Проблемы литератур Дальнего Востока. Часть 1

Секция 2 • Panel 2 Проблемы литератур Дальнего Востока. Т. 1. 2018 200 and brought before Han Xin. Han Xin honored Li Zuohe and revered him as a teacher, highly estimating his merits and acknowledging that his advises, if have being followed, would have brought Zhao the victory. Later Li Zuoche became Han Xin’s counselor and led him to a great success in war [for more detailed records about Li Zuoche q. v. “Shi ji” ( ਢ䁈 . Grand scribe's record), juan 92, — 18 , V. 2, 1158–1161] and Han Shu ( ╒ᴨ , Han history), juan 34, — 11 , V. 2, 853–856]. The fact that none other than Li Zuoche was the very Hail God is stated in both novelettes and especially stressed in the epilogue of the second. But what can connect the sage of antiquity with the drop- ping hail chore? Apparently a coincidence: foremost, the real location of Li Zuoche’s grave is unidentified, whilst quite a number of his graves can be found in towns and villages of Hebei, Henan, Shandong provinces. One of the places, where he suppos- edly spent his last years, is associated with a small spot in Shandong called Baoquan ( 䴩⋹ ) that is the Chinese for “Hail stream”. Later even a temple — Baoquan miao ( 䴩⋹ᔏ ) — has been erected there in Li Zuoche’s honor. Thus the name of the ancient official could be associated with the idea of hail, and he personally could have obtained those thundergodly features. The statement, quite popular today, that worship toLi Zuoche as a Hail God was quite outspread in Henan, Hebei and Shandong in previous centuries [for instance q. v. 28 ], as it was proved above, has no reliable evidence; though it becomes quite a substantial part of tourist industry of some of the mentioned regions nowadays. But still the whole thing is closely associated with those two novelettes by Pu Songling. Could Pu Songling have been the first mover of the later worship tradition? Possibly yes; we know similar cases of literary characters’ deification [q. v. 8 ], though here it is no more than a hypothesis. It cold have been a minor cult of such a god in some restricted Shangdong area (and surely with no long history or else it must have been accepted outside and become common), that became known to Pu Songling and was described by him; or the cult may have emerged after the novelettes were written — today one can only guess with no historic tradition proof provided. But the one case is doubtless — the appearance of such a deity in all-nation scope and its promotion are totally Pu Song-ling’s merits, no wonder the only source of quotation everywhere the Hail Deity is mentioned today, are tales from “Liaozhai zhiyi”. Hence far more sufficient seems the central message of these two short-stories: the militant deity, taking orders from the Heavenly Emperor himself, the former great strategist must be respectful and attentive before an outstanding talent, even if the latter is a humble mortal. That’s why the deity is to hide his vigor (“go deco- rously, not militantly”) in front of Wang Mengzhen, and generally — serve him as a courier (for it was him who delivered the invitation from Zhang Tianshi); the same conduct he must keep without the superior’s eye in front of Tang Menglai, but he doesn’t. Arrogance can not be advocated either by high rank or by the past achievements, especially when we speak of men of learning; for haven’t Li Zuoche once declared: “In a hundred plans of a sage there for sure must be one erroneous;