his life and cannot be truly trusted by Qianlong. Some background knowledge needs to be introduced here. Ji Xiaolan's official fate was controlled by Qianlong. Qianlong is a famous "holy lord" in Chinese history. He was also an emperor who grew up in a palace since childhood and had many strange habits. For Ji Xiaolan, the most important thing about Qianlong was the employment standards for his ministers. He not only required these people to be alert, agile, smart and capable, but also handsome, young and beautiful. For example, He Shen, Wang Jie, Yu Minzhong, Dong Gao, Liang Guozhi, Fu Changan and others are all among the best "beautiful men", so they are highly used. It goes without saying that Heshen is beautiful. Even Fu Changan was favored in Qianlong's later years. On the one hand, it was because he followed Heshen wholeheartedly and became his best friend. Another important reason was because he was young and beautiful. Macartney, the British envoy who once came to China, recorded in his book that Fu Changan was very heroic and a typical aristocratic and beautiful boy. Your appearance is determined by God, there is no way to choose. The ugly Ji Xiaolan happened to meet Qianlong again, so no matter how talented he was, it was difficult for him to get real attention and participate in major political decisions. He could only rely on writing to make a living. Ji Xiaolan could only be Qianlong's Ci minister, but it was difficult for him to be Qianlong's favorite and important minister. In his life, Ji Xiaolan served as examiner of the rural examination twice, as examiner of the national examination six times, and as minister of the Ministry of Rites three times, which are all manifestations of this kind of fate. This kind of official position has no real power and is just a decoration of the Qing court. Even though Qianlong sent him to the Metropolitan Procuratorate, and he should have been punished for his poor judgment in the case, Qianlong said: "Ji Xiaolan, who was appointed this time, is a useless and rotten scholar. He was just making up a number. Besides, he is not familiar with the names of criminal punishments." He was short-sighted... The mistakes he made were excusable." This shows Ji Xiaolan's status in his mind. In fact, appearance is just a superficial reason. There is a deeper reason for the estrangement between Ji Xiaolan and Qianlong, and that is: in essence, an autocratic monarch will not like intellectuals with a little personality and a sense of justice. On one occasion, Yin Zhuangtu, a cabinet scholar, pointed out Chen's bad government, saying that the provincial governors "have a bad reputation and the officials are ineffective. I passed through various provinces and asked about the quality of officials, and people frowned and sighed. This is generally the same in all provinces." Because these words offended Qianlong, who was already old and could no longer listen to honest advice, the military minister wanted to have Yin Zhuangtu beheaded. Yin Zhuangtu's father, Yin Songlin, and Ji Xiaolan were Jinshi in the same year. When Ji Xiaolan planned to intercede for Yin Zhuangtu, Qianlong became furious and immediately cursed: "I think you are excellent in literature, so I entrusted you with Sikushu. It's really nothing." It turns out that when the emperor asked Ji Xiaolan to compile the "Sikuquanshu", he did not really regard him as an important official in his own right, but just as an actor to relieve the emperor's boredom. In the first century BC, the great historian Sima Qian made Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty furious and was brutally tortured because he spoke a few words for Li Ling. Sima Qian learned from the painful experience and said: "Literary and historical chronology is almost a matter of divination. It is just a matter of teasing by the emperor and advocating excellent animals, which is underestimated by popular customs." More than 1,800 years later, Ji Xiaolan faced the same situation: in the autocratic world In front of imperial power, it is difficult for an intellectual to have dignity. Facing Qianlong's accusations, Ji Xiaolan could only swallow her anger.
