A Gathering of Heroes – Tale of the Marshes

Based on the historical facts of Song Jiang’s uprising at Mount Liang in the last years of the Northern Song dynasty, the Tale of the Marshes evolved into its present shape for over two hundred years. As far back as the Southern Song dynasty the story of Song Jiang’s uprising circulated widely in the society and became the materials for folk story-tellers. In the story-tellers’ script of the Song and Yuan dynasties Tales of Xuan He Period there existed quite a few stories from the Tale of the Marshes. In the earlier stories of the Marshes there were only Song Jiang and other thirty-five bandit-heroes and in the Yuan dynasty play of the Marshes the number of the Mount Liang bandit-heroes increased to one hundred and eight. Between the late Yuan dynasty and the early Ming dynasty Shi Nai’an improved upon the stories of the Marshes and recast them into a long novel Tale of the Marshes.

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Shi Nai’an’s life experience and story is still open to discussion for lack of its official record. It is generally believed that he was a native of Baijuchang, Taizhou (present-day Dafeng County, Jiangsu Province) and his polite name was Zi’an. He passed the imperial examination for Jinshi in the last years of the Yuan dynasty and took official posts in Qiantang, Zhejiang Province. Due to the dark officialdom he resigned and secluded himself in the life of the countryside. It was during his years of seclusion that he finished writing the Tale of the Marshes.

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The edition of the Tale of the Marshes is a hard nut to crack. Of its most popular editions there are a 70-cahpter one, a 100-chapter one and a 120-chapter one, but the most artistic of the three is the 70-chapte edition and the most full-length is the 120-chapter one. www.1155815.cn

The Tale of the Marshes is so complicated in ideological content that people have their widely differing views about it. In fact, its earliest name is A Loyal and Righteous Tale of the Marshes, which centers on “loyalty and righteousness”. Song Jiang is the most representative of it and, so to speak, its personification. A leader of the Mount Liang heroes, Song Jiang is very loyal, hospitable and generous and is ready to lend a helping hand to the poor and distressed. A filial son and loyal subject, he leads the Mount Liang heroes to receive the governmental amnesty exerts himself to his utmost for the throne. He would rather die for than turn against the throne, thus bringing the Mount Liang cause to a tragic ending. 

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