枕中记

《枕中记》，又称《黄粱记》、《邯郸梦》、《吕翁》等，是《唐人传奇》中的一篇文章，作者是唐朝文人沈既济。

本事

开元七年（719年），有一卢生进京赶考，结果未就，只好留在家中种田。一天，旅途中经过邯郸，下榻旅馆，店中遇见了一位老道士“吕翁”，二人相谈甚欢，吕翁送他一个青瓷枕头，当时店主正在蒸黄粱米饭。

卢生以吕翁之枕就寝，梦中娶了清河崔氏之女，又考中进士，平步青云，官至宰相。忽遭同僚陷害入狱、流放多年。平反后封燕国公。享尽荣华富贵，最后老死家中。梦醒之后发现店主人锅里的黄粱饭还没煮熟，可见此梦时间非常之短，“黄粱一梦”的典故由此而来。

《太平广记》收入卷八十二，改题为〈吕翁〉。

故事延伸

《枕中记》以《幽冥录》的焦湖庙祝以玉枕使杨林入梦事为原型。鸠摩罗什所译的《大庄严论经》卷十二第六十五也有类似故事。元朝马致远的〈黄粱梦〉和明朝汤显祖的临川四梦中〈邯郸记〉明显受到《枕中记》的影响。

"The World Inside a Pillow" (Chinese Simplified: 枕中记) is a traditional Chinese story by Shen Jiji of the Tang dynasty (A.D. 618–907). The story involves a Daoist monk and is interpreted through the Daoist and Buddhist belief of life as an illusion and the moral of not striving too much in one's life.

Plot

The story begins with a Daoist monk called Lü travelling when he meets a man named Lu at an inn. This man is unhappy with his life and laments that he was a great man born at the wrong time. The monk responds asking him if his life is not happy then whose life could possibly be happy. Lu monologues that a good and happy life ought to have a certain level of prestige, wealth, and glory. The monk offers Lu a blue porcelain pillow on which to sleep. The pillow had an opening on each end. While the owner of the inn begins cooking a meal of yellow millet, Lu falls asleep.

While the man slept he entered the pillow. Inside the pillow the man was married to a beautiful wife from a wealthy family and became quite rich. He was appointed to be chancellor to the emperor during a time of war, as well. But soon afterwards his colleagues became jealous and started spreading rumors that Lu was a traitor; the rumors caused an edict that he should be imprisoned. Upon his capture he told his wife that he had been afflicted to have wanted such a large salary that he should deserve such a fate. He grew old inside the pillow and upon his dying breath wrote a memorandum about his life and divine fate explaining that his strife was in vain.

When he died an old man inside the pillow he then awoke in an inn with the Daoist monk. The meal of yellow millet is not yet ready. Lu proclaims that it may have been a dream and the monk responds that "the happinesses of human life are all like that."

Themes

The Tang dynasty was an open system with many religious influences including Buddhism and Daoism. The Daoists believe in wu wei (inaction) and not striving to gain fortune, wealth, or status. This theme is evident in the moral of The World Inside a Pillow as the man Lu realizes that all of his strife was in vain. This theme also relates to Buddhist concepts of letting go of attachments and ceasing craving, which also has traces in the story. According to John Hawley the story is a formulaic dream tale in which a religious teacher (Buddhist or Daoist) causes a mortal person to become enlightened through some type of dream.

This story gives rise to the idiom of the "yellow millet dream", which is used to describe unrealistic pipe dreams.

Other related works

"The Governor of Nanke" is a work that was regarded by the Chinese literary critic Lu Xun as a superior dream tale to "The World Inside a Pillow". The story was written in a similar time frame (also during the Tang dynasty) and follows a similar story method in which the mortal falls asleep and the lines between dream and reality are blurred.

The episode "Puhoy" of the American animated television series Adventure Time explores a similar story line when the show's main character Finn builds a giant pillow fort. While seemingly fallen asleep in it and dreaming, he ends up in a magical pillow world where he marries a pillow woman, grows old with a family and eventually dies. Unlike in the Chinese story, Finn later doesn't retain any memories of the happy life he experienced.