Wu Cheng'en's writing style and lifestyle (who knows)

Wu Cheng'en (1500- 1582) was born in Shanyang County, Huai 'an (now Chuzhou District, Huai 'an City, Jiangsu Province). Ming dynasty novelist. His father, Wu Rui, was born in a family where a junior official was reduced to a small businessman. He was optimistic, open-minded and pursued the philosophy of happiness. He named his son Cheng En, the word Ruzhong, which means that he can study as an official, inherit the business of emperors, benefit the people and be a loyal minister in history. When Wu Cheng'en was a child, he was eager to learn and read and recite quickly. He is good at painting, calligraphy, lyrics and Go, and he also likes to collect Fa Tie's famous paintings. As a teenager, he was famous in his hometown for his outstanding literary talent and was appreciated by people. He thought he was "as good as picking up a mustard tuber" in the imperial examination. The Records of Huai 'an Prefecture recorded that he was "quick and wise, rich in books, and wrote for poetry." In addition to being eager to learn, he also likes to search for anecdotes and read books such as immortals, ghosts, foxes and monkeys. For example, unofficial history, with the growth of his age, developed a hobby of seeking novelty in this colorful mythical world, which had a great influence on his The Journey to the West creation. After the age of 30, the anecdotes he searched have been "hidden in his chest" and he has a creative plan. At the age of 50, I wrote the first ten chapters of The Journey to the West, which was interrupted for many years for some reason. It was not until he resigned in his later years and returned to his hometown that he finally finished The Journey to the West's creation which lasted for seven years. Wu Cheng'en, who entered his youth, is a wild and arrogant young man. Low social status, poverty and hardship made this great genius wild and uninhibited, which attracted a flood of laughter. Gone are the days when he was praised by others. When Wu Cheng'en was about twenty years old, she married a girl from her hometown named Ye. After marriage, she had deep feelings. Although Wu Cheng'en was bohemian, she was virtuous and faithful to her wife. In the ten years of Jiajing, Wu Cheng'en achieved excellent results in the annual examination and scientific research, obtained the qualification of Jinshi, and went to Nanjing to take the provincial examination with friends. However, his talent is not as good as his companion's. He, a famous genius in a village, fell into Sun Shan. The following spring, his father passed away with regret. Wu Cheng'en accepted the lesson of his first failure and studied hard for the next three years, but he still failed in the exam in the autumn of Jiajing 13th year. Wu Cheng'en felt ashamed and resentful, and fell ill this winter. The defeat of two provincial examinations, coupled with the death of his father, was a heavy blow to Wu Cheng'en. In his view, it is not only unreasonable to fail the jury in the exam, but also a shame for parents and grandparents. However, he didn't think that he didn't have the ability to get in, but his fate was not good. He believes that "fame and fortune have their own lives, and it is stupid to have them?" Wu Cheng'en lived a different life, upright and upright. The reason why he is so talented and tried and tested is probably related to his unwillingness to please Shangguan against his will. He hates corrupt officialdom, doesn't want to go against his heart, and holds a negative attitude towards the dark reality. He wrote in the poem "Jiro's Song of Seeking Mountains": "The disaster of human beings is not for apes and cranes, but for insects. Sitting in the song room with the five ghosts, I didn't see the four murderers in court. Ye Fu was very grateful, but he felt sorry for his kindness. Wear an evil knife on your chest. You can't hate it. Save the moon has a goal to save the Japanese bow. Are there no heroes in the world? Who can make some contribution to Lin Feng for me and make it last for ten thousand years? " It is believed that the reason for the "civil disaster" and the ugliness of social reality is that the rulers are not good at employing people and let the bad guys like "Five Ghosts" and "Four Fierces" take power. He wanted to "make a fortune" and "be king" to turn Gan Kun around, but he was short of talents and ambitious, so he could only sigh generously when the wind came. The hardships of life have brought Wu Cheng'en no less pressure than the failure of scientific research. After his father died, he needed to manage all the expenses at home, but he was unable to support his family, let alone the means to support it. The source of family life, in addition to getting back six dou of rice from the university every month, can only eat the legacy left by my father. Wu Cheng'en, who had tasted the ups and downs of social life, began to think more clearly and deeply about the problems of social life, and used his own poems to fight against unreasonable society.

