Summary
Summary of Slapping the Table in Amazement
Slapping the Table in Amazement at a glance
Summary: 8 min to read
- Reading time
- About 23 h18 h 15 min fast, 27 h 20 min slow
- Length
- 327,900 words
- Library level
- Challenging long sentences, a rich vocabulary
- First published
- 1628by Ling Mengchu
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
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Key ideas
Key idea 1
Fortune does not follow effort
Ling Mengchu begins with a troubling claim: fame, rank and wealth are settled by fate, not by cleverness or work. Yet fortune can appear in a moment, so nobody knows what is coming. Jin Weihou gives this idea a human face. He saves his silver carefully, tying each ingot with red thread.
On his seventieth birthday, he dreams of eight men in white saying goodbye. By morning, his silver has vanished. His search puts a lifetime of saving against the unsettling possibility that wealth never truly belonged to him.
Key idea 2
Luck can favor unlikely goods
Wen Ruoxu has gifts for music, chess, painting and conversation, but his businesses keep failing.
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Key idea 3
Strength is measured by its use
The tales repeatedly place remarkable strength in women whom men do not expect to find powerful.
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Key idea 4
Love follows an unexpected route
Minister Zhang Gao promises his daughter Derong to Pei Yueke, and the families choose a wedding date.
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Key idea 5
Calm can answer cruel deception
Lady Wu welcomes Zhao, a nun, as a frequent guest while her husband, Scholar Jia, is away teaching.
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Key idea 6
Wonders put royal power on trial
Emperor Xuanzong is fascinated by Zhang Guo, a Daoist whose stories suggest an extraordinary age.
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Key idea 7
Kindness travels beyond familiar boundaries
Generosity appears in encounters where repayment seems unlikely.
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Key idea 8
Hidden wrongdoing calls for an answer
Justice takes different forms in these tales.
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Key idea 9
Surprise carries the moral lesson
Fortune, love and justice reach people by routes they could not have planned.
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The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Who it’s for
Readers who enjoy stories told aloud will love these tales of swindlers, clever judges, ghosts and brave women. Those curious about daily life in Ming China will find surprises and morals.
What this book is
What would you do if the silver you saved for a lifetime got up and walked out of your bedroom? In the first tale of this book, an old merchant named Jin Weihou ties eight ingots with red thread. On his seventieth birthday, he dreams of eight tall men in white who bow and say goodbye. In the morning the ingots are gone.
Slapping the Table in Amazement is a collection of forty tales by Ling Mengchu, who died in 1644 as the Ming dynasty ended. He retold old notebook stories, gossip and marketplace tales in a lively spoken voice, to astonish you and to say something about luck, greed, love and justice.
In this summary
- 1Fortune does not follow effortFree
- 2Luck can favor unlikely goods
- 3Strength is measured by its use
- 4Love follows an unexpected route
- 5Calm can answer cruel deception
- 6Wonders put royal power on trial
- 7Kindness travels beyond familiar boundaries
- 8Hidden wrongdoing calls for an answer
- 9Surprise carries the moral lesson
Fortune is settled by fate, not effort
Ling Mengchu opens with a claim. Fame, rank and wealth are set by fate, he says, and a clever man can starve while a dull one prospers. If everything is fixed, why work at all? His answer is that fortune often shows up in the blink of an eye, and nobody can predict it.
To prove it, he tells of Jin Weihou, who saves every hundred taels as one silver ingot tied with red thread. In his whole life he makes exactly eight. That night he dreams of eight tall men in white. They say their time in his household is up, and they name a man called Wang in another village. Jin wakes, and the ingots are gone.
Jin finds Old Wang, whose family discovered eight ingots under a bed. Jin asks only to see them once and weeps. Wang pities him and presses three taels into his sleeve, but the coins fall through a tear and land by Wang's own doorstep.
Silver that fate has not given you cannot be kept by saving, and silver that is yours cannot be pushed away.
That’s 1 of 9 key points.
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Check yourself
What does Ling Mengchu claim determines fame, rank and wealth?
Right. “Fame, rank and wealth are set by fate, he says, and a clever man can starve while a dull one prospers.”Not quite. “Fame, rank and wealth are set by fate, he says, and a clever man can starve while a dull one prospers.”
Why does Scholar Jia turn away from a public lawsuit?
Right. “His first thought is to draw his sword, but he sees that a lawsuit would spread rumors and stain her name.”Not quite. “His first thought is to draw his sword, but he sees that a lawsuit would spread rumors and stain her name.”
Which two forces bring justice in these tales?
Right. “A third theme is justice, which the book sees in two forms: the clever magistrate and the avenging spirit.”Not quite. “A third theme is justice, which the book sees in two forms: the clever magistrate and the avenging spirit.”
Go deeper: the whole of Slapping the Table in Amazement
About 23 h 50 min to read.Start freePaperback, hardcover and large print, printed for you at cost, are on their way.Email me when it is printed
About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 327,900 words
- Reading timeAbout 23 h
Questions about Slapping the Table in Amazement
What is Slapping the Table in Amazement about?
It is a collection of forty tales from Ming dynasty China about luck, greed, love and justice. Merchants, scholars, judges, ghosts, swordswomen and immortals appear, and each story ends with a surprise or a moral drawn by the storyteller.
What does the title Slapping the Table in Amazement mean?
The title names the reaction of a listener who hears something so astonishing that he slaps the table. The author promises tales strange enough to cause that reaction, from shells filled with pearls to ghosts who testify in court.
Is Slapping the Table in Amazement easy to follow?
Each tale stands alone and has a clear plot. The narrator speaks directly to you, poems frame each volume, and the stories move quickly from one scene to the next, so you can start with any volume you like.
Cite this edition
Ling, Mengchu. Slapping the Table in Amazement. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/slapping-the-table-in-amazement.
Ling, M. (2026). Slapping the table in amazement. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/slapping-the-table-in-amazement (Original work published 1628)
Ling, Mengchu. Slapping the Table in Amazement. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/slapping-the-table-in-amazement.
@book{ling2026slapping,
author = {Ling, Mengchu},
title = {Slapping the Table in Amazement},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/slapping-the-table-in-amazement},
note = {First published 1628}
}
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