I think such a scene would never appear in a TV series, right? As Mr. Deng Zhicheng, an expert on Qing history, said, Qianlong's employment was "based on appearance. Wenda (i.e. Ji Xiaolan) was short-sighted and short-sighted, and he was from Jiangbei, so he was not favored by Emperor Chun (i.e. Qianlong). At that time, Weng Tanxi and Zhu Zhujun were like , Wang Lanquan, and Zou Yigui were all not allowed to serve in official positions, and their circumstances were quite similar. Emperor Chun promised that they were bright and sensitive people, and they promoted them to governors. For example, Wen Xiang, Liang Wending, and Dong Wengong were all promoted as jesters." Using appearance as the criterion for selecting talents is a historical tragedy. As mentioned above, Ji Xiaolan's status in Qianlong's mind was nothing more than this. So, from Ji Xiaolan's side, how does he understand his situation? Throughout his life, Ji Xiaolan served as an editor of the Hanlin Academy, an official of the daily lectures on daily life, a minister to Zuo Shuzi, a bachelor to serve as a scholar, a minister of Zhanshi Mansion, a cabinet bachelor, the prime minister's official affairs department, a minister of the Ministry of War, and a censor of Zuodu of the Imperial Procuratorate. , Minister of the Ministry of War, Minister of the Ministry of Rites, co-organizer of the University, and other officials, were granted the title of Guanglu Dafu, served as a lecturer at the banquet, and served as the direct minister of the Wenyuan Pavilion, and were given the gift of riding horses in the Forbidden City. Among them, only in the 33rd year of Qianlong's reign (1768), he was involved in the salt government deficit case because he tipped off the information to his in-laws, Lu Jianzeng, and was sent to Urumqi. However, he was recalled to the capital to serve as an official in just over two years. Therefore, in the eyes of ordinary people, Ji Xiaolan can be regarded as a person with a prosperous official career. However, Ji Xiaolan, who had been in the officialdom for a long time, did not experience much of the joy of rising to prominence. His heart was more often filled with sighs of loneliness and sadness. This can be seen from several details in Ji Xiaolan's life. Dare not write books Ji Xiaolan wrote a lot in his life, including "Sikuquanshu", "Sikuquanshu General Catalog", "Rehe Zhi", etc. compiled in his official capacity, as well as "Yuewei Thatched Cottage" written in his private capacity notes". But before Ji Xiaolan's lifetime, there were rumors circulating that he never wrote books. Some people say that Ji Xiaolan believed that his works could not surpass those of the ancients, so he did not focus on writings and did not save his works. Ji Xiaolan's disciple Liu Quanzhi said that his teacher was famous all over the world and often wrote articles for people, but they were "randomly lost and no manuscripts were kept." It turned out that Ji Xiaolan always believed that these words were just the dregs of the ancients and had no publication value. Chen He, another student of Ji Xiaolan, also said that since the teacher took charge of the compilation of "Sikuquanshu", looking at ancient and modern writings, he knew that everything that should be there was already there. No matter how hard people later worked, the writings could not go beyond the scope of the ancients. , and those who claim to be superior to the ancients are simply overestimating their abilities. Therefore, Ji Xiaolan "never wrote a book in his life". He occasionally wrote prefaces, tablets and other texts for others, but they were immediately discarded without being preserved. Chen He said with emotion that some people now occasionally write something small and then show it around, eager to show it off. How shameless! Jiang Fan, a great scholar in the Qing Dynasty, said in his "Historical Records of Sinology" that Ji Xiaolan spent all his energy on the "Summary of the General Catalog of Sikuquanshu" and also liked to write some novels about barnyard officials, so he was "too lazy to write books". The writings he wrote during his youth were hidden at home and have never been circulated to the world. According to Ji Xiaolan's own statement, it is slightly different from the above. Ji Xiaolan once said in his later years, "I studied poetry in my early years. During this period, I was very high-spirited and sang with people all over the world. I was always unwilling to be left behind. Now that I am almost 80 years old, I have turned to shrinking and dare not say a word. What I have written in my life I dare not keep my manuscripts by myself." He said this was because as his experience increased, he looked back at his proud works and found that most of them were things that the ancients had already said. His hard work