The Journey to the West author Wu Cheng'en (1506— 1582) was born in Huai 'an in the middle of Ming Dynasty. Huai 'an was once called Sheyang County in the Han Dynasty, and there was a lake in the southeast of the county called Sheyang Lake, so Wu Cheng'en took Sheyang as his name and often called himself Sheyang lay man. Later generations also called him "Sheyang Mountain Man", probably not his own name. Huai 'an is located in the south of Huaihe River, which was Huaiyin County in Qin and Han Dynasties. The Tang Dynasty was Chuzhou, which was once renamed Huaiyin County, so when he signed his name, there was often the word "Huaiyin" in front. This is the general atmosphere of literati in the Ming and Qing Dynasties.

Little is known about Wu Cheng'en's family background at present. Because there is too little information, so far, the only information available is the epitaph of Xian Fubin. Now, based on this epitaph and other materials, I make the following speculation.

Wu was born in Lianshui and later moved to Huai 'an. When did you move to Huai 'an? He didn't say it himself. I guess it should be no later than early next year. There are two reasons:

First, in terms of time, it should be before the early Ming Dynasty. Xian Fubin's Epitaph says:

In the past, people in Lianshui were not as good as when they moved to Yangshan. Poor and lonely, I lost my genealogy, so I can't elaborate on it for more than three generations. Great-grandfather taboo tripod; Ancestor taboo inscriptions, Yuyao commandments; Chastity, benevolence and religion are taboo in imperial examinations.

The great grandfather, grandfather and emperor mentioned here are all based on the identity of Wu Cheng'en's father Wu Rui. The so-called "more than III" refers to these III's, excluding Wu Cheng'en and his son. If you count them together, it's V .. These five generations of Wu Cheng'en all know it. From his father's great-grandfather Wu Ding, he is "unable to elaborate". Wu Cheng'en was born at the beginning of16th century, more than 30 years after the founding of the Ming Dynasty. According to the usual saying, 3 0 years is a lifetime, and it happened in the early Ming Dynasty from Wu Cheng'en to the last four generations 12 0 years. The meaning of "more than three generations can't be detailed" obviously means that Wu Ding is not the ancestor who moved to Huai, but moved to Huai in a previous life, two or even several generations, just because there is no genealogy, which Wu Cheng'en can't explain clearly. Therefore, Wu Qianhuai was not the night of the early Ming Dynasty.

Second, there were frequent wars at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, especially in Huai 'an, where indigenous people died scattered and the population dropped sharply. According to Huang Lizhou's Biography of Huai 'an Yang Shijie, as well as Cao Pi's Jin Chengxin in Huai 'an and Yang Qingzhi's Memories of Spring Night, "whoever survives in the early Ming Dynasty stops at seven". "Huai people" probably refers to the residents in the city, and "Qijia" may refer to seven surnames. It is said that these seven surnames are "Xu (Ji), Li, Zhang pian, Mianhe Wang, Wang, Nanmenpan (Yu)" and so on. In addition, some people say that Wu is one of the seven surnames, but that refers to Wu Jie and later advised by Jinshi, and has nothing to do with Wu Cheng'en. Wu Cheng'en's ancestral home in Huai 'an was not a adherent of Yuan Dynasty, but moved from Lianshui at the end of Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of Ming Dynasty. In the early Ming Dynasty, Ming Taizu implemented the immigration policy in view of the scarcity of residents in Jiangbei. Most of the immigrants who come here are from Jiangnan, mostly rich children or officers. Today, many Huai 'an people have been handed down from generation to generation, and their hometown is Suzhou in the south of the Yangtze River or somewhere else. Wu Cheng'en's home is north-south, which naturally does not belong to this trend. It should be the migration of bankrupt farmers in the late yuan dynasty and early Ming dynasty.

