Original Text
In the border region between Shandong and the northern capital's jurisdiction, a dragon fell into a village, moving with sluggish and clumsy steps, and entered the home of a certain scholar-gentry. The gate of this house could barely accommodate the dragon's body, yet it forced itself through. The entire household fled in terror; some climbed to the upper floors and shouted, while others fired earthen guns and cannons with a thunderous roar, only then did the dragon depart. Outside the gate lay a puddle of water, shallow and less than a foot deep. The dragon entered the water, rolling and twisting, coating itself entirely in mud. It struggled mightily to leap and soar, but could rise no more than a foot from the ground before falling back. For three days it coiled in the muddy water, its scales and armor covered with swarming flies. One day, a sudden heavy rain fell, and amidst the crash of thunder, the dragon soared into the sky and vanished.
A scholar surnamed Fang was climbing Ox Mountain with a friend to visit a temple when suddenly a yellow brick fell from the rafters, upon which coiled a tiny snake as slender as an earthworm. In an instant it turned once and grew as thick as a finger; it turned again and became as wide as a sash. The party was greatly alarmed, recognizing it as a dragon, and they all fled down the mountain together. Just as they reached the mountainside, a thunderclap burst from the temple, black clouds gathered like a cauldron lid in the sky, and a giant dragon writhed and tumbled freely among the clouds before vanishing after a while.
In Zhangqiu's Small Master Zhuang Village, a peasant woman was walking through the fields when a sudden gale arose, driving dust and sand into her face. She felt as though one eye was sealed shut, with a sensation as painful as if a wheat awn were lodged within it. She rubbed it and blew on it, but to no avail. Upon lifting the eyelid and examining it closely, she found no visible injury, only a thin red line winding along the boundary between the eyeball and the eyelid. Someone said, "This is a dormant dragon." The woman grew both anxious and terrified, resigning herself to await death. After more than three months, a torrential rainstorm descended from the heavens, and with a sudden thunderclap, the dragon burst forth from her eye and flew away, leaving the woman entirely unharmed.
Yuan Xuansi recounted: While in Suzhou, he encountered an overcast day when suddenly thunder roared mightily. The crowd saw a dragon hanging by the edge of the clouds, its scales and armor quivering, and in its claws it clutched a human head, with beard and eyebrows clearly visible. After a while, the dragon entered the clouds and vanished. At the time, no one had heard of anyone losing their head.
Commentary
Chinese literati have a tradition of expressing their aspirations through descriptions of objects, and Pu Songling was no exception. However, here he employs not poetry but fiction. This piece comprises four legends concerning dragons.
Except for the last story, which is attributed to Pu Songling's friend Yuan Xuan Si and can be regarded as a joint creation by Pu and Yuan, the first three stories are solely the original works of Pu Songling. In the first story, the dragon is described as "heavy and clumsy in its movements"; in the second, it is "as slender as an earthworm"; in the third, it appears "as if holding a wheat awn" and "with a red line winding." The common thread is that before the dragon ascends to heaven and reveals its true form, it is not taken seriously by people. Only when a great rain comes and a thunderclap sounds does it shake heaven and earth and earn people's respect. The commentator of Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio, Dan Minglun, remarked on the first story: "When it fell, seeing its heavy and clumsy body, all thought it was but a dull creature, or else they would say, 'It is an inauspicious thing.' In a shallow puddle less than a foot deep, it could not even turn over, trapped and humiliated in the mud. Though it struggled mightily to leap, it fell back after a few feet; even small insects like gnats could bully it. Then people would gather and sneer, saying, 'It can do nothing; its skill ends here.' But when it meets the wind and clouds, encounters a drenching rain, and with a thunderclap soars into the sky, its scales and armor gleam brightly, nourishing all living things, then people are startled and awed, and with changed expressions they declare, 'It is a dragon!' A scholar humiliated in the mud, long oppressed before gaining recognition, is treated with contempt before and respect after, as if two different people." Does the state of the dragon before its ascent metaphorically reflect Pu Songling's own plight in the imperial examinations, and does the "thunderclap as it soars into the sky" metaphorically represent his expectations for himself?