Cu hulu
{{short description|Chinese novella}}
{{Infobox book
|name = Cu hulu
|title_orig = {{noitalic|{{lang|zh-Hant|醋葫蘆}}}}
|translator =
|image =
|caption =
|author =
|illustrator =
|cover_artist =
|country = China (Ming dynasty)
|language = Chinese
|series =
|genre =
|release_date = Early 17th-century
|english_release_date =
|media_type = Print
|pages =
}}
{{Infobox Chinese|title=Cu hulu|t=醋葫蘆|s=醋葫芦|l=vinegar calabash|p=Cù húlu|mi={{IPAc-cmn|c|u|4|-|h|u|2|l|u|5}}}}
Cu hulu ({{lang-zh|t=醋葫蘆}}), known in English as The Jealous Wife,{{Sfn|Wu|1988|p=371}} is a Chinese novella written in the Ming dynasty by an unknown author.
Plot
Having unsuccessfully tried for 40 years to conceive with her henpecked husband Cheng Gui ({{lang|zh|成珪}}), Dushi ({{lang|zh|都氏}}) finally permits him to have a concubine. Unfortunately, Cheng finds a woman with an "impenetrable vagina".{{Sfn|Moore|2013|p=447}} After discovering that Cheng is having an affair with their maidservant, Dushi flogs her to apparent death.{{Sfn|Wu|1988|p=372}} However, the woman survives and Cheng arranges for her to stay with his friend.{{Sfn|Wu|1988|p=372}} She subsequently gives birth to a boy, while Dushi is cheated of her money by her godson and sent to Hell. Dushi eventually repents and makes amends with her maidservant.{{Sfn|Wu|1988|p=372}}
Publication history
Comprising twenty chapters, the novella was written by an unknown author using the pseudonym "Fucijiao zhu" ({{lang|zh|伏雌教主}}), variously translated into English as "Bishop of the Women-Taming Sect",{{Sfn|Wu|1988|p=371}} "Master of Female Submission",{{Sfn|Vitiello|1994|p=41}} "Master of the Doctrine of Subduing Women",{{Sfn|McMahon|1995|p=303}} or "The Founder of the Teaching on Capitulation to Women",{{Sfn|Lomová|2003|p=272}} while the "Moon-Heart Master of the Drunken West Lake" ({{lang|zh|醉西湖心月主人}}) wrote a preface to Cu hulu.{{Sfn|McMahon|1987|p=229}} The novella was published sometime between 1639 and 1640 by the publishing house {{proper name|Bigeng shanfang}} ({{lang|zh|筆耕山房}}).{{Sfn|Vitiello|1994|p=41}} An original edition is housed in the National Archives of Japan.{{Sfn|McMahon|1995|p=303}}
Analysis
The title of the novella, Cu hulu ({{lang|zh|醋葫蘆}}), literally means "Calabash of Vinegar", recalling a Chinese expression for being jealous: "eating vinegar" ({{Transliteration|zh|chī cù}} {{lang|zh|吃醋}}).{{Sfn|McMahon|1995|p=75}} The protagonist of Cu hulu is a shrew whose surname, Dù ({{lang|zh|都}}), is a homophone for the Chinese word for jealousy ({{lang|zh|妒}} dù).{{Sfn|Wu|1988|p=372}} According to Yenna Wu, the "elaborate descriptions of tortures in the underworld" in Cu hulu were inspired by similar scenes in Stories to Caution the World by Feng Menglong.{{Sfn|Wu|1999|p=51}} Keith McMahon suggests that the author intended for Cu hulu to be an "attack on polygamy".{{Sfn|McMahon|1995|p=81}}
References
=Citations=
{{Reflist|20em}}
=Bibliography=
{{refbegin}}
- {{cite book|title=Recarving the Dragon: Understanding Chinese Poetics|first=Olga|last=Lomová|publisher=Charles University in Prague|year=2003|isbn=9788024606910}}
- {{cite journal|title=Eroticism in Late Ming, Early Qing Fiction: The Beauteous Realm and the Sexual Battlefield|first=Keith|last=McMahon|journal=T'oung Pao|pages=217–264|publisher=Brill|year=1987|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4528390|doi=10.1163/156853287x00032|volume=73|issue=4|jstor=4528390 |pmid=11618220 |url-access=subscription}}
- {{cite book|title=Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists: Sexuality and Male-female Relations in Eighteenth-century Chinese Fiction|first=Keith|last=McMahon|isbn=9780822315667|year=1995|publisher=Duke University Press}}
- {{cite book|title=The Novel: An Alternative History, 1600―1800|first=Steven|last=Moore|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing USA|isbn=9781623565190|year=2013}}
- {{cite book|title=Exemplary Sodomites: Male Homosexuality in Late Ming Fiction|first=Giovanni|last=Vitiello|year=1994|publisher=University of California Press}}
- {{cite journal|title=The Inversion of Marital Hierarchy: Shrewish Wives and Henpecked Husbands in Seventeenth-Century Chinese Literature|first=Yenna|last=Wu|journal=Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies|number=2|volume=48|pages=363–382|publisher=Harvard-Yenching Institute|doi=10.2307/2719314|date= December 1988|jstor=2719314 }}
- {{cite book|title=Ameliorative Satire and the Seventeenth-century Chinese Novel, Xingshi Yinyuan Zhuan-marriage as Retribution, Awakening the World|year=1999|first=Yenna|last=Wu|isbn=9780773479562|publisher=E. Mellen Press}}
{{refend}}
Category:17th-century Chinese novels
Category:Ming dynasty literature
Category:Works published under a pseudonym
Category:Works of unknown authorship