in writing was just in vain. Judging from Ji Xiaolan's words, he did not "never write a book". In his early years, he still had the courage to recite poems and write poems. However, later he gradually gained a deeper understanding of the world he lived in and became less and less afraid to engage in writing. And I don’t dare to save my manuscript. To say that he stopped writing because he was afraid of not being able to surpass the ancients seems to be a very reluctant reason. There is also a huge social and political background behind this reason, that is, the strengthening of ideological control during the Qianlong period, and literary prisons were common. Literary inquisition in the Qing Dynasty concentrated in the Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong periods, which were known as the prosperous times. Among them, the famous ones were Zhuang's "History of the Ming Dynasty" prison and Dai Mingshi's "Nanshan Collection" prison during the Kangxi period. During the Yongzheng period, there were Cha Siting Prison, Lu Liuliang and Zeng Jing prisons. Among them, apart from the unwarranted charge of being imprisoned in Siting, the others are more or less taboo due to the writing. During the Qianlong period, the literary network was more strict, and most of them were made up of nothing and used topics to play off people. For example, there is Hu Zhongzaoji, a cabinet bachelor. There are two lines in Hu Zhongzao's poems that aroused Qianlong's sensitivity. One sentence is "One's heart can judge the turbidity and the purity". Qianlong believed that it was disrespectful to deliberately add the turbidity to the name of the Qing Dynasty. The other sentence is "The old Buddha is not sick now, and the court can't open the door to hear it". Qianlong thought this was It is a satire that he does not open the door and does not admit talents. And because Hu Zhongzao once asked the question "There are three lines of Qian that are not like dragons" when he was in Guangxi's academic administration, Qianlong thought that dragon and long had the same pronunciation, which was a slander against his reign name. Qianlong relied on these strong excuses to kill Hu Zhongzao. Most of the literary inquisitions during the Qianlong dynasty were like this. As a Ci official of Qianlong, Ji Xiaolan was naturally deeply aware of these literary inquisitions. At the same time, Ji Xiaolan and his colleagues also suffered from the embarrassment caused by writing while compiling the "Sikuquanshu", and even lost their families and died. Originally, when carrying out such a large cultural project, some mistakes are inevitable. As long as you try your best, correct any mistakes and improve them, that's it. It's a pity that Ji Xiaolan and the others are facing the dictatorial and meritorious Emperor Qianlong. A little imperfection can lead to death.
In the process of compiling the Siku, Chief Editor Ji Xiaolan, Lu Xixiong, and Chief Editor Lu Feiqi were scolded, submitted to the Ministry for discussion, and fined for their mistakes many times. In the end, Chief Editor Lu Xixiong died while traveling to Northeast China. On the way to school, Lu Feiqi was dismissed from his post because he could not afford the revision costs of Jiangnan Three Pavilions. He died in depression, his family property was confiscated, and his wife and children were separated. The personal experiences of his colleagues and himself will definitely bring deeper feelings to Ji Xiaolan and make him truly realize the danger of his own environment. There is an anecdote about Ji Xiaolan in "Qingbai Leichao" that is worth recalling. It is said that when Ji Xiaolan was working in the Hanlin Academy, one day he was drafting documents and his literary thoughts were exhausted, so he left the house and walked along the corridor. There was a veteran sleeping soundly in the corridor, snoring loudly. Ji Xiaolan patted the soldier awake and asked him if he slept well. The veteran said it was good. Ji Xiaolan then brought him a book to ask him to read, but the veteran said he couldn't read. Ji Xiaolan said thoughtfully at this time: "Literacy in life is the beginning of hardships. If you are illiterate, you are really happy." This anecdote may not be true, but the mentality it reflects may be different from the real Ji Xiaolan Not far. Ji Xiaolan fell in love with a pen and inkstone at the age of 4, and later embarked on an official career through writing. However, he did not expect that writing would often bring fatal disasters to people and bring him embarrassment. It is reasonable to feel this way.
Let's look back at the phenomenon of him "shrinking and not daring to say a word". Doesn't it reflect his trepidation in front of the autocratic monarch? For more information, please visit: /3601/2005/04/20/109@521503_1.htm