One

  It has been decided that tomorrow we will go to Tianyi Pavilion.

  Unexpectedly, that night, the typhoon struck, and the rain poured down, causing the entire city of Ningbo to tremble weakly. The next afternoon, when I arrived at Tianyi Pavilion, I saw that the front and back courtyards inside the main gate were all flooded. Fallen leaves floated on the water's surface, and a chilly, damp air seeped through the thick brick walls.

  It was Mr. Pei Minghai, Deputy Director of Ningbo Municipal Bureau of Culture, who accompanied me there. The old man at the gate did not expect that the director would come with guests in such weather, and he hastily borrowed a pair of rain boots from the cleaning staff for us to wear, and handed over two umbrellas. However, the water in the yard was too deep, and as soon as we stepped down, the boots were flooded, and the only solution was to simply take off our shoes, roll up our pants and wade into the water.

  Originally, my whole body had already been chilled to the bone by the wind and rain. Stepping into the water with bare feet immediately sent a shiver through me. Supporting each other, Mr. Pei Minghai and I made our way to the library, one foot high and the other low.

  I am aware of the majesty of Tianyi Pavilion, so I am willing to accept this arrangement from above, stripping away elegance and leisure, taking off my shoes, bowing humbly, stuttering with reverence, and worshiping devoutly. Today there are no other visitors here, making this ceremony seem both serene and pure.

  Two

  As a library, the Tianyi Pavilion has far exceeded its actual function. It is a symbol, and the significance of this symbol cannot be fully expressed in just a few words.

  The inheritance of human civilization is mainly based on written language. The selection and collection of written language has become books. If there were no books, the wisdom and voices of our ancestors would have long been scattered in the wind, leaving no trace. In short, without books, history would lose its continuity, and people would lose their reason for gathering together; in a smaller sense, without books, it is difficult for any individual to transcend the ordinary and become a person with vision, insight, and wisdom.

  China was the earliest to invent paper and printing. Books, which had all the conditions for production, should have been published in large quantities, collected in large quantities, and disseminated widely. However, the actual situation was not like this, it encountered too many deadly enemies.

  For example, the imperial court burned books. This is a barbaric means adopted by some rulers to implement ideological dictatorship. Unfortunately, before the advent of paper books, the tradition of burning books had already been formed, and at that time, bamboo slips, wooden tablets, and silk books were burned. From Qin Shi Huang and Li Si, Emperor Yang of Sui, Cai Jing, Qin Hui, and Zhu Di of Ming all had book-burning actions, not to mention the tragic destruction of books during the literary inquisition of the Qing dynasty.

  For example, books were destroyed in wars. In Chinese history, frequent wars led to people burning books when they fled and the occupying forces also burned books. Historical records show that during Dong Zhuo's rebellion, over 6,000 carts of books were destroyed; when the Western Wei army captured Jiangling, 140,000 volumes of books were burned in one day; at the end of the Sui dynasty, peasant uprisings led to the burning of 370,000 volumes of books; and at the end of the Tang dynasty, peasant uprisings led to the burning of 80,000 volumes of books.

  Furthermore, water and fire have also devoured books. In ancient times, many books were transported by boat, and there were instances where large quantities of books sank into the Yellow River during the late Han and early Tang dynasties. Floods have repeatedly submerged many libraries. More severe than floods are fires, such as the fire at the Chongwen Pavilion during the Song dynasty and the fire at the Wenyuan Chamber during the Ming dynasty, which reduced imperial collections to ashes. As for private book collections destroyed by fire, they are too numerous to count. Apart from water and fire, pests and mold are also irresistible natural factors that have become the bane of books.

  All these, illustrate that for a book to be preserved is extremely difficult. It is so weak and fragile, while the disasters that attack it are so strong, so fierce, and so irresistible.

