Quote
"To have just finished repaying all ones debts. Ah, is this not happiness?"
J
Jin Shengtan"As I write, a bee flies into my window and an ant crawls along the balcony. The ant and the bee are enjoying their present temporary life even as I am enjoying my temporary existence. When I become an "ancient one," so too will the ant and the bee become an "ancient bee" and an "ancient ant." What mystery and what joy that I should be living today at this hour by this place before this window with pen, inkstone, and paper spread before me, while my mind thinks and my hand writes in the company of the present bee and the present ant!"
Jin Shengtan, original name Jin Renrui (金人瑞), also known as Jin Kui (金喟), was a Chinese editor, writer and critic, who has been called the champion of Vernacular Chinese literature.
"To have just finished repaying all ones debts. Ah, is this not happiness?"
"I wake up in the morning and seem to hear some one in the house sighing and saying that last night some one died. I immediately ask to find out who it is, and learn that it is the sharpest, most calculating fellow in town. Ah, is this not happiness?"
"To open the window and let a wasp out of the room. Ah, is this not happiness?"
"The Western Wing is not a work written by an individual named Wang Shifu alone; if I read it carefully, it will also be a work of my own creation, because all the words in The Western Wing happen to be the words that I want to say and that I want to write down."
"冬夜饮酒,转复寒甚,推窗试看,雪大如手,已积三四寸矣。不亦快哉!"
"Eat pickled turnips with yellow beans. It gives the taste of walnut."