Korean and Japanese Chaoben

Abstract

In the period 1850–1950 covered by this book, China had a vibrant chaoben culture that extended into almost every facet of life for the common people. By contrast, chaoben culture in Korea and Japan was much more limited. I draw this conclusion from my investigations of themarkets for handwritten books and booklets in Korea and Japan and from the types of handwritten materials available in antiques stores and flea markets there. In premodern times, people in both Korea and Japan usually wrote with a brush and black ink on handmade paper. They also wrote in classical Chinese [wenyanwen文言文], generally omitting punctuation marks. In Korea, following Chinese practice, the name of the copyist, the date of the copy, or its location were usually omitted. It is often possible to find clues in the text to give some likely answers to these questions. In the “official” or “semiofficial” handwritten materials I have gathered, such as tax records (not discussed in this study) or the Japanese chaoben discussed below, names, dates, and locations are regularly given, although this is not the case for items of an unofficial nature. Among the chaoben produced in Korea that I have seen, almost every category of subject represented in the Chinese handwritten materials was also produced in Korea: copying of Buddhist orDaoist religious texts, genealogies, fortunetelling texts, examples of letters and social announcements, herbal medical recipes, etc. The differences compared to material from China that I perceive were that people in Korea who could write in Chinese with good calligraphy were in general from the educated and elite classes, not from the lower economic or social strata. Therefore, their interests focused on propagating and endorsing the highly respected Confucian ritual behavior prescribed for all critical life transitions—of which funerals and weddings were the most important. Korean elites made great efforts to learn the numerous details and procedures for ceremonies such as those relating to funerals, and as a result they produced lengthy and detailed descriptions of all aspects of funerals, and they kept records of the money offerings made by guests at funerals and of the eulogies delivered at the funeral or later at the gravesite during a memorial service. I have found many such handwritten materials in Korea, but they are much less common in China. Korean scholars preferred to follow the Chinese practice of writing in the standard [zhengkai正楷] style of calligraphy. Chinese friends have sometimes toldme the classical Chinese texts of the Korean writers were “strange” or “incorrect” compared to the classical Chinese they had learned in school. The penchant for paying great honor to Confucian rituals and theirmany requirements is also reflected in thewoodblockprints from theChoson periodof the 1800s to 1910available in themarketplace.TheKoreans reprinted/republished