What occupation did Wu Cheng'en engage in after his ancestors moved to Huai River? It is not mentioned in Xian Fubin's epitaph. At that time, some people transferred to Huai 'an were recruited into An Wei, Dahewei and Kuanhewei hospitals in Huai 'an. Have a plenty of business, engaged in commercial activities; There are also some people who were settled by their ancestors in Huaishang as officials; Some people are engaged in medicine, such as Pan Jia and Lu Jia. There are still many people who practice Confucianism, eat by reading and being an official, and so on. Wu Cheng'en's family is not a soldier, nor a descendant of a big official, nor is it like Confucianism from the beginning. According to Xian Fubin's Epitaph, Wu Cheng'en's family produced two generations of scholars: great-grandfather Wu Ming taught in Yuyao County, Zhejiang Province, and grandfather Zhen Wu taught in Renhe County, Zhejiang Province (now Hangzhou City) (volume 9 of Shanyang County Records of Tongzhi and volume 102 of Hangzhou Prefecture Records of Guangxu are all instructions). Discipline and discipline are cold officials with low salaries. Being far away from home, their wives and children often can't get together. When Wu Cheng'en's father Wu Rui was four years old, his mother Liang Shi took him to Renhe to reunite with his family. A few months after the reunion, something unfortunate happened: my father, Wu Cheng'en's grandfather, Wu died of illness. Liang had no choice but to take the four-year-old orphan back to Huai 'an. Because two generations of his family are running "poor Confucianism", they have no savings and no other income, so their family is getting poorer and poorer. Because he is poor and has no relatives and friends to help him, Wu Rui can't go to school when he grows up. He started studying sociology several years later than other children. Because there is no money to give Melissa Zhou a gift, Melissa Zhou doesn't teach Wu Rui much. However, Wu Rui is very clever. He listened carefully to what Mr. Wang told others. He actually studied all the classes, and he did well. Wu Rui's cleverness touched Mr. She Xue, won his praise and recommended him to continue studying in rural schools. But it didn't work out because of the difficulties of the Wu family. Mrs. Liang said bitterly, "Wu finished writing in the second year. If so, I am very helpless! " First, Mrs. Liang cried, then Wu Rui also cried, and both mother and son began to cry. We don't know what we did after dropping out of school, but when he was twenty, he married the daughter of the Xu family, a small businessman, and became a family. Buddhists have been selling lace, thread and other small commodities for a living for generations, so Wu Shuo inherited the family business and became a small businessman sitting in a shop. From this record, we can see some family background of Wu. The so-called "Xiuwen II" probably refers to debt-ridden great-grandfather Wu Ming and grandfather Zhen Wu. Further pondering this sentence, it seems that Wu's Confucianism is only two generations, and his predecessors are not scholars. Wu Zushang is neither a Confucian scholar, nor a military commander, nor an official. Besides, they are either engaged in agriculture or business. Comparing the two, I think it may be more like running a small business when his family first moved to Huai. There are two reasons.

1. The Wu Cheng'en family has no real estate income. Some people say that after Wu moved to the Huaihe River, he once lived in an irrigation canal and engaged in agricultural production. Based on the fact that Wu Cheng'en was buried here after his death, they called it "Fairy Dragon". This evidence is insufficient. "Dragon" means cemetery, and "dragon head" means ancestral grave, which doesn't mean how much land his family has there. People in the city can't be buried in the city when they are dead. Burying in the country is inevitable. It is normal to buy a piece of land in the country as a cemetery. Of course, the Wu family bought this property from the beginning, so there is no need to buy it again. But I don't think it's possible. The Wu family moved from Lianshui. If he had been a landlord and a rich man, he wouldn't have given up his original land and left his home to land again. If he is a bankrupt farmer, he has no money to buy land in Huai 'an countryside. At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, people migrated from Jiangnan to Jiangbei because Jiangbei was vast and sparsely populated. The purpose of mobilizing wealthy Jiangnan people to reclaim land in Jiangbei was to develop Jiangbei. At that time, it was driven away by administrative means, and there is still a saying that "Hongwu drove away" among Huai' an farmers. The economic situation of Lianshui in the early Ming Dynasty will not be better than that of Huai 'an, and the Wu family has never been "driven away" because of their money.

On the other hand, if the Wu family had a certain property, after the death of Zhen Wu, an Oracle, the Wu family would not be so poor. Wu Cheng'en's father couldn't afford to go to school, and he didn't go to school for several years. Went to social studies, had no money to give gifts to her husband, and was discriminated against; Finally, I dropped out of school. According to my guess, his family has no real estate at all, and his ancestors were not farmers at all after they moved to Huaihe River.

