Ch'ien seems to have abandoned the writing of his earlier vitriolic works and restricted himself to literary scholarshipHis most significant post-1949 work has been Annotated Selection of Sung Poetry (Sung-shib hsiian-chu), which was published in 1958Later he headed a team of scholars responsible for the writing of the T'ang and Sung sections of a history of Chinese literatureIn 1974 it was widely rumored that he had diedHsia to write a memorial essay, "In Memory of MrCh'ien Chung-shu" (Chui-nien Ch'ien Chung-shu hsien-sheng) ~6 Ch'ien, how ever, is alive and well and has been "resurrected" after the fall of the Gang of FourHis recent activities include visits to Rome in the fall of 1978 and to the United States in the spring of 1979 as a member of Chinese academic delegationsWhile he was in Italy, he talked with three scholars who were translating or had translated Fortress Besieged into French, Czech, and RussianYang Chiang was a member of a Chinese delegation in Paris while her husband was in AmericaHer most recent publication was a Chinese translation of Don Quixote in 1978, and it is now in its second printing
In 1979 Ch'ien published a book containing four studies, one on Chinese painting and Chinese poetry dating back to the 1930s and the other three essays written since 1949 (including one on Lin Shu, which was partially translated by George Kao and published in Renditions)Also in 1979 a new edition of Annotated Selection of Sung Poetry with thirty additional notes was published
Ch'ien's most important publication in 1979, however, is a mammoth work of over one million words entitled Kuan-chui pien, in four volumesEach section focuses on one major classical Chinese work: I ching, Shib ching, Chuang-tzu, Lieh-tzu, Shib-chi, Tso-chuan, and the complete pre T'ang proseAltogether ten studies, both philological and comparative (Western), comprising the four divisions of ching, shib, tzu, and chi, are written in a style more elegant and archaic than that of On the Art of PoetryCh'ien wanted to show the world that there is at least one person in China who can write in this style and has not broken with the old tradition; he also hoped to inspire younger Chinese everywhere to study the Chinese pastKuan-chui pien, Ch'ien believes, will be his masterworkthesis, On the Art of Poetry, and Annotated Selection of Sung Poetry are all works of solid scholarshipThe first represents meticulous research; the second contains many references to Western poetics from Plato to the Abb~ Bremond and an honest evaluation of Chinese poets and their shortcomings; and the preface to the third is a masterpiece of literary analysis Apart from these works, Ch'ien is primarily a satirist in his essays and short storiesFor example, the first essay in Marginalia of Life is "Satan Pays an Evening Visit to MrCh'ien Chung-shu" (Mo-kuei yeh fang Ch'ien Chung-shu hsien-sheng), a satire on man through the super natural, the targets being hypocrisy and ignoranceIn "On Laughter and Humor" (Shuo hsiao), he attacks those lacking humor; he mocks and scorns false champions of moraFortress Besiegedlity in "Those Who Moralize" (T'an chiao-hsun); he chides the hypocrites in "Men of Letters" (Lun wen-jen) and literary charlatans in "Illiteracy" (Shih wen-mang)In a similar vein, his vitriolic fire is also apparent in his short stories, most notably in "Inspiration" (Ling kan), a satiric and harsh attack on the writing profession itself and a lampoon on a number of well-known literary figuresLampooning as much as he does in Men, Beasts, and Ghosts, he is also a fine writer of psychological insightHis story "Cat" (Mao) is a good example of marital strife which mars the happiness of a certain Li familyEven finer than "Cat" is "Souvenir" (Chi nien), often considered the best story in Men, Beasts, and GhostsA study of the seduction of a lonely married woman by an air force pilot during the Sino-Japanese War, it emphasizes the heroine's feelings of guilt, fascination, revulsion, and relief toward her extramarital affairAlso well done is the story's ironic endingAfter the pilot dies in action, the woman's husband, not knowing of his wife's infidelity and impregnation by the pilot, suggests that they commemorate the dead pilot by naming the baby after him, if it is a boy
Fortress Besieged, however, remains the best of Ch'ien's pre-1949 worksStructured in nine chapters, it is a comedy of manners with much picaresque humor, as well as a scholar's novel, a satire, a commentary on courtship and marriage, and a study of one contemporary man
The nine chapters can be divided into four sections, or what Roland Barthes calls "functional sequences": 9 Section I (chapters 1?4); Section II (chapter 5); Section III (chapters 6?8); and Section IV (chapter 9)Section I begins with the story of Fang Hung-chien, who is returning to China from Europe in 1937; continues with his brief visit to his hometown, Wushi, and his experience in Shanghai; and concludes with his accepting a teaching appointment at the newly established San Lii University in the interiorSection II is relatively short and centers on the trials and tribulations Fang Hung-chien and others encounter in their journey to the university; Section III highlights in vivid color the true story of Chinese pseudo-intellectuals within the confines of an academic environment; and Section IV details the trivial misunderstandings between Fang Hung-chien and his bride and ends with the dissolution of their marriage
In each of the four sections, Ch'ien Chung-shu emphasizes the hero's experiences from hope through frustration to defeat; a functional unit in itself, each section has its own curve of hope, frustration, and defeatFurthermore, Section I serves as a microcosm for the other sectionsThe theme of "besiegement" is seen in Ch'ien Chung-shu's description of the various types of pressures closing in on Fang Hung-chien in Section I; the pressures are amplified in Sections II and III and concretized in Section IVTraits of character that we are to know in excruciating detail for tens of pages are unmistakably sketched in a fewFang's ineffectualness as a person in Section I clearly hints at the failures that are to haunt him in later
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