Lanyan 蘭岩, an anonymous commentator, appends a comment to nearly each of the items in He Bang'e's 和邦額 (fl. 1736-ca. 1779) Yetan suilu 夜譚隨錄 (Casual Records of Night Talks). Given the assumption by many scholars that such books were read as creative works of art, it is significant that Lanyan's remarks are generally devoted to trying to make sense of unusual phenomena. Even when he disagrees with interpretations offered by Bang'e or other commentators, the fictional nature of the stories is never the issue. Generally the reason for comments made by Bang'e or Lanyan demonstrate their desire to understand the phenomena described in the stories. Lanyan takes Bang'e's comments seriously, but he is not afraid to disagree with him or with some of the other commentators. While Bang'e sometimes interprets the material in the legends metaphorically, and he and the other commentators often reveal the circumstances surrounding his recording of the legends and his belief in them, Lanyan never discusses them metaphorically, and is not concerned with the factual nature of the stories. While his comments lie within the mainstream of popular Chinese cosmological beliefs, Lanyan tends to focus more on how the individual's behavior leads to the occurrence of certain events, good or bad, rather than crediting or faulting external forces for causing things to happen.