Second, I think the Wu family lived under the river after they came to Huai. At that time, the river was under the Huaihe River (then also called the Yellow River). After the Yellow River captured the Huaihe River, the lower reaches of the Huaihe River in this area were also the lower reaches of the Yellow River. ), the canal is in the west, and the river is between the two rivers, which is a commercial port. At that time, there were many businessmen and people from all over the world, and most of them lived here. These people gradually joined the Yang Shan nationality. After his family moved to Huaihe River, he settled down by the river, in a market where every family did business. Therefore, it is natural for him to engage in some small businesses to make a living. Judging from the surrounding environment under the river, it is true: Datong Lane, Nailhu Lane, Zhang Fen Lane and Appraisal Street surround his home. The residents in these alleys basically run the businesses listed in the name of the alley. When their business was in surplus and their living conditions improved, they made some progress in the direction of being an official, and made some achievements, resulting in two generations of academic palaces (although Zhen Wu was born in Gong Sheng, he may have to pay a little money, but this just proves that his family has both scholars and a small surplus in economy). At this time, his family abandoned the business that was not commensurate with the status of an official (although it was a dirty little official), and the source of life depended entirely on the meager salary of learning. If this road goes wrong, there will be trouble. Sure enough, Zhen Wu is dead and has no official salary. The life of the whole family is in an imminent crisis, and even Wu Shuo is difficult to go to school. If it were a bureaucratic landlord family, such problems would not arise. It is conceivable that the Wu family has no real estate and lives a hard life. At this time, forced by life, the scholarly children of the "second generation of Xiuwen" dropped out of school, got a shop and started a small business, and suddenly returned to the status of a small businessman. For the Wu family, it is natural and unobtrusive for future generations to pick up the occupations that their ancestors operated and get familiar with them.

Wu Cheng'en described his family's situation as "poor and lonely". "Poverty and loneliness" is the main feature of his family background. The so-called "poverty" mainly refers to economic difficulties. As I said before, his family is really not rich, and sometimes it is quite difficult. In addition, it may also mean that fate is not very good. For generations, twists and turns have been underdeveloped, and it is unlucky to be an official and make a fortune. I have been a junior official for two generations. Instead of rising, I returned to my original position and got into trouble. The so-called "loneliness" probably means that the population is not prosperous, and several generations are single-handedly, and the population is weak and small. The Wu family is in trouble and no one supports him. Wu Cheng'en's father was blackmailed by the government and petty officials, and no one was fair to him. All these clearly show how "poor and lonely" his family is. There is no one in the family who can make a lot of money as his political or economic backer. I'm afraid there are very few brothers and uncles in his family, and there is no record of other people in his family yet. There are indications that his family may be passed down from generation to generation.

Wu Cheng'en's kinship has nothing to show off. Ancestral relatives, Wu Cheng'en didn't speak, probably praise is not enough. Grandma Liang's family is not clear. She is probably from Huai 'an. At that time, Liang's family in Huai 'an didn't show off, and his great-uncle knew nothing about it. Neither my ancestors nor my aunt recorded it, so it is impossible to talk about it. The first mother, Xu, is the daughter of a businessman, and the biological mother, Zhang, knows nothing about anyone. I haven't even seen a word about my uncle's house and my aunt's house, or there is no aunt at all. The situation of Wu Cheng'en's relatives above the level of parents is simply a mystery.

Some people like to praise two relatives of Wu Cheng'en's own generation: one is the brother-in-law Shen family, and the other is the brother-in-law Ye family. They are descendants of Shen Yi and Ye Qi respectively. Shen Yi and Ye Qi were the ministers of the southern and northern governments in Jingtai and Hongzhi years respectively, and they were both important figures in Huai 'an. But Wu Cheng'en's brother-in-law and wife are probably just the two ethnic groups, not the direct descendants of the two ministers. But in the end, it is still a relationship between relatives and friends, and it has something to do with it. Now let's look at these two relatives.

Let's talk about my brother-in-law Shenyang first. "Epitaph of Xianfubin" says: "Mrs. Xu gave birth to a daughter and became a woman, suitable for Shenshan County." So Wu Cheng'en's brother-in-law is called Shen Shan. How do you know that Shen Shan and Shen Yi belong to his family? This is reflected in the epitaph written by Wu Cheng'en's grandson Du Qiu, the son of Shen Shan's daughter, for his parents. The epitaph says. "When it comes to Huai County, the most popular thing is that the family of Shangshu is also the first; My mother is a man, and I know her granddaughter. " This epitaph says that the grandmother is "Mrs Wu" and "Sheyang Wu Gong, mother uncle". Therefore, her mother Shen Shi is Wu Cheng'en's niece and Wu Chengjia's daughter, "Mrs. Wu". Therefore, Wu Cheng'en's brother-in-law Shen Shan was immediately called "the home of the first minister of Shen Gong". At that time, Shen Yi was the only Shangshu in Huai 'an, so Shen Shan was a member of Shen Yi. In addition, Du Qiu's middle cousin is clearly recorded in Shen Yi's genealogy, while Shen Shi's genealogy also records Du Qiu as an important relative. These are all confirmations.

