江户时代（1603-1868）有大量的中国商船前往日本长崎进行贸易，这些船携带的汉籍被日本学者大庭修称为“唐船持渡书”。书籍贸易留下的目录资料中保留着许多中国小说流入日本的记录。从目录中提取有关小说文献的资料进行统计和分析，既能够对日本的中国小说接受史有新的认识，也有助于理解同时期中国国内小说文献的出版与销售状态。

首先，将唐船持渡书目录中著录的通俗小说与江户日本的翻刻情况进行比较，可以发现除了广受欢迎的《水浒传》外，当时的日本人偏好阅读艳情小说，多有翻刻。翻译改写为日文重新出版的中国小说，则前期集中于历史演义，后期转向了其他的虚构小说，对日本叙事文学的近代化发展产生了重要的影响。这些现象也同时说明了，唐船持渡书目录中的文献情况，与日本的需求有所出入，更多地反映了清代书籍流通的实况。沿着这一思路进行考察，发现唐船携带的书籍中，小说数量占比很低，且乾隆以后呈现明显的增加趋势，这与清代书籍市场的情况是一致的。对比部分小说的版本情况和舶载记录可以发现，通俗出版物的流通时间很短，如果没有通过翻刻保存下来，很快就会从市面上消失甚至散佚。此外，尽管清代实行严格的禁书政策，但是从唐船持渡书的记录来看，有许多遭到禁毁的小说仍然在市场上流通。

最后，选取了一个典型的书籍史事例——原本“三言二拍”佚失而选本《今古奇观》大量流行，利用唐船持渡书记录中的新见史料，结合传世文献的旁证，给出更为合理的解释：选本代替原本的现象并非发生在清初，而是乾隆后期才渐成定势。“三言二拍”的佚失也并非遭到查禁所致，而是由于其本身体量庞大不便流传。唐船持渡书的记录中有关中日双方书籍市场的史料非常丰富，尤其对于缺乏正史文献记录的古代小说来说，提供了很大的讨论空间。

This volume looks into the book trade between the Qing Dynasty and Tokugawa Japan in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which is called Books Transported to Japan aboard Chinese Vessels by Japanese scholar Osamu OBA. The bibliography preserved during the book trade and the censorship procedures of Tokugawa Japan includes records of many pieces of Chinese novels, which not only contributes to the study of the history of literary acceptance in Edo Period, but also shows how the publication and sales of novels looks like in Qing Dynasty.

First, we can see from the republication of vernacular novels in Japan that erotic novels were widely preferred, second only to the great piece of work the Tale of the Marshes. What’s more, those Chinese novels which was translated into Japanese were mainly historical romance in the early Edo Period, and then gradually turned to other fiction ones later, having had an important impact on the development of Japanese narrative literature. These phenomena also suggests that the books transported to Japan are closer to the actual situation of the circulation of books in the Qing Dynasty than the demand of Tokugawa Japan. Following this line of thought, it is showed in the bibliography that the market share of novels is much lower than the consensus of academia, and it significantly increased after late Qianlong Period. The records of certain pieces in List of Books Brought as Cargo also shows that popular publications have a short circulation time, and they might withdraw from the market soon or even disappear if there was no republication. Further more, although the Qing Dynasty implemented a strict ban on books, we can still see the trade records of the novels which were already banned by the government.

In the last chapter, the case of the loss of “Sanyan Erpai” and the huge republications of Jingu Qiguan is taken as a typical example of book history. The records in the bibliography provide new evidence for the study, suggesting that the phenomenon did not happen in the early Qing Dynasty but in late Qianlong Period. To get deeper in this topic, the reason why “Sanyan Erpai” got lost was actually not the ban policy by Qing Dynasty, but the huge volume of this set of books, which makes them inconvenient to spread. The bibliography of Books Transported to Japan aboard Chinese Vessels has provided abundant materials for in-depth studies about classical literature in both Qing Dynasty and Tokugawa Japan, especially for those ancient novels lacking records of official history.