CH 27

The artisans in the rear courtyard had not eaten yet, they were studying how to print in the workshop located on the second floor.

The workshop was based on Cui Xie’s modern office design preferences and the room was arranged with multiple school desks and chair sets for each artisan, all of the furniture left behind by Teacher Wang. Two artisans sat opposite each other while working. In the middle of the workshop, there was merely a long restaurant dining table that was used during meetings. 

When Cui Xie headed upstairs, the workshop’s entrance was closed securely and laterally next to the workshop, a special lounge had been set up and there was a table laden with large bowls of meat dishes, mixed noodles, and steamed buns, and all of it had already gotten cold, but no one came to eat them. A furen wearing indigo robes was bustling around packing up the food and planned to take them back to the kitchen to heat them up again.

夫人(fū ren): the mistress/wife, also a general term to refer to an official’s wife/madam.

This furen was the wife of an engraver named Huang Yang and just two days ago, her entire family had moved in with her husband. Seeing that the Master and servant trios were all men, with no furen to handle the housework, she took the initiative to clean and cook for them. Cui Xie saw that they did not have any presentable and decent household items and clothing, so he first paid them one month worth of wages as moving expenses. Even Huang dasao was given 500 copper coins as part of the monthly payment.

Dasao: older brother’s wife/sister in law; Woman in indigo robes is called Huang dasao because she is married to the eldest son of the Huang family.

What the Cui family gave were real bright and brassy copper coins, not the second-rate money mixed with iron often given outside. 600 copper coins was equivalent to one or two silver taels and therefore, the couple was very content to repay Cui Xie’s grace, getting up early and retiring late at night, sparing no effort.

Towards Cui Xie, she said some words in blessing and called him ‘Little Official’, and wanted to go in and call the workers out for him. Cui Xie said, “Huang dasao can first warm up the food, I will talk to all of the da-ge about the engraving matter and then I’ll ask them to go eat soon.”

Da-ge: older brother

Huang dasao came downstairs with the dishes and when the artisans heard Cui Xie talking outside, they stopped their work and got up to greet him.

As soon as Cui Xie entered the workshop, he caught sight of many dyed, carved printing blocks littered and piled up all over the large long table located in the middle of the room. Some of them were whole and a few were broken. A few sheets of white paper were spread out on the outer corners of the table top, with a bright red plum blossom printed on the paper’s surface.

In order to prepare for entering the academy and starting his studies these past few days, Cui Xie had not spent much time checking their progress. Only today, did he discover that they were already able to print quite well.

In the earliest occurrence when Cui Xie had talked about color printing with Li Jinbao, the man had not even known the technique of two-color chromatic printing of vermillion red and black ink. In just over a month, unexpectedly, an entire plum blossom was already printed. Inky black branches extended downwards from the painting with the nodes and branch connections exposed. There was a twisting, yet powerful, vigorous air and the plum petals were dense and conveyed sincerity. The color was a bright vermillion and from a distance, it looked picturesque and vivid.

Upon closer inspection, the dried plums were all black and the petals were bright red from top to end, lacking a change in color depth. The contrast between the outer part of the petals and the stamen outlined in inked lines compared to the petal itself was too intense and not harmonious enough.

This pattern was probably printed by engraved printing blocks that used traditional techniques of line drawing using the ink and brush style, but he did not know how they found a way to fill in the painting with color. If it is overfilled, when it is printed, it will seem too rigid and manufactured.

Cui Xie subconsciously shook his head, tracing his fingers along the lines of the plum blossom branches and while gazing at the printed sketch, he commented, “The lines are well engraved, the coloring is even, but the colors of the branches and petals are harsh and rigid. As for the silhouette—the ink outline and red blossoms are not harmonious enough.”

Although there were some inadequacies and problems here and there, to be able to experiment and print in this kind of way so quickly turned out to be a pleasant surprise. He originally thought there would be the problem of color misalignment and overflow, but he did not expect for so many of the pictures to be printed so neatly. It seems that the hands of these artisans were extremely stable and their eyes are comparable to dial calipers*.

Note: Dial calipers are literally dials that help you read a workpiece or tools in fractions of a millimeter or inch, so the standard measurement is much smaller and requires a good eye/eye for detail.

He could not help but think of the Legend of the Liberation Army’s Eighth-Class Fitter*, secretly eyeing the seemingly ordinary-looking artisans standing on the side.

*TN: The “Legend of the Liberation Army’s Junior Eighth-Class Fitter” refers to the Communists’ victory over the Nationalists in 1949. In the era of planned economy, the workers were divided into eight levels of skill. To achieve the certification as an eight-ranked technician is said to take decades to do it and the legend refers to a young man obtaining this when he was younger than 30 which is super rare.