  A century's accumulation can be dispersed in a single morning; three thousand miles of collection can be burned in a single evening. This situation is indeed a microcosm of the fate of civilization. In the face of the historical theme of blood, fire, and war, civilization has almost no status. Among large numbers of refugees and soldiers, the function of books is often described as: "using torn pages as pillows, burning them to cook meals." That is to say, books are only used as makeshift bedding for the homeless or as kindling for cooking fires. To preserve them amidst the hoofbeats and smoke signals is almost impossible, unless there are a few stalwart scholars who can hold on to them.

  It is easier to collect royal books on a large scale, but apart from being useful when editing dictionaries during the Ming and Qing dynasties, they are of little practical use in everyday life and are often destroyed when dynasties change. Therefore, private book collections have become an important way of cultural heritage. Private book collection is extremely difficult to collect, and there is not enough power to withstand various disasters, so it is doomed to be a tragic behavior. Knowing that the tragedy still goes forward bravely, this is the personality strength of private book collectors. This personality strength is not only theirs, but also a great will to hope for the long-term continuation of Chinese civilization, which is expressed through them.

  The Tianyi Pavilion is a physical manifestation of this desire. Among the existing ancient libraries in China, it has the longest history and is also the first in Asia. Since two Renaissance-era libraries have been preserved in Italy, which are slightly earlier than it, it ranks third in the world.

  Three

  The founder of Tianyi Pavilion, Fan Qin, was born in the early 16th century.

  If we compare it in the world coordinates, then we might as well know: two years before Fan Qin was born, Michelangelo had just completed the sculpture "David"; in the same year Fan Qin was born, Da Vinci completed the oil painting "Mona Lisa".

  Fan Qin's life, of course, cannot be like Michelangelo and Da Vinci stepping into a new era, but only showed the typical process of an excellent literary man in the Ming Dynasty. He became an official through a series of imperial examinations at a very young age and soon tasted the intrigue and turmoil of the Ming court. He was an upright, responsible, and capable official who could open up a situation wherever he went to work, but was always involved in high-level personnel struggles. I once tried to summarize his career ups and downs in the simplest language, but finally gave up because those one after another political whirlpools were too strange and meaningless. The only things that interest me are...

  He was once wrongly accused and "廷杖" into prison.廷杖 is a kind of extremely humiliating punishment. In the majestic palace, outside the Meridian Gate, under the gaze of many officials, he was bound with hemp cloth, stripped of his pants, pressed to the ground, mouth full of mud, and beaten with thirty-six rods. Having suffered this punishment, plus several times being wrongly accused and exonerated, a person's "mental constitution" would take on a different appearance. Later, as a successful book collector, the astonishing willpower and perseverance he showed were all related to this experience.

  His official career, due to the machinations of corrupt officials and other reasons, has been frequently sliding over long distances. In my impression, the places where he held office include at least Hubei, Jiangxi, Guangxi, Fujian, Yunnan, Shaanxi, and of course, Beijing, and also Ningbo for retirement. He has traveled all over half of China.

  In the midst of his busy travels, he began collecting books, especially focusing on local gazetteers, government documents, historical records, and examination records. At that time, China had experienced a cultural peak during the Song Dynasty, with engraving, printing, and collecting books becoming a widespread phenomenon across the country. Whether it was the imperial court, local governments, academies, temples, or private collectors, book collections were incredibly rich. This overall atmosphere allowed Fan Qin to become a mature collector, and his vision and insight led him to find his own unique position. That is, he didn't follow others in collecting books by only admiring the Song Dynasty and ancient times, but instead focused on contemporary society, social data, and local documents scattered across the country that would soon be lost. This choice made him an irreplaceable collector in Chinese history.

  An outstanding collector of books cannot just collect ancient things, what later generations of researchers need more urgently is the era in which he lived and the land on which he trod, as well as the cultural choices he made in his own most authentic ecological environment.

