Episode 222: Spoon Spirit
A large part of Chinese folklore is related with animism that everything possesses a distinct spiritual essence. We have talked many stories about it. Today we will tell a story from the book Taiping Guangji 太平广记, a collection of stories complied in the early Song dynasty 宋朝 around the 10th century.
In the book, it says during the reign of Xianzong of Tang between the year 806 ~ 820, there was a student name Zhou Yi 周乙 from the Imperial College 国子监. One night, he was studying at night and saw a boy with messy hair around 2 chi 尺, which is about 63 cm high. The boy’s neck sparkles like stars. The flashing was annoying and distracting. Moreover, the naughty boy played with the writing brushes, ink bottles and messed around in the room.
Zhou Yi was not afraid and yelled at the boy. The boy stepped back and later lied against the desk. Zhou Yi was just waiting and watching the boy to see what he was up to. The boy started approaching him. Zhou Yi caught him right away. The boy begged Zhou Yi to let him go and sounded really sincere.
When the sun rose, Zhou Yi heard a sound like something was broken. He looked at the boy, it turned into a broken wooden spoon with more than 100 cooked rice stuck on it.
Mentioned:
太平广记 Taiping Guangji
