The Social Life of Inkstones Read Along: Chapter 4

[forestofglory]

Welcome to our read a long of The Social Life of Inkstones: Artisans and Scholars in Early Qing China by Dorothy Ko! For this post we are reading "Chapter 4: Beyond Suzhou: Gu Erniang the Super-Brand"

Previous posts:
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3

You are welcome to join in at any time!

This chapter was mostly about inkstones attributed to Gu Erniang.

What where the main arguments in this chapter? Did you find them convincing?

Did any historical figures introduced in the chapter stand out to you? In what way?

Did any of the inkstones or other objects in the chapter stand out to you? In what way?

What did this chapter make you want to learn more about?

Did anything in this chapter remind you of fiction you enjoy? Or inspire creative writing thoughts fic or otherwise?

Comments

[forestofglory]

Some thoughts form me. Look I'm not waiting a week and half this time!

I found the main arguments harder to follow in this chapter than in previous chapters. I think the main point was that Gu Erniang became a super-brand but the chapter focused so much on the details of individual inkstones that I had hard time following.

There were a lot of pretty inkstones in this chapter though! I think Clouds and Moon was my favorite -- I just really liked the swrilly clouds.

I frequently come across brief references to footbinding when I'm reading about historical women, and I know almost nothing about it. It's an uncomfortable topic for me so I don't really want to do a deep dive, but I would like to have better overview.

Most of my writing thoughts about this chapter are about how I can better describe inkstones next time I want to include one in a fic. I have much better idea what qualities are valued than before.

[cortue]

Agreed, especially on the perspective of what is valued in an inkstone. It's cool to have a better understanding of what exactly was being looked for.

[blueshiftofdeath]

I found the main arguments harder to follow in this chapter than in previous chapters. I think the main point was that Gu Erniang became a super-brand but the chapter focused so much on the details of individual inkstones that I had hard time following.

Totally agree with this!

I frequently come across brief references to footbinding when I'm reading about historical women, and I know almost nothing about it. It's an uncomfortable topic for me so I don't really want to do a deep dive, but I would like to have better overview.

I recently saw that Ko also wrote an entire book on footbinding, so I was thinking about reading that sometime. If so, maybe I could post an overview here?

[forestofglory]

If you do read the book on footbinding I would love it if you shared an overview! Ko writes about so many interesting things

[rhysiana]

What were the main arguments in this chapter?

Though it took the author a while to get there, I think her eventual argument is that the spread of Gu Erniang's super-brand can be seen as a bridge from inkstones as mere objects of scholarly use to objects of art collection. This argument could have been laid out more clearly in the beginning, rather than taking us on such a winding path, but I do think I find it convincing. Ko argues, after the comparison of two stones attributed to Gu Erniang on the same theme but in wildly different styles, that absent a firm body of identified Gu Erniang stones, the diversity of techniques and styles in the stones attributed to her that frustrate research into her work specifically do a great deal to support the strength of her popularity and cachet.

Ko also draws a parallel (through implication) between the changing status of inkstones as object and the changing status of Gu Erniang herself from respected artisan to sexy myth:

Under the fig leaf of a discourse of skill—the ability to discern the inner qualities of an uncut stone is a skill valued by stoneworkers—myth-makers in the Qianlong era and after shifted popular attention from Gu’s hands to her feet. Although Gu’s patrons were certainly aware of the uniqueness of her female gender in a male profession and did not shy away from using feminized terms to address her, they paid tribute to her by a well-chosen mixture of masculine and feminine allusions. The scholars and collectors who commissioned works from Gu regarded her as a skilled artisan, not a subject of male curiosity. The eroticization of Gu Erniang in public imagination is tantamount to her deskilling as an artisan, the exchange of a productive body for an ornamental one.

siiiiiigh. At least she had patrons who truly respected her during her lifetime.

Did any historical figures introduced in the chapter stand out to you? & Did any of the inkstones stand out to you?

I think I've just trained myself to be excited anytime Xie Ruqi turns up. XD

I appreciated him turning up here to introduce the way skills from Fuzhou seal carvers got incorporated into inkstone carving. I also particularly liked his two sun & moon stones we got examples of in this chapter: Clouds and Moon and Rising Sun Over Waves. I really enjoy the stylized way he treated the clouds and waves; additionally, both stones look like they would be nice to hold, pleasantly rounded.

Other thoughts

I enjoyed all the cross-discipline techniques discussed in this chapter, such as the comparison of painterly carving to embroidery, the 3D effects from seal carving, the climbing-over technique from jade carving (affecting not only inkstones but many other contemporaneous crafts), and the increasing turn toward draping 2D designs over the 3D surfaces of the inkstone to really demonstrate skill.

This struck me as a thought-provoking statement about Suzhou's reputation as a artisan center: "the success of a place-based super-brand requires the establishment of a recognizable style across media."

On men signing with their given names: "In dispensing with the family name, the male artisan broadcasted his identity as a singular person." Quite the contrast with Gu Erniang never seeming to sign any of her work herself, only having her mark appended by others later.

[forestofglory]

Your analysis of the argument here is really helpful! I struggled with the way it was structured so thank you for laying it out clearly for me.

