Jottings from the Granite Studio

Wang Fuzhi (王夫之, 1619–1692, courtesy name, Ernong 而农, he also styled himself Chuanshan 船山) was witness to a calamity — the fall of the Ming Empire first to the bandit armies of Li Zicheng and subsequently to the Manchu ‘peacekeeping forces’ under the regent Dorgon.  He became active in the anti-Manchu resistance and when the last of the Ming claimants proved unable to restore a Chinese emperor to the throne, Wang “retired” in  his early-30s, living  in the hills of Hunan province, and devoting himself to a life of writing and scholarship.  So virulent were his writings attacking the Manchus that his essays and books went unpublished for nearly 200 years, until Wang was “rediscovered” in the latter half of the 19th century when his particular brand of anti-Manchuism seemed a useful complement to more recently imported and adapted ideas of ethnic-nationalism.  The fact that philosophically, Wang espoused a form of materialism, guaranteed that while nearly unknown in his own time, he would be well-remembered in ours.

This is Wang Fuzhi in high dudgeon:

“Now even the ants have rulers who preside over territory of their nests, and when red ants or flying white ants penetrqate their gates, the ruler