Chapter 2 Section 1 What is a class book?

There is an idiom in ancient my country: "Opening a book is beneficial."This is what Emperor Song Taizong Zhao Guangyi said.Song Taizong had to read three volumes of "Yu Lan" every day. If he was busy with things one day and missed it, he would make up for it as soon as he was free.Some people say: It is too hard to read three volumes a day due to the cold weather and short days.Song Taizong replied: "It is beneficial to read a book! Reading is not a hard thing." This is how this idiom comes from, which means that reading is beneficial.The "Yu Lan" he read, that is, "Taiping Yu Lan", is a kind of book.

So, what exactly is a class book?What is the nature and scope of the book?For a long time, there are different opinions."Song History·Yiwenzhi" compiled by the Yuan Dynasty classified political books and series books into category books; "Ming History·Yiwenzhi" compiled by Qing people also regarded series books as category books; Books are all classified as class books; "The Department of Class Books in the Catalog of Yenching University Library" even counts surname books, political books, and daily common sense books as class books.In modern treatises, some people also count the Ming Dynasty science and technology monograph "Tiangong Kaiwu" as a similar book.In short, since ancient times, due to various understandings of the nature and scope of Lienshu, opinions are very inconsistent; as to whether a certain book is Lienshu, there are also different opinions; and the boundaries are often broad.In fact, it should be narrow rather than broad. The more clearly the nature and characteristics of the book are revealed, the clearer the concept is, and it is more conducive to checking the information.

Class books have a long history, a long history and a wide variety, and are a major category of reference books in our country.It is a kind of collection and compilation of group books, which classifies and compiles various materials for checking data.Its content and form are relatively special.It lists text exegesis (interpretation of ancient books), rhetoric, and allusions, but it is not a dictionary or dictionary; it involves laws and regulations, mountains and rivers, geography, medical divination, astrology, flowers, plants, trees, animals, insects, fish, etc., but it is neither political codes, collections, etc. Kao, local chronicles, and maps are not any monographs.It includes miscellaneous biographies of classics and history, speeches of various schools of thought, and poems and essays.However, according to ancient Chinese books, it does not have a suitable department to be classified, because Leishu is neither classics, nor history, nor Zizi, nor collections, but it also contains the contents of four volumes.It is famous for miscellaneous, which is the outstanding feature of class books.Due to the extensive collection of materials, it involves all ancient books such as classics, history, zi, anthology, etc. The content includes historical facts, biographies, origins of things, evolution of political regions, system of names and objects, poems and songs, beautiful sentences in articles, idioms and allusions, and even medical divination and astrology. , as well as astronomy and geography, the sun, the moon and the stars, mountains and rivers, birds and beasts, flowers, insects and fish.It can be said that its content includes all knowledge of nature and human society, so it is very close to an encyclopedia.No wonder that when the 15th edition of "Encyclopedia Britannica" introduced Chinese encyclopedias, it cited 27 kinds of ancient Chinese books, and pointed out that "Yongle Dadian" is the largest encyclopedia in the world.But it is only an encyclopedia in ancient China, an encyclopedia in feudal society, different from modern encyclopedias.Every entry in a modern encyclopedia is always written, while ancient Chinese books only collect, select, and extract original materials, and collect and compare them by category, just like a "data collection".Therefore, Leishu has the nature of both an encyclopedia and a collection of data, and it can be said to be a combination of "encyclopedia" and "compilation of data".Furthermore, its editing method is to distinguish between categories, and the name "Leishu" comes from this.

The classishu produced and developed on the basis of traditional culture embodies the essence of Confucian culture from content to form. The world view of “response between man and nature”.Its classification is mostly divided into several major categories according to the political, economic, cultural system and social life needs of feudal society.For example, those about natural phenomena are generally divided into astronomy, geography, mountains, water, birds, animals, grass, and trees; Jubilee, criminal law, state and county, industry, people, rites, music, etc.; belonging to social life, it is divided into residence, clothing, boats, food, cloth, treasures, etc.; Several subheads.For example, in the "Heaven" department, it is often subdivided into subheads such as sky, sun, moon, stars, clouds, wind, rain, thunder, and snow; In the "music" department, it is often divided into song, dance, qin, zither, drum, xiao, sheng, flute and other subheads; in the "residence" department there are palaces, halls, and buildings. , pavilions, pavilions, platforms, gardens, etc.The content and classification methods of these departments fully reflect the characteristics of the social outlook in the feudal era.When we look up class books, we must first understand their ordering style and size categories, know which department the allusions of the materials to be checked belong to, and then search according to the department.Most of the materials collected in general books are divided into major categories first, followed by subheadings; stories are listed first, poems and prose are listed second; classics, histories, sons, collections or eras are the order.Tang, Song, Ming, and Qing books are divided into categories, which are similar with minor differences.For example, "Yiwenleiju" has a "Sui Shi Department", and "Taiping Yulan" has a "Time Series Department", both of which compile articles about the four seasons. "Yiwenleiju" has "state and county department", "Taiping Yulan" also has "state and county department", and "Ancient and Modern Book Collection" does not have the name of "state and county department", but "Fangyu Compilation" has "Zhifangdian" The content received is exactly the same.The capital of general books has a general heading by category, indicating the number of books.To check the category of books, first look at the general catalog, see what categories this book has, and then determine which category the materials to be checked belong to, and then find out the volumes, and then search.

There are several types of class books: Judging from the genre of the compilation, the earliest form is about events, such as "Huang Lan"; Some are compiled into rhymes, such as "Children's Learning Stories Qionglin"; Judging from the situation of compiling books: there are official editors who use the power of the state to concentrate manpower and material resources to compile large-scale books; there are literati and scholars who compile and print books for poetry and writing; After the establishment of bookstores, bookstores also edited books. Judging from the method of cataloging books, classification is the main form, and most books are cataloged in the form of classification.Later, a method of cataloging according to rhyme using the "dictionary" style was invented.This kind of books has lost the form of classification, but still has the essence of encyclopedias and data compilations; therefore, books without classification are still classified as books, such as the most famous "Yongle Dadian".There are also those that are cataloged with numbers, and that gather facts based on numbers, such as "Primary School Blue Pearl"; there are very few such books, so I won't introduce them here.

For the convenience of discussion, from the nature of the content of Leishu, we summarize Leishu into two categories according to the scope of its collection and compilation: (1) Compilation of various materials, mountains and seas, and comprehensive types of general books-this is the authentic book of books, that is, comprehensive books. (2) Only one category of specialized books—this is another type of books, that is, specialized books.

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