Deeply hidden talent, he could not refuse this.

But looking more closely, Cui Xie suddenly discovered that the faces of the artisans were filled with loss, and all of them looked at him flusteredly, as if they were going to work overtime and stay up all night to reprint everything.

Realizing that the inadequacies and shortcomings he had pointed out had scared the workers, he hurriedly smiled at them and gently added, “It has been printed extremely well, much better than I expected. Tomorrow, I will ask Huang dasao to make some dishes and pour wine to reward everyone. Can all the printed pictures be printed so neatly?”

The two printer craftsmen ashamedly answered, “Nine out of ten sheets were incorrectly misaligned when first printed, which squandered quite a bit of Young Master’s paper. But now, the accuracy is slightly better, five or six sheets out of 10 are now aligned correctly. Young Master, please give us a bit more time to practice. It is estimated that once dozens of copies are printed, one can find the feel for it.”

Cui Xie generously replied, “That is not considered a waste, naturally you must practice such things. The same is true for engraving. Do not hesitate to engrave the board, we are not planning on printing once and then not using it again right?”

In the future, printed books with beauties in it, one could just switch out the clothing color, eradicate a few lines, then the template can be reprinted again as the heroine of a new novel.

Cui Xie calmly thought and then announced the news of a new project: “Our bookstore has received four new manuscripts and the contents are all about scholars meeting goddesses or demons, and they can all be put together into a novel. I want to add this kind of colorful printing with beauties in it and add them to this novel. Da-ge all have rich experiences, do any of you have suggestions?”

A printer craftsman named Wang saw that Cui Xie had a good temper and he boldly exclaimed, “We have printed books for decades, but we have never seen a book with colored pictures in it. If you see something like that for sale outside, then one must buy a set and keep it for its novelness. Young Master does not need to worry about the picture being poorly printed and affecting the novel’s sales. We are only afraid that the accuracy will be inconsistent, squander a lot of paper and the printing cost will be quite high.”

Zhang Da mulled over this and said, “These plum blossoms were also casually engraved by us, so the quality is not great. When it is time to engrave the woodblock template, the Young Master can hire a good painter to draw the picture and then we can engrave and imitate the color. The resulting printing will be much better than this prototype.”

They glanced at the inky black plum blossoms on the table, their eyes and hearts getting feverish.

Previously, no one would print colored pictures when printing novels, let alone printing this kind of picturesque painting. If they were the first to print such pictures, not to mention anything else, once the novel was published, the two capitals and all thirteen provinces would have to point to their study and say: “This is the Zhirong Study that can print colored novel editions”. As artisans, they would immediately become legends, their stories spreading for thousands of miles!

Several workers glanced at each other, the tip of their brows and the corners of their eye hopeful, yet also worried that this opportunity to make a name for themselves would be missed. They all turned their heads to look at the wood blocks, raw materials and paper piled in the room, wishing they could practice their workmanship a bit more before starting the new printing job.

Seeing that these people in the printing industry were full of fighting spirit and felt confident, Cui Xie smiled, “Then you all must eat first, rest a bit more these next two days as to cultivate enough energy. I have already instructed Pengyan to copy the manuscript, and I will prepare the sketches. It will not be so difficult that we cannot make it ourselves.”

It had gotten quite late and Huang dasao had warmed up the food again. The artisans sat in the lounge and dined on the newly warmed dishes and then went home separately.

Cui Xie asked for some brushes, paint, gelatin alum, and rulers before heading back to his own room in the main courtyard. Upon entering, he caught sight of Pengyan sitting at his desk, copying the manuscripts by candlelight.

Since it was autumn, the days were getting shorter and outside turned half dark and half light, making the candlelight seem dim. This time was the most uncomfortable to read or study. Cui Xie set down his materials and sheared off the tips of candle wicks and lit up two more wicks. Then he sat down in front of the desk and flipped through some of the rarely touched novels with pictures gifted by the officials in Tongzhou, looking at the colored portraits in them.

Pengyan set down his brush, concernedly asking, “Why is da-ge reading? Did you not say that your eyes get tired at night and you don’t dare to read?”

Cui Xie asked him with a grin, “Didn’t you praise me for drawing chestnuts well the other day? I also feel that I am quite talented now and want to look at some portraits drawn by others and imitate a few portraits of the beautiful women in the novel, what do you think?”

Pengyan replied without hesitation: “Anything that you paint will naturally be good.” After he said that, he glanced at the pages spread out in Cui Xie’s hands, seeing the paper littered with many and varied kinds of people and beautifully drawn buildings, he could not help but frown. He tactfully advised:”Let’s draw something simple, just a beautiful woman, nothing too much…it is the artisans first time painting a chromatic-colored novel, I am afraid they will print it poorly otherwise.”