According to Pingyagong's Epitaph, Shen Shi "was the first family in Donglu, and the founding fathers moved away from the soldiers, so he returned. Inheritors are distinguished by subjects, and the first taboo person is the minister of Nanjing Household Department of Leigong, and there are imperial merits between orthodox religions. Those who are taboo, officials and ministers all give things, and they are promoted to Taibu Temple and Shao Qing to speak in Taiwan. They are tired of the right-wing officials in Sichuan, and they are responsible for the birth of the people ... Yin Lun Heyi, the branch name is re-elected, and the number of Huai people in China is huge, which means that the first bend is Shen. " This is indeed a distinguished family. But there is no Shen Shan's name in this Shen Shi genealogy, and there is no record of marrying Wu. According to the relationship with Shen Shi family, Shenshan should be Shen. Shen was either the spectral name of Shen Shan, which was later renamed. This is based on the following points:

1. Du Qiu wrote "Epitaph of Ping Yagong": "Shen Fu is the former residence of Huai Qiaomu, and my mother gave me the door to Gong Yu, while Ping Yagong and the rest have cousins." Pingya's public name is Shen Pu, the word husband. His nickname is Pingya and his Changshan is three years old.

Second, Shen Qian's "Shanglinyuan Supervision Bureau Chengpi County Government" said: "Qiu Gong Zhen Gang (Du Qiu Zhen Gang), the ancestors are also in the table." Shen Qian's ancestor was Shen Pu.

Third, Shen Peikuan's "Fu Xing Jun Shu" said: "When Zeng Wang's father saw his back, Wang's father had been married for 12 years, leaving him and his cousin Zhen Gang Qiu Gong alone." Shen Peikuan's great-grandfather is still Shen Pu.

All the above records can be found in Shen Yi's genealogy.

Press: Shen Pu's father's name is Shen, his grandfather's name is Shen, and his great-grandfather's name is Shen Xuan, so he is called the second brother. Since Shen Puhe is a cousin, Shen should be his mother's uncle, and his mother Shen Shi should be his brother and sister, while Shen Dang, the father of talents, should be his grandfather, who is Wu Chengjia's married husband named Shen Shanzhe. I think this is an unchangeable inference. Shen Shi's genealogy is called Shen Wuying instead of Shen Shan. Maybe Shenshan was the first name, and later it was changed to Shen! Because of the surplus. According to Shen Shi's genealogy, Shen was used to match Ning and Wang, and there is no record of Wu. This is probably because the Wu family is "poor and lonely". When Wu Chengjia marries the Shen family, it is a wing room, even a concubine, and there may be no boys. Shen Shan may be much older than Wu Chengjia. Shen Yixing was born in 1392, and his second brother Xu Shen was born earlier. Shen Shan, the only son of Shen Xuan, the fourth son of Xu Shen, is the third generation of Xu Shen. He was born on the second night. If you take 30 years as your life, then the first year and the second year are 60 years, which is 1450. If some other possible special circumstances are added, the time should be extended, at least 1460 or 1470. His eldest son, Shen, was born in 1500, which is quite different. Therefore, Shen Shan's birth year may be earlier, even close to Wu Cheng'en's father Wu Rui (Wu Rui was born in 146 1). According to the above analysis, Shen Shan is only Shen Shangshu's nephew, and Cheng En's sister Cheng Jia is not Shen Shan's original wife, but an unknown spouse in the genealogy, so this relative is not worthy of praise. In addition, when Shen Shi arrived at the sacred mountain, there were no dignitaries and nothing to show off. So Wu Cheng'en only mentioned Shen Shan's name in his father's epitaph, without further introduction, and never mentioned it anywhere else. Later, he took Jinshi as an official, and Shen Shi's blood flowed in his veins, so he strengthened the relationship between Shen Shi and the Qiu family and valued the relationship between Shen Shi and Wu. From here, we can also see how low the social status of the Wu Cheng'en family is.

