Chapter 77 dissent

Although Qian Mu's "Miscellaneous Memories of Teachers and Friends" records many fragments of the exchanges between Qian Mu and Chen Yinke, most of them are ordinary human exchanges in daily life, such as the reasons for their acquaintance, the teaching situation of both parties when they were teaching at Peking University, their encounters and interactions during the Anti-Japanese War, and the founding of the People's Republic of China. On the eve of Qian's visit to Chen Weiguo and others on the question of where to go, there are very few words that really speak about Chen Yinke's academics.The reason is probably due to the differences between the two in their research methods of history.

In 1931, Qian Mu taught in the History Department of Peking University.The following year, the Nationalist Government issued a decree that the general history of China was a compulsory course for universities, and Peking University then hired "specialists in the field of history in Beiping, and taught them separately in each era", and Qian Mu also took a seat.He told students in class that countless people in history said that there should be no "one line running through". "Some people say that it is inappropriate for a course of general history to be divided into multiple people, but it is not easy to ask one person to do it alone. Or let Qian take the first half, and Chen Yinke take the second half. It’s a common duty. Yu said, Yu asked himself that one person can take charge of everything alone, and don’t need to share the responsibility with others.”Qian Mu's refusal to talk about general history separately from Chen Yinke's can be seen that the two have a big ideological difference on the issue of research and governance of general history.

In the summer vacation of 1933, Meng Wentong came from Henan University to teach in the History Department of Peking University.Soon, Hu Shi, dean of the Faculty of Liberal Arts, visited Qian Mu and talked about Meng Wentong's class, "some students don't understand his language", so he will not renew his employment.Qian said, "Wen Tong's position is the history of the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties and the Sui and Tang Dynasties. Yu dare to say that, as far as I know, if Wentong resigns, at least three years will not be found for a successor. There is nothing else to say ".These remarks clearly showed Qian Mu's unspoken judgment on Chen Yinke.Because at that time, Chen Yinke should be the best candidate for studying the history of Jin Dynasty and Tang Dynasty.Therefore, Qian Mu told Hu Shi that if Meng Wentong resigned, he would not be able to hire a successor teacher, which shows that Qian Mu did not agree with Chen Yinke's work in this field.

In 1960, Qian Mu wrote a letter to Yu Yingshi, a student who was studying in the United States, discussing his opinions on his articles. The second half of the letter discussed the articles of modern scholars. He praised Zhang Taiyan, Wang Guowei, Liang Qichao, Hu Shi, and Chen Yuan. More than derogatory, but when talking about Chen Yinke, Qian Mu said: "It's like Chen Yinke, the writing is not as good as Wang (Wang Guowei), it is redundant and has many details. If three or four of each article can be deleted, it can be recited." Most of them are deep and high, pretending to be swaying, which is not suitable for studying words.