“DEPEND ON HEAVEN FOR FOOD”: A WELL-KNOWN PROVERB IN LITERATURE, ILLUSTRATIONS AND COMMENTS

Abstract

“Depend on Heaven for food” (kao tian chi fan, 靠天吃飯) is a well-known Chinese proverb. The presumed author of this expression was Wen Kang (文康), his novel Legend of Heroes and Heroines (儿女英雄傳) Ernü Yingxiong Zhuan first published in late 1870s became very popular. The expression “depend on Heaven for food” is from the 33rd chapter of the novel. Yet, the image under the title Picture Depend on Heaven for Food (kao tian chi fan tu, 靠天吃飯圖) appeared earlier than novel: two stone steles dated 1813 with the same picture, but different commentary text. In the academician Vasyli M. Alekseev’s collection of Chinese popular prints nianhua there are several engravings on this subject, the explanations for which are in the notebooks of the Chinese xiansheng mentors V. M. Alekseev to his collections of folk art (St. Petersburg Branch of the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences, fund 820, inv. 1, files 473, 479a). And finally we can compare xiansheng comments to (kao tian chi fan tu, 靠天吃飯圖) with the essay on the same subject by Lu Xun in his Qie Jie Ting Essay Collection (雜文集: 且介亭雜文二 集, 1935).