Wu Cheng'en's father-in-law, Ye Jia, is somewhat similar. Ye's ancestor was Ye Heng, the prime minister in the early Southern Song Dynasty, who lived in Jinhua, Zhejiang. Ye Qi's great-grandfather, Julia, was famous for his poems in the Yuan Dynasty, and wrote "Qiao Yun Solo". His grandfathers Ye Tulian and Hong Du once guarded Huai 'an, so he became Huai 'an Shoujiang. There is a biography of Ye Qi in Volume 185 of Ming History. According to legend, Qi Zi was originally in the Qing Dynasty, and Jingtai was buried in the soil for five years, and was awarded the Imperial History. During Chenghua's reign, he was tired of being the prefect of Datong. In Hongzhi's fourth year, he went to the Ministry of Finance to look for Prince Taibao. The epitaph was written by Li Dongyang. According to the epitaph, Ye Qi was born in 1426 and died in 150 1 year. He "has a long beard and is called a great weapon by people who see him", "worthy of his wife, following Quelikong and sealing his wife, all of whom are experts". He's story is unknown, but Kong's is Wu Cheng'en's Ye Laotai, Ye Laotai and Ye Taimu's Preface to Poetry (see Volumes 1 and 2 of Mr. Sheyang's Draft). In these two articles, Cheng En said: "The first assistant is the minister of the country and the talent of the pillars, Kang Fan is the minister of the sea, Gong Zhenbaoyi", and "Taifuren is the true descendant of her predecessor's forty-five generations". Say it again; Thank you for your marriage. Mrs. Ban's great-grandson was the last one. Although Wu Cheng'en only said in Xian Fubin's epitaph that he "married Ye" and did not specify which Ye family he came from, we can know from these two articles that Ye is a descendant and a great-grandson member. Kong was born in 1468, 42 years younger than her husband, who died at the age of 34. From the time point of view, Ye Shi, Cheng En's wife, can't be Kong's great-granddaughter, only in the "class" of his great-grandson, and she is also the "last one". It seems that Ye's wife is not a direct descendant. The record of Kong's family in Ye Qi Epitaph written by Li Dongyang only exists in Volume 24 of Huailu Tanghou Manuscript in Ming Dynasty. In the hardcover edition of this book, the words "following Kong's family in the que, sealing his wife, there are experts" have been deleted. This reminds me of Wu Cheng'en's sister Wu Chengjia. Perhaps this is the fate of a woman, who married a small room, a small room, or had no son. Kong, who was sealed as his wife, is still the same. Wu Chengjia, an ordinary woman, doesn't belong to the Shen Shi family tree. What is there to say? Two brothers, Ye Qi, and his younger brother's name is Yang Ye. Cotyledon basket, Yu Chongli, Tianshun Chen Geng buried. According to Volume 16 of the Records of the Apocalypse Huai 'an Prefecture, he "is strict outside the official, and the prison should be ruled by law, and the people dare not be private." Abide by the three counties, perform their duties diligently, do not brush feelings to attract resentment, and do not innovate to invite names. Tired of work and punishment, Second Assistant Minister. " These two uncles were important people in the Ye family at that time. Cotyledon Lu Ye, called Xidi, is Cheng En's uncle. He wrote the first volume of Sheyang Survival Draft, the poem "Send a Letter to Ye", and the fourth volume, "Where is Great-grandfather Weng's Seven Words". Ye Huan's family condition is very superior, his father is an official of the imperial court, and his shadow is the book of Guanglu Temple (Volume 9 of Tongyi County Records). Uncle Bao Ye is very rich. It is said that Ye Zhi has been in the official position for more than 40 years, and he has paid all the expenses for going in and out. According to the word barrier, Ye Sasakawa "is your son, a wise man when he left, and a country guy when he returned from fatigue." When I was a teenager, I liked to make friends with all kinds of people. "Jianghu Rangers, time is at their doorstep; Heresy Ji Fang, the sky is listed in front of it. " Then he changed his way of life and made friends with celebrities all over the world: "hanging foil and having piano and chess, spending money to collect paintings and calligraphy." Flute, write fine print, beg for the spring rain pavilion and avoid the west pavilion. "However, he always values wealth and righteousness." If you are short, you will forget lunch. "When it is abundant, diners are several times as many as families." Although Wu Cheng'en was his nephew Qian, he was regarded as a distinguished guest because he was a celebrity at that time. Their friendship is very good. When Zuo Ye was in Beijing, he wrote a poem "Send Xiaoxi to Ye Taizhang", which gave people a feeling of "hanging the old reward, leaving dreams around Cangbo" and asked Zuo Ye to "miss Laoshan radish". In fact, Ye Sasakawa is not much bigger than Wu Cheng'en. Qin Long's seventieth birthday is in the fourth year (1570), so he should have been born in 150 1 year, which is similar to Wu Cheng'en's age. Zhang Zi also said, "I have been married for forty years." This sentence needs to be considered. "Yu" should be mistaken for "Yu", but the word book says that "Yu" and "Yu" are interlinked. The ancients like to use generic terms and can put them aside. In ancient Chinese, "forty years left" means "hanging for forty years" and "nearly forty years", so this sentence is very problematic. We try our best to make the "remaining forty years" as big as possible, that is, thirty-eight or nine years. It was not until 1570 that Wu was married for 389 years, so his marriage date should be 1532. This year, Wu Cheng'en's father had just passed away, and in the epitaph he wrote for his father, he just caught up with "marrying into Ye's family", which was so mysterious. Besides, Wu Cheng'en is almost 30 years old this year. For a one-child family in their forties, I'm afraid they will never let their children get married and start a family until they are near death in their seventies. So I think this "remaining forty years" should be a mistake of "more than forty years". In this case, it makes sense for Paul to get married in his twenties.