Cui Xie could not help but pat Pengyan’s worried head and comforted, “It does not matter, I just have not painted much before and am just practicing a bit more using these.”

Pengyan was still young and had not tied his hair up like scholars do, so he still had a half-up and down hairstyle, which was very convenient to touch. After two years, once the hair is combed up, it would not be so good to stroke anymore. Cui Xie could not help but stroke a few more times before he retracted his hands to look at the illustrations and precisely duplicated and saved the illustrations clearly into a .pdf so that he would not have to turn to the book when he wanted to refer to it in the future.

There were not many illustrations in the pictured novel and looking at pictures was significantly simpler and less labor-intensive than looking at characters and as such, it did not take too much work or time to copy them all. Afterwards, Cui Xie dug out the cheapest yellow bamboo paper and then under the dim candlelight, he dipped a flexible, hook line pen into faint black ink. Starting from the upper right corner, he drew long and short curved lines one after another, slowly regaining the feeling of line drawing. 

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Teacher Lin’s set of manuscripts had arrived just in time, right around when the study had finished researching how to engrave and print colored pictures, so they were ready to print when they received the works. When Cui Xie attended the academy the next day, he brought with him a basket of fresh, watery red pears that had just hit the market; they tasted clean and delicious and as such Cui Xie arrived at the academy early to thank Teacher Lin.

After Teacher Lin finished this request, he felt a lot more relaxed and was even more confident when seeing Cui Xie. After accepting the gift, he said the usually few sentences that instructed Cui Xie not to dwell on miscellaneous things like novels and then looked at the homework Cui Xie had handed in, commented a few times and then said, “These past few days, I see that you are worrying about your housework and your heart is not in your studies, so I did not teach you too much. Starting from today, Teacher will strictly require you to not only study the scriptures, but to also start writing essays to prepare for the county examination in February the year after next.

Cui Xie’s heart lightly skipped a beat, the three big characters, ‘Eight-legged essay‘ popped into his mind. He asked in bewilderment, “I have only learned 《The Classic of Poetry》from Teacher, I can learn how to write eight-legged essays now?”

Eight-legged essay: ‘eight bone text’; style of essay in imperial examinations during the Ming and Qing dynasties in China. The eight-legged essay was needed for those test-takers in these civil service exams to show their merits for government service, the contents often focusing on Confucian thought and knowledge of the Four Books and Five Classics in relation to governmental ideals

Teacher Lin glanced at him and said with some surprise, “An eight-legged essay? That is quite a precise and appropriate generalization. After receiving the prompt of the essay, there are indeed four different sections that need to be written and each section must include two comparative parallel couplets. It is not bad to say that it is indeed an essay in eight parts. Is this idea something that you came up with on your own? Have you done such an essay at home before?”

…….In the 18th year of the Chenghua reign, was the eight-legged essay still not called the eight-legged essay yet? Ai, why did he choose to study modern and contemporary literature instead of ancient literature?!

Chenghua: Ming Dynasty’s Ninth emperor, Chenghua Emperor, Zhu Jianshen; it would be approximately around 1469; Chenghua stands for ‘accomplished change’. Chenghua is not the emperor’s real name but the name he is given when he ascends to the throne. This title is used when addressing his reign/era and people use this term when mentioning the current emperor or his reign. After all, one cannot refer to the emperor by his real/birth name.

Cui Xie’s heart was sweating three thousand inches, he hated that he could not transmigrate back, change his major and go back to university. But, he did not dare to bring any attention to his expression. He calmly said, “I have never studied it before, but I heard a guest at home that once said we must write good eight-legged essays in order to pass the Imperial examination, so I naturally remembered this piece of advice.”

Teacher Lin did not doubt anything, just nodding and said with a sense of understanding, “It turns out to be so. The family of a functionary (educated middle class) is after all a place of learning, former generations have already summarized all of their experiences for us to draw from. If the article is constrained to be an essay in eight parts, each couplet comparing the positive and negative theories to discuss the main theme, the writing will be beautiful and neat. Even if the examiner were to just glance at it, he would also find it pleasing to the eye…”

His voice gradually became lower and lower and he was gradually immersed in his thoughts. Cui Xie had almost exposed his identity as a transmigrator and since it was time to be lowkey, he naturally did not dare to disturb him, quietly returning back to his seat to practice his calligraphy.

Teacher Lin did not wake up from his stupor until the next student came into the hall and greeted him. He accepted the students’ homework, said a few perfunctory comments and walked in front of Cui Xie, “First review 《Xiaoya》, and once I randomly test you on random sections and ask you to recite them, I will then teach you how to approach and break down prompts.”

Xiaoya is a section in in the Book of Songs or Classic of Poetry on Minor Odes