Turning Songs into Poems and Poems into Songs: Intersections of Literary Sinitic and Vernacular Korean in Chosŏn Literature

This article investigates the dynamic intersections of Literary Sinitic and vernacular Korean and their impact on the innovations in poetry and song in fifteenth- through nineteenth-century Chosŏn Korea. More specifically, it traces the evolution of poetry or song discourse and explores the different strategies employed by Chosŏn poets and songwriters to render oral songs into text. It also investigates the differing views on the function of poetry and song, musical and textual preservation, and emotional and lyrical immediacy, which influenced the composition and translation of song-poems. The article probes the creative collaboration and competition between Literary Sinitic and vernacular Korean, and the fluid relations between translation and vernacularization. On the whole, it explores the ways in which the evolution of poetry-song discourse and the ensuing literary innovations contributed to Chosŏn's complex linguistic ecology.

Tea Bowl with Decoration of Standing Cranes (Tachizuru): Made-to-order Ceramics Produced in the Japan House Kilns

The Japan House (Korean: waegwan; Japanese: wakan) in the port city of Pusan, was a Japanese outpost during the Chosŏn dynasty. In the period 1639 to 1718, the Sō clan of Tsushima, commissioned made-to-order ceramics here, reflecting Japanese requirements, and a long-standing Japanese enthusiasm for kōrai chawan (“Korean tea bowls”), as demanded by the tea authorities in Japan. The focus of this paper is a group of tea bowls with decoration of standing cranes, the most representative type of made-to-order tea bowls produced at the Japan House kilns. Historical records and recent excavations of kiln sites have revealed that the type of tea bowl with standing crane design enjoyed popularity and continued to be produced until the closure of the Japan House kilns. A bowl of the deep, cylindrical shape adheres closely to early Koryŏ prototypes, while its notched foot resembles those of soft porcelain bowls made for ritual use. The subject of its design motif can be traced back to the ubiquitous cranes of Koryŏ inlaid celadon. The ethereal crane, traditionally associated with longevity, was popular in East Asian pictorial culture. The standing crane design on this type of tea bowl displays a combination of influences from the crane painting by the Southern Song painter Muqi (act. ca. 1240-75) and its reinterpretation by the Kano painters. This paper seeks to define the characteristics of the Japan House kiln products by examining its best-known type of tea bowl with decoration of standing cranes. It elucidates how the tea bowl with standing crane design is clearly not an imitation of early Koryŏ celadon but shows a range of decorative styles that reflect the tastes of the Edo-period daimyo tea world. While adapted to the tastes of Japanese consumers, the tea bowl with standing crane design produced at the Japan House kilns display influences from regional kilns in Chosŏn Korea. In this light, the type of tea bowl with decoration of standing cranes manifests a hybrid state of shifting boundaries and demarcations where Japanese and Korean influences coexisted and encountered with difference.

East Asian Cartographic Print Culture

Alexander Akin examines how the expansion of publishing in the late Ming dynasty prompted changes in the nature and circulation of cartographic materials in East Asia. Focusing on mass-produced printed maps, this book investigates a series of path-breaking late sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century works in genres including geographical education, military affairs, and history, analysing how maps achieved unprecedented penetration among published materials, even in the absence of major theoretical or technological changes like those that transformed contemporary European cartography. By examining contemporaneous developments in neighboring Choson Korea and Japan, the study demonstrates the crucial importance of considering the broader East Asian sphere in this period as a network of communication and publication, rather than as discrete units with separate cartographic histories. It also reexamines the place of the Jesuits in this context, arguing that in printing maps on Ming soil they should be seen as participants in the local cartographic publishing boom and its trans-regional repercussions.

Confucianism and Rituals for Women in Chosŏn Korea

This essay offers an analysis of the writing and practices of Song Siyŏl as a way to explore the philosophical concepts and philosophizing process of Confucian ritual in relation to women. As a symbolic and influential figure in Korean philosophy and politics, his views contributed to shaping the orthodox interpretation of the theory and practice of Neo-Confucian ritual regarding women. By demonstrating and analyzing what kinds of issues were discussed in terms of women in four family rituals, I delineate the ways in which Song Siyŏl positioned women in his ritualist metaphysics and to examine his philosophizing process.

竹香《花鳥花卉草蟲圖帖》及妓生的繪畫知識

<p>本研究以朝鮮時代樂歌舞表演的主要演出者，同時也熟悉繪畫創作及鑑賞的妓生為研究對象，旨在闡明其繪畫特徵、繪畫知識的水準，並客觀將其置於朝鮮時代藝術史上。為達此研究目標，本文首先分析了竹香《花鳥花卉草蟲圖》13帖（國立中央博物館藏）的畫題。竹香《花鳥花卉草蟲圖》13帖的畫題，大多摘取自中國花鳥畫大家或著名詩人的詩句。竹香熟知中國書籍，能自由運用中國題畫詩於自身畫作中，又懂得分析自身畫作與中國題畫詩的關係，靈活摘取詩句於畫題中。竹香摘取中國詩人或畫家的詩，代表已具有一定程度的繪畫知識水準，能將之運用於自身畫作的畫題中。</p> <p> 竹香何以摘取中國詩人的題畫詩或詩句為畫題？竹香為強調自己是喜歡寫生的畫家，特意選用錢選的詩。竹香引用中國題畵詩，是為了表示自己從小在平壤即是喜歡寫生的畫家，也是水準相當高的畫家。其原因在於希望自己的畫作，被當代社會認可為是追求文人畫風的作品。此外，竹香也透過畫題表現官妓的生命。妓生求愛而不可得，終遭背棄的生命哀愁，亦發生在竹香身上。此外，她也表達了以官妓身分出席宴會，從中感受到的空虛與寂寥。儘管官妓出身，身分低賤，竹香仍想表現個人心性的孤高。因此對竹香而言，畫題是表達自己身為作家的生命、身為妓生的生命最適合的媒介</p> <p>&nbsp;</p><p>This study explores what characteristics paintings by female entertainers(妓生, Kisaeng) who not only was mainly charge of singing and dancing performances but skilled at paintings and appreciation of them in Chosŏn Korea have and how abreast of them they are. To this end, this study shed lights on Poem describing the painting(畫題) in an 13-page long album with flowers, birds, plant and insects(花鳥花卉草蟲圖) at National museum of Korea. This Haojae(畫題) was a good medium for Chukhyang(竹香) to show her life as a painter and kisaeng. </p> <p>&nbsp;</p>