PDF《A History of Chinese Letters and》

5 This fact is particularly important in the case of a famous calligrapher whose handwriting is prized for its aesthetic and commercial value.6 In a well-known story, the statesman Xie An 谢安 (320C385) deliberately wrote his reply in the blank end space of a let- ter from Wang Xianzhi 王献之 (344C386), a celebrated calligrapher, and sent it back to Wang to show that he did not care to preserve Wang'

s calligraphy, to Wang'

s chagrin.7 This story underlines the physical nature of a letter and highlights the resemblance of the presentation of a letter to that of a gift. Thus, exchanging letters regarding giving and receiving a gift constitutes yet another 3? Derrida, Given Time, 12.

4 Sanguo zhi 3.103. The anecdote originally appears in Sun Sheng'

s 孙盛 (302C73) Weishi Chunqiu 魏氏春秋, cited in Pei Songzhi'

s 裴松之 (372C451) commentary to Sanguo zhi. In analyzing Gawain and the Green Knight, Britton J. Harwood remarks that with insults, recip- rocal blows, and gifts, the recipient controls not only the nature but the timing of the return. Harwood, Gawain and the Gift, 487. 5? Richter, Letters and Epistolary Culture, 17. 6? For a description of the emergence and subsequent prevalence of this phenomenon in early medieval China, see the section on Calligraphy and Letter Writing in Richter, Letters and Epistolary Culture, 23C26. 7? The anecdote can be found, among other early sources, in Zhang Huaiguan'

s 张怀 (fl. early 8th c.) Shu duan 书断, which was completed in 724. Lidai shufa lunwen xuan, 205.

137 Material and Symbolic Economies For use by the Author only | ?

2015 Koninklijke Brill NV layer of object transference, one that delimits and accentuates the symbolic signif?icance of gift exchange. In the letters discussed in this essay, the transaction between letter writer and letter recipient happens on both the material and discursive level. The letters constitute a verbal and material economy that is closely tied to the production of value of the circulated objects, and enable a new balance to be established between donor and recipient. The presence of the letters gives nuances to and even def?ines the gifts, and inf?initely complicates the concept of reciprocity in gift exchange as initially proposed by Marcel Mauss.

1 The Gift of Death and Life Like any social action, the general signif?icance of gift giving must be instan- tiated in specif?ic contexts. The symbolic nuances of a gift vary in diffferent situations, and letters accompanying gifts are often essential for the correct interpretation of the gifts. In this section I focus on a pair of letters exchanged between Cao Cao 曹操 (155C220), the powerful warlord, and Yang Biao 杨彪 (142C225), an eminent senior minister, as well as a pair of letters exchanged between Ca........