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Sima Qian held the neutral spirit of “recording” to write Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), which possessed the principle of “calling a spade a spade” to record historical truth. However, Sima Qian lived in the Han Wu Emperor Dynasty, which was a royal absolutism period; additionally, he suffered from castration. Therefore, Shiji, a book completed during the period of “Witchcraft Conspiracy (wu-ku chih-huo)”, Sima Qian must need to be more prudent. Writing the sensitive contemporary history, Sima Qian not only had to avoid facing the realistic pressure of political authority but also needed to present the truth of the history, as well as hiding his value and judgement in the work, which was not an easy task. According to his own words, Sima Qian attempted to imitate the writing strategy of Chunqiu, when encountering contemporary taboos, which conducted the writing strategies to break the realistic shackles. In other words, to probe into the writing strategies of Shiji written by Sima Qian, paying attention to Emperor Wu of Han would be the best starting point.
The article aims to develop from the Emperor Wu of Han and focus on the four themes regarding his standards of selecting generals and prime ministers, his particular respect of Confucianism only, the warfare for the barbarous areas around the mainland, and the behaviors of offering sacrifices to gods for praying. Using the chapters and sentences as a thread to study the material selection, writing criteria, and presenting techniques of Sima Qian, further, to explore the application of writing strategy and discourse the diversity of history. Moreover, the article discusses how Sima Qian merged the objective historical facts with his subjective thoughts in the book of Shiji; meanwhile, how Sima Qian managed to protect himself and survive under the coercion of realistic politics by Emperor Wu of Han while completing the purpose of writing the history that “forms a philosophy of his own”. Through observing, the writing strategy of Shiji can also reveal the value judgement of Sima Qian.
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