Having finished reading this essay in full at last, I am astounded at how completely unsubstantiative this discussion thread is. Not a single comment seems to b

Having finished reading this essay in full at last, I am astounded at how completely unsubstantiative this discussion thread is. Not a single comment seems to be informed by TFA, but rather by preconceived notions about the imperial Chinese civil examination system. That said, I would say that if there's any flaw in this essay, is that it doesn't revisit those predominant notions until the last two sections of the essay ("Modern Prose Aesthetics and Individuality"), ("Meritocracy and Social Reproduction"). It instead spends most of the time describing the system in detail, which is of course very much appreciated. I particularly like how it explains that much of the exam material was prepared by "the so-called literati [...] the cultured elite." (There's probably all sorts of parallels one could choose to read into contemporary society, if one was inclined to treat history like a cudgel.) Wikipedia's article on the eight-legged essay mentions there is a post-Opening Amplification section that elaborates and clarifies the themes of the essay. One wonders how this article would read if delivered in the baguwen format.