  As an official, he still did his job conscientiously. He handled court affairs with great care. However, as a civil servant, whenever he arrived at a new place, he had to understand the local culture, history, and customs, so he had to find books. When meeting with local officials, most of the things he needed to ask were also related to these aspects. After discussing official business, in order to show their elegance, they would focus on talking about books, especially local literature and news. In his daily inspections and visits, he inevitably emphasized the importance of literary pursuits. All of this was the usual life of an ancient civil servant, but what was different was that Fan Qin took book-related matters seriously.

  One day's official business, perhaps interrogating a major case, perhaps sorting out several financial matters, the dignity of the court, the etiquette of the imperial court, and so on. But what he was most interested in was the blue cloth package quietly handed over by the runner, and the list of books to be purchased that he lightly held in his sleeve. He knew in his heart that this was a trivial matter of public leisure and private hobby, and could not interfere with official business. However, after he finally retired from the turmoil of officialdom, he began to wonder: which is more important, being an official or collecting books?

  We stand hundreds of years later and look far away, then there is no doubt: for Fan Qin, collecting books was his lifelong career, and being an official was a sideline.

  It can even be said that history had to produce a great book collector in China at the time, and so placed him in an official position that would overturn the nine states.

  Fan Qin gave us an inspiration: the so-called official duties and career that have been busy all one's life may not be your main contribution to this world; please pay close attention to those small things that you think are not doing a proper job but are very interested in.

  Four

  Fan Qin's interest in books has obviously reached a state of infatuation. Infatuation, with a kind of non-utilitarian blindness. It is this lovely blindness that makes culture have a large number of loyal guardians outside of practical use, tirelessly reciting.

  Infatuation is reasonless. In Chinese history, there were many people infatuated with books, who would endure hunger and cold, and still read under the dim light of a snowy night without putting down the book. Among them, those who were infatuated because they liked the poetry and literature in the book didn't count as truly infatuated; those who were infatuated regardless of the book's content had reached another level. At this level, as long as it was a book, as long as their fingers could touch the thin xuan paper, they would feel inexplicably excited and thoroughly comfortable.

  I think Fan Qin's infatuation with the book belongs to the latter kind. I have read all of his poems and essays that I could find, and found them to be ordinary, so I don't think he would have a special sensitivity to the poetry in the book. What he is sensitive to is the book itself.

  So only he, rather than the more talented writers, had this rough and unyielding energy to make the publishing industry so big, so good, and so long-lasting.

  His experience in official career, especially in the Ministry of Works responsible for the construction and repair of various palaces, temples, city gods and altars, made him treat book collection as an engineering project, which was something that other book collectors could not do.

  Blind obsession, combined with engineer-like precision, made Fan Qin who he is, and Tianyi Pavilion what it is.

  Five

  The real trouble that book collectors encounter is mostly after they pass away. Fan Qin's biggest problem was how to turn his will into an unshakeable family legacy. It can be said that the truly tragic history of Tianyi Pavilion began after Fan Qin's death. I don't know whether preserving this pavilion is a glorious honor for the Fan family or a prolonged and arduous task.

  Fan Qin, after retiring and returning home, on the one hand, collected books with even greater enthusiasm than before, greatly increasing the number of books in his collection. On the other hand, he calmly observed whether his son could inherit these books.

  Fan Qin had two sons: Fan Da Chong and Fan Da Qian. He was not very satisfied with either of his two sons, but in comparison, he thought Fan Da Chong was much better. He had long made up his mind that after his death, all property could be divided, but the books in this building were absolutely not to be divided. Once the books are divided, they will no longer be a collection, and they will soon disperse. However, all relatives knew that his greatest wealth in life was books. If he only gave them to one son, what would the other son think?

  Fan Qin decided that his eldest son, Fan Da Chong, would inherit all the books alone, and gave 10,000 taels of silver to his younger son, Fan Da Qian, as compensation for not sharing the books. Unexpectedly, Fan Da Qian died three months before his father Fan Qin, so the 10,000 taels of silver were divided by his wife, Lu Shi. Lu Shi was instigated by others and wanted to divide the books as well, which caused some trouble later on. However, "books cannot be divided" had already become Fan Qin's unshakeable family law.

