Miss Li, later Yen-êrh

Overview

Miss Li is the cold-handed visitor who befriends Sang Tzŭ-ming in Pu Songling’s Lien-hsiang story, translated by Giles in1880. She leaves an embroidered slipper that summons her when shaken and avoids the other visitor, Lien-hsiang. Li identifies that rival as a fox, while concealing her own dead state. Sang’s increasing weakness eventually exposes the danger of their meetings, though Li explicitly says she sought companionship rather than his death. She rejects the suggestion that killing him to obtain a dead companion would fulfil her wishes.

After Lien-hsiang confronts her, Li administers the fox’s prepared medicine and helps nurse Sang. She then withdraws, ashamed of being a ghost. Later the recently dead Yen-êrh of the Chang family revives declaring herself Li and demanding her slipper. It no longer fits her new body, and a mirror confirms that her appearance has changed. Following a period of distress, refusal of food and bodily alteration, she regains her former features and the slipper fits again. These are narrated supernatural changes, not a treatment or evidence about an actual illness.

In her account of the transition, Li says she wandered without returning to her grave and entered the young woman’s body without knowing it would revive. The text therefore does not identify her as Yen-êrh’s murderer. She marries Sang with Lien-hsiang’s encouragement, later recognizes the fox’s return as the girl Wei, and asks that her own former bones be buried alongside the fox’s remains. The women’s affectionate sister-language develops through companionship and does not establish biological sisterhood. Li and Yen-êrh are retained as stages of this narrated identity rather than duplicated as unrelated ghosts.

Origins & earliest records

Pu Songling’s literary collection in Giles’s selected translation.

Records & interpretation

Complete English story, all attached notes and relevant referenced notes read.

Selected bibliography

Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.

1. 01

   Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio

   Pu Songling; translated and annotated by Herbert A. Giles · 1880

   Volume I, XXIII, Miss Lien-hsiang, pp.168–185; electronic notes145–155 plus referenced49/64; complete story and all notes read.

Family & connections

A source-supported family tree or inspiration record has not yet been compiled for this profile. Related reading below indicates a connection in subject matter, not a proven lineage or creative influence.

Primary records and illustrations

References

Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.

1. Historical literary translationStrange Stories from a Chinese Studio — Miss Lien-hsiangResearch access: 2026-10-05

Image credits

A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.