Wu, the son of Zuo Ye, was buried in the 29th year of Jiaqing, and was the official of the Imperial Academy. His Sun Wu won the first place in the military competition in the 20th year of Wanli. This is behind Wu Cheng'en's back. In a word, Wu Cheng'en is such a relative, and seems to be better than the Shen Shi family.

How many children does Wu Cheng'en have? There is no record. He had a son named Mao Feng, but he died young. No other children can't know. Chen Wei wrote A New Order of Flowers and Plants for him, saying that after Wu Cheng'en's death, the Wu family "had no cooking and no fire". According to this sentence, Wu Cheng'en was the last person in the family to die, and there were probably no other children. After his death, the chimney stopped smoking and the fireworks were broken. Even if she had a daughter, she would have been married long ago. But there is no material to prove this.

Wu's situation has only been mentioned in two places. First, "Introduction to Society" says that "you owe your son heartfelt friendship all his life, and attach importance to marriage friendship". Another epitaph of Shen Kun's parents reads: "We are connected with each other and we know each other. I lost my son's phoenix feather, and I tasted the wine sacrifice. The last article said that in the twenty-third year of Jiajing (1544), Shen Kun was the first scholar in three years, and the emperor gave gifts to his parents, which coincided with Shen Mu's 64th birthday to celebrate. The twenty-third year of Jiajing was an eventful autumn for Shen Kun. In the twenty years of Jiajing, he won the top prize. In this year, the emperor gave a gift to his parents and wife, and his sister-in-law Zhang Kan was buried underground in this year. His family is rising. At this time, it was really important for Shen Kun and Wu Cheng'en to order their children's in-laws, and he did not forget the friendship and attached great importance to Wu Cheng'en. But it is more reasonable to say that the engagement was a few years ago, that is, before Shen Kun won the highest prize. Therefore, Mao Feng was born between the 11th year of Jiajing and the 20th year of Jiajing. The second article was written in the winter of the thirty-fifth year of Jiajing (1556). In the article, Mao Feng is called "the dead son", indicating that he has died, and it may have been some time. Because the epitaph says that one of the parents' three granddaughters married Zhou, and the other two may have hired someone else. Of these three people, of course, including the daughter who was engaged to Wu, because she died and married someone else. But it seems that the past time won't be too long, because Cheng Si remembers it vividly, and he wrote it on the epitaph of Shen Kun's parents. Maybe Mao Feng died just a year or two ago. But these are all speculations. It is difficult to tell when Wu was born, when he died and how old he lived.

The above is a brief textual research on Wu Cheng'en's family background and related conditions, aiming at providing reference for scholars studying The Journey to the West and Wu Cheng'en. Many places are bold speculations, and new information needs to be found to correct and enrich them.