  Fan Da-chong inherited the first floor library, although it was his father's life-long effort and a major literary treasure of Jiangnan, but in fact, it could not be sold or opened to the public, completely shouldering a heavy responsibility on himself. His father spent 10,000 taels of silver to preserve its purity, and the remaining money was gone, leaving him with no choice but to rely on his own efforts to make ends meet.

  In the autumn of 1585, Fan Qin passed away on the ninth day after his eightieth birthday. The book collector repeatedly looked at Fan Da Chong's eyes when he was dying and felt that he had left a shocking legacy for his son. He didn't know if his son could hold on to the end, and if so, what about his grandson? What about his grandson's descendants?

  He didn't dare think about it anymore.

  A person who is overly self-confident can't have too many extravagant hopes for their children and grandchildren.

  He knew that he had no reason to let his descendants be book collectors generation after generation, but if they didn't, what would happen to the fate of Tianyi Pavilion? If they did, in fact, it was not a book collector like himself, but just a tower keeper.

  Descendants, books; books, descendants...

  Fan Qin finally closed his dazed eyes.

  Six

  And so began an endless relay race: after many years, Fan Dachong would also have a will, and Fan Dachong's son would also have a will...

  The family legacy is a life process of constant division, alienation and independence, forcing future generations to accept a lifelong commitment to a rigid directive, which goes against the natural state of life. It's hard to imagine that hundreds of years later, descendants would blindly follow the life impulse of an ancestor from hundreds of years ago without experiencing it themselves, and there must be many suffocating aspects to this. It's not hard to imagine that the Tianyi Pavilion library has become a quasi-religious object of worship for many Fan family descendants, who only know to maintain and preserve it with reverence and trepidation, but don't know why.

  I am certain that there are many unspoken psychological tragedies and family conflicts hidden in this interval. This family, who has lived under the library for hundreds of years, is very worthy of sympathy.

  Later generations will inevitably be curious, what is the upstairs like? What books are there, can we borrow them to take a look? Relatives and friends will ask frequently, as the secret library that has been worshipped by your family for generations, can you let us take a look at it?

  Fan Qin and his successors had long anticipated this possibility, and expected that the library would collapse due to this possibility, so they had taken preventive measures in advance. They formulated a strict punishment rule for the family, which was considered the greatest humiliation at the time, namely, not being allowed to participate in the ancestral worship ceremony. Because this punishment meant showing a "yellow card" in the family blood relationship, it was more severe than flogging and whipping.

  The rules of punishment are as follows: If a descendant enters the ancestral hall without reason, they will be punished by not being allowed to participate in the sacrificial rites for three times; if someone privately leads relatives and friends into the hall or opens the book cabinet without permission, they will be punished by not being allowed to participate in the sacrificial rites for one year; if someone borrows books from the storage room and takes them out of the house or lends them to people with different surnames, they will be punished by not being allowed to participate in the sacrificial rites for three years; if there is a case of pawn or mortgage, apart from being punished, they will be permanently expelled and not allowed to participate in the sacrificial rites.

  Here is the translation:

  It's inevitable to mention that story which makes me feel sad every time I think of it. According to Xie Zhen's "Spring Grass Hall Collection", more than 200 years after Fan Qin's death, something happened in the Ningbo Governor's mansion. His niece was a woman who loved poetry and books, and she heard that the Tianyi Pavilion had a vast collection of books that had not been damaged for over 200 years, all thanks to the wormwood leaves placed between the pages. She only wanted to be like one of those wormwood leaves, placed between the books. So, every day she embroidered wormwood leaves with silk thread and even changed her name to "Embroidered Wormwood".

  Her parents saw her infatuation and asked the county magistrate to act as a matchmaker, marrying her off to a descendant of the Fan family. She had thought that after becoming the daughter-in-law of the Fan family, she could at least climb up to the Tianyi Pavilion; even if not allowed to read books, she could still take a look at the art of verse. But she never expected that the Fan family had rules and strictly forbade women from climbing the building.

