Historians agree that Shi Jueming's "Yelu Notes" (hereinafter referred to as "Notes") is an important historical material for studying the relationship between Chu and Qi, and its historical nature is higher than its literary nature. Professor Zhou Yong, a famous historian, said that unlike other documents that avoid talking about the history of the relationship between Chu and Qi, "Notes" uses time as the outline and records in detail major historical events from the 12th year of Yongzheng in Southern Chu to the 10th year of Jianyuan of Qi. The detailed process and clear cause and effect are the best among current documents. More importantly, Shi Jueming personally experienced the relationship between Chu and Qi, and he has always been in an important position, and has better access to the truth. Therefore, the credibility of "Notes" is extremely high.
But literary scholars do not agree with this view. The literary community insists that "Notes" is actually a wild history novel. Fagu, a well-known writer, pointed out that the events highlighted in "Notes", such as the "Yong'an Incident", "Shen Xiang Jin Hou", "Death of King Zhong", "Jianyuan Tuogu" and "Feng Daling", etc., Have ups and downs in the plot, three-dimensional and full characters, relaxed writing techniques, and ready-to-explain the main themes. Their literary nature obviously exceeds their historical nature. The most important point is that although Shi Jueming's life is full of legend, later generations have mostly commented on him as "cunning" and "none of his words are true." To study history, "even a layman like me thinks it's a layman's job to accept a book written by such a standard "treacherous sycophant"!"
So what kind of book is "Notes"? What do you think? Leave a message in the comment area and communicate with the editor!
Intention: "There is a cause before and there is a result after."