[blueshiftofdeath]

I think her eventual argument is that the spread of Gu Erniang's super-brand can be seen as a bridge from inkstones as mere objects of scholarly use to objects of art collection. [...] Ko also draws a parallel (through implication) between the changing status of inkstones as object and the changing status of Gu Erniang herself from respected artisan to sexy myth

Oh!! I actually hadn't made that connection-- thank you for sharing this analysis! It makes sense that serious scholars would want their inkstones to be made by a skilled artisan, and collectors of novelty art would want their inkstones to be made by a sexy myth. Pretty interesting stuff!

[rhysiana]

I'm glad you found it helpful! (This caused me to go back and read what I'd written. Good job on sounding smart, past me.)

[blueshiftofdeath]

Whew, this chapter was a lot! The analysis of the inkstones was kind of overwhelming, haha, but I guess worth it for helping us understand exactly how they connect to the greater picture of trends in inkstone-making at the time. She did a pretty good job articulating why she thought the one inkstone (with swallows and peaches) had the potential to be a genuine Gu stone, despite having no hard evidence at all. But as Ko herself said, these are objects that are meant to be held and looked at in person-- getting all those details in text form got a little tedious, even if I understand the necessity of it.

Also interesting and tied to these physical details is the path that inkstone designs took-- you can see the novelty of the designs really exploded, and how this presumably connected to the desirability of the Gu superbrand.

What I really liked about this chapter was the inclusion of a lot of text written about interactions with Gu from her patrons. One of my favorite parts of the book so far is the opening anecdote of this chapter, about Gu loving the poem Lin Ji wrote about her, and begging to have it written down, and then carving an inkstone in appreciation. I feel like this one anecdote paints such an appealing picture of her, and with so much personality! It's especially nice given the complete void of information about her actual life in general.

I also enjoyed reading these anecdotes since it's always nice to hear about women being respected for their work by their contemporaries. I was honestly genuinely touched by the poem Lin Ji wrote in opposition to things like the Gazetteer snub (the one on page 170). Dare I say feminist king?!

Interesting how, as Ko says, "the eroticization of Gu Erniang in public imagination is tantamount to her deskilling as an artisan, the exchange of a productive body for an ornamental one." What's interesting to me is how this deskilling occurred with the goal of making her works more desirable and appealing. Wouldn't you want an item that's made by someone skilled, not someone erotic? I think this connects back to the classism that Ko introduced at the beginning of the book. I went ahead and found my own comment from Chapter 2:

The perception of stoneworkers by scholars really reminds me of the "noble savage" trope. [...] In both cases there's a kind of acknowledgement and appreciation of "native" wisdom, but not real respect. That wisdom is credited towards some kind of primitive instinct or connection to the earth, which is looked down on as less high minded and therefore human. [...] they aren't perceived as having any agency. ("Idiot savants", as used in the book, is a great summary of this kind of perception -- people can be diminished even as they are praised.)

The new myths about Gu praised her "magical" skill, but attributing her abilities to eroticized "magic" strips her of agency, in a way that's extremely similar to how the skills of stoneworkers were dismissed. It seems that artisans were climbing up the class ladder to be seen as closer to scholars than stoneworkers, but of course it'll be harder for a woman to gain that respect. Basically, this seems like a great example of class/gender intersectionality. I wonder how scholarly works by women (paintings, poems, etc.) were treated in comparison?

(On that note, Joanna Russ also describes how this is done to women very eloquently in How to Suppress Women's Writing.)

Other thoughts:

• I liked the discussion of how inkstones like the bamboo-shaped inkstones "[bring] forth both the "stone-ness" of the material and the "bamboo-ness" of the representation." What this really reminded me of is the "Meat-Shaped Stone", which oh my god... it seriously looks like pork belly!!! (Look at those close ups!!!) But of course you can tell it's a rock, and in fact the reason it's so impressive and appealing is precisely because it's a rock and not actual meat.
• I gotta say, I still like the imperial dragon inkstone from chapter 1 the best. Turns out I love dragons and over the top dramatic designs! I think a simple one would be appealing if I was actually using them to write, though.
• I'm proud to say I have now updated the inkstone and Gu Erniang Wikipedia pages! The Gu Erniang page was so sad before, so I'm really happy I've read far enough to add more to it. I've tried searching for other sources so it's not all just this one book, but it turns out nobody else is writing books about inkstones in English?? Thank you Ms. Ko! There's still a lot more that could be added, so if anyone's ever bored and in the mood to do something productive, it could be worth checking out further improving these pages. Especially the more complicated arguments in this chapter (like the impact on the market from having a superbrand (=Gu Erniang)) would be nice to include, but it was too hard for me to figure out how to get it in there without maybe misinterpreting the text. I also wish I could have found museum sources for photos of the other inkstones attributed to Gu, since those are usually copyright free and can be uploaded, but sadly I could only find the one from the Met.

[forestofglory]

Your comparison to How to Suppress Women's Writing is spot on!

I don't think I'd see the Meat-Shaped Stone before. I does look impressively like pork belly!

That dragon inkstone is very impressive, no wonder its your favorite.

And well done updating Wikipedia, you really expanded the Gu Erniang page!