  From then on, she became increasingly melancholic and eventually died of depression. Before her death, she didn't even dare to mention a single word about books, but told her husband: "Not even a single blade of grass can be seen, what's the point of living? If you pity me, bury me near Tianyi Pavilion, then I can close my eyes in peace!"

  Today, when I raised my head to gaze at the building of Tianyi Pavilion, what first came to mind was Qian Zhongyan's melancholic eyes. In an era lacking in humanistic spirit and marital freedom, a girl who wanted to read more books through marriage was actually bargaining with her fragile life for her cultural aspirations. She failed, but it moved me deeply.

  Seven

  From the standpoint of the Fan family, not allowing anyone to climb up or read books is indeed a helpless move. As soon as a small gap is opened, it will eventually tear apart completely. However, if no one is ever allowed to climb up or read books, then what is the significance of this library existing in the world? This question often puts the Fan family in a dilemma.

  The Fan family rules that no matter how many branches the family has, all must agree to open the door. The keys to the door and bookcase are held separately by each branch, forming an indispensable link in a chain. If one branch is missing, it is impossible to access any of the stored books.

  Just then, news arrived that Mr. Huang Zongxi, a university scholar, wanted to climb the building to read books! This was undoubtedly a shock to each of the Fan family's houses.

  Huang Zongxi was a native of Yuyao, his hometown, and had no blood relation with the Fan family. By rights, he should not have been allowed to enter the tower. However, he was a giant who was deeply admired by the national academic community for his character, integrity, and scholarship, and the Fan family had long heard of him. Although the means of information dissemination at that time were extremely backward, Huang Zongxi's behavior was so extraordinary that it caused an extraordinary sensation in the imperial court and the countryside. His father was a key figure in the Donglin Party at the end of the Ming Dynasty and was killed by the Wei Zhongxian eunuch group. Later, when the eunuch group was put on trial, 19-year-old Huang Zongxi testified against them with righteous indignation, and later pursued and killed the murderers, warning Ruan Dacheng, which brought great joy to the people. When the Qing army marched south, he and his two brothers organized a militia of hundreds of people in their hometown, the "Shi Zhongying" battalion, to bravely resist the Qing army. After the failure of the resistance, he devoted himself to academic pursuits, writing and lecturing, infusing national morality and personal strength into his scholarship, becoming one of the first-rate thinkers and historians in ancient Chinese academia. He had previously gone to the "Shi Xue Lou" of the Niu family in Shaoxing and the "Dan Sheng Tang" of the Qi family to study, and now he finally came to knock on the door of the Tianyi Pavilion. He was well aware of the strict rules of the Fan family, but he still came, in the 12th year of Kangxi, that is, 1673.

  Unexpectedly, the Fan family unanimously agreed to let Huang Zongxi ascend to the loft and allowed him to carefully examine all the books stored there. Huang Zongxi, dressed in long clothes and wearing cloth shoes, quietly ascended to the loft. The copper locks were opened one by one, making 1673 a particularly glorious year in the history of Tianyi Pavilion.

  Huang Zongxi read through all the books in Tianyi Pavilion, compiled a catalog of those that were not widely circulated, and wrote "Tianyi Pavilion Book Collection" to be passed down. From then on, this library was linked with the name of a great scholar and spread far and wide.

  From then on, Tianyi Pavilion had a new rule that could be opened to real scholars, but the implementation of this rule was still very strict. In the nearly two hundred years since then, only more than ten scholars have been allowed to enter the building, including Wan Sitong, Quan Zuwang, Qian Daxin, Yuan Mei, Ruan Yuan, Xue Fucheng and others. Their names are all recorded in Chinese cultural history.

  In this way, Tianyi Pavilion finally showed its own existence significance, although the opportunity to show it was so small.

