You Xian Ku

You Xian Ku or Youxian ku (Chinese: 遊仙窟 ; translated as "A Visit to a Fairy Cave", "Cavern of the Disporting Fairies" or "Journey to the Immortals' Grotto") is a Chinese tale from the Tang dynasty, written by Zhang Zhuo (張鷟, also known as Zhang Wencheng 張文成) (658–730). It is one of the most noted works of chuanqi fiction (唐人傳奇).

Cover of a modern copy of the book You Xian Ku

Pages of a printed edition of You Xian Ku

The text, depends on the editions, has around 10,000 characters,^[1] making it one of the longer early Tang chuanqi literature. The text's composition has been dated to between 681 and 684 in the late 7th-century.^[2]

Story

Zhang Zhuo (Chinese: 張鷟, born 658–730 CE), bestowed the honorary name of Wencheng (文成), was a Tang dynasty jinshi, a former imperial censor (御史), and a native of Luze, Shenzhou (now Shenxian 深縣 county, Hebei province).

You Xian Ku is a story of the author's purported first-hand account visiting Heyuan (now Qinghai province, Xinghai county), passing through Jishi (積石) mountain. "The days turn to nights, and the road is far. The horse is weary and the man tired" (日晚途遙, 馬疲人乏). He stayed in the fairy grotto and met two women by chance: Cui Shi Niang (崔十娘) and Wu Sao (五嫂), a widow. There they drank wine, wrote poetry, flirted, and joked around.

The text is written in a mixture of different styles, including pianwen (parallel prose) and bianwen, and it features rhymes and is leisurely in tone.^{[lower-alpha 1]}

Some scholars called the work a "new form of novel" (新體小說).^{[citation needed]} You Xian Ku can be considered as one of the Tang dynasty's earliest romances, based on the wanton lives of prostitutes first met by Tang scholars. It has had a profound influence on the love stories and romance novels written by later generations of writers. The work's popularity in Japan also proved to be enormous. According to the Old Book of Tang, every time Japan sent an envoy to China during the Tang dynasty, they had to pay a lot to buy copies of the book. In the late Qing dynasty, the book was reprinted and sent back to China.

In Bai Xianyong's (白先勇) novel Crystal Boys, the chapter "Journey to the Goblin Cave" (You Yao Ku, 遊妖窟) is a parody of You Xian Ku.^[3]

Illustrations of scenes from You Xian Ku

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See also

• The Tale of Genji
• Chuanqi

Notes

1. Poem text:

   天上無雙，人間有一。

   依依弱柳，束作腰支；

   焰焰橫波，翻成眼尾。

   才舒兩頰，孰疑地上無華；

   乍出雙眉，漸覺天邊失月。

References

1. "中国古代文学要籍简介（四）：文言小说集". 《游仙窟》是用第一人称手法，用一万余字的骈文详细铺陈了一场华丽的艳遇。
2. Lucas, Aude (2023). Rêves de la littérature de divertissement en Chine impériale tardive (in French). De Gruyter. p. 130. ISBN 9783110749427. Youxian ku fut composé (entre 681 et 684)
3. 李奭學：《人妖之間——從張鷟的〈遊仙窟〉看白先勇的〈孽子〉》，《中國文哲研究通訊》（中央研究院）第15卷第4期（2006年3月），頁135-150.