  Until Qianlong decided to compile "Siku Quanshu", the fate of Tianyi Pavilion underwent a major change.

  Qianlong ordered the provinces to collect and submit books, requiring book collectors, especially those in Jiangnan, to actively donate books. The Tianyi Pavilion presented over 600 precious ancient books, among which 96 were included in the "Siku Quanshu" and more than 370 were listed in the catalog. Qianlong was very grateful for the contribution of the Tianyi Pavilion, repeatedly praised and rewarded it, and instructed that the newly built main libraries in the north and south should be built in the style of the Tianyi Pavilion.

  The Tianyi Pavilion thus gained great fame, although most of the books submitted were not returned. However, in the national "encyclopedia" and in the designated repository, it had its life. I have seen many works and articles that refer to Qianlong's order for the "Complete Library of the Four Treasuries" as a major disaster for the Tianyi Pavilion, which seems to be an exaggeration. Even the imperial court's compilation of books could not help but make extensive use of the Tianyi Pavilion's collection, turning family collections into administrative dissemination, proving that the Tianyi Pavilion achieved great success and Fan Qin obtained great success.

  Eight

  The Tianyi Pavilion has finally entered modern times, and this ancient library has begun its new adventure.

  When the Taiping Army attacked Ningbo, local thieves took advantage of the chaos to steal books by dismantling walls, and then sold them as scrap paper by weight to paper mills. Once, someone bought a batch at a high price from the mill, but it was destroyed in a big fire.

  This became an omen for the fate of Tianyi Pavilion, and the problem it now faced was no longer whether to let a certain scholar go upstairs or not, but thieves and robbers had become its greatest enemies.

  In 1914, a thief named Xue Jiyu miraculously sneaked into the Tianyi Pavilion, silent during the day and stealing books at night. He only ate dates he brought with him to sustain himself. A small boat on the river outside the east wall transported the stolen books away. This time, nearly half of the valuable books in the Tianyi Pavilion were stolen, gradually appearing in bookstores in Shanghai.

  Xue Jiwei's theft this time was different from those small thieves during the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, not only in terms of the enormous quantity and systematic operation, but also in that it ultimately hooked up with Shanghai's bookstores. I always feel that there is a certain symbolic meaning in the fact that modern urban booksellers use such means to swallow up an ancient library.

  Row after row of bookshelves were empty, and Qian Xiangyun gazed up at the loft that she had never been able to climb in her lifetime. The loft boards that Huang Zongxi had trodden carefully now only held a large pile of date pits spat out by thieves.

  At that time, Mr. Zhang Yuanji, who was in charge of the Commercial Press, heard that the Tianyi Pavilion had suffered a great disaster and learned that some bookstores were preparing to sell the Tianyi Pavilion's collection to foreigners. He immediately allocated a large sum of money to rescue it. The Tianyi Pavilion books he purchased are stored in the "Hanfen Building" of the Oriental Library. The Hanfen Building has gained a reputation in the cultural circle due to the nourishment of the Tianyi Pavilion collection, and many contemporary cultural celebrities have drawn nutrition from there. However, as is well known, it was ultimately destroyed again by the Japanese invaders' bombs.

  What was not destroyed is the Tianyi Pavilion itself. This building, like an old man who has seen the world, can withstand any disaster. But it's not just withstanding; it's gazing at all posterity, both those surnamed Fan and those not, with a philosophical expression that makes them lower their heads again and again, only to raise them once more.

  As long as one considers oneself a descendant of Chinese culture, one always wants to do something about this old building and cannot bear to let it become completely dilapidated. Therefore, in the 1930s, 1950s, 1960s, and 1980s, Tianyi Pavilion was repeatedly renovated and improved on a large scale. It has become a witness to modern cultural conscience.

  As I climbed the stairs of the Tianyi Pavilion, my footsteps were extremely slow. I kept asking myself: Have you arrived? Which generation of Chinese scholars are you from?