Liu Zongyuan

Life

In 793, the ninth year of the Zhenyuan era, he passed the jinshi examination; in the fourteenth year, he passed the boxue hongci examination and was appointed zhengzi at the Jixian Hall. He later served as a collator in the Secretariat and as magistrate of Lantian. In the nineteenth year (803), he entered office as a probationary investigating censor, and he was a colleague of Han Yu and Liu Yuxi.

In the first year of Yongzhen (805), Emperor Shunzong succeeded to the throne, elevated Wang Shuwen and others, and pursued political reform. Zongyuan was a friend of Wang Shuwen and was promoted to the post of yuanwailang in the Ministry of Rites. Together with Liu Yuxi, he became a core member of the reform group. After Xianzong succeeded Shunzong, Zongyuan was implicated in Wang Shuwen’s affair, first demoted to cishi of Shaozhou and then further demoted to sima of Yongzhou.

Summoned back to Chang’an in the first month of Yuanhe 10 (815), he was sent out again in the third month as cishi of Liuzhou. He died at Liuzhou in Yuanhe 14 (819). The biographical tradition gives his age at death as forty-seven.

Family and associations

Zongyuan was the son of Liu Zhen, the grandson of Liu Chagong, and the son-in-law of Yang Ping. His wife, Yang, died in 799; his daughter is named Liu Nü in one entry and Liu Fobi in another (801–810), and he also had a son, Liu Gao (d. 869).

He was close to Liu Yuxi, and their careers and political fortunes were broadly alike; they were known together as “Liu-Liu.” With Han Yu, he promoted the Classical Prose Movement, and the two were known as “Han-Liu.”

Literary thought and writing

Zongyuan advocated wen yi ming dao, “writing to illuminate the Way.” His prose was vigorous and sharply wrought. It was also characterized as “雄深雅健,” and he was especially skilled in landscape travel writing. Of his poetry, 163 poems survive; most were written after his demotions, and he achieved distinction in all poetic forms. His subjects included the hardships of peasants, satire of current politics, mourning for friends, praise of the early Tang resistance to incursions, and the sorrow of exile and displacement. In “田家三首,” he used plain depiction to portray peasant hardship, while “行路難” and “籠鷹詞” used the manner of fable to satirize contemporary politics. Poems such as “登柳州城樓寄漳汀封連四州” placed anger and protest within landscape imagery and were clear, austere, and deeply melancholy in style. Poems such as “漁翁” and “夏晝偶作,” which depict the more leisured side of an exiled life, are lucid and rounded, with an echoing, lingering charm.

Works

His prose and fables include “永州八記,” “封建論,” “三戒,” and “羆說,” while his poems include “江雪” and “漁翁.” His collections include Liu Hedong ji and Liu Zongyuan ji, the latter in thirty juan. The Complete Tang Poems contains four juan of his poetry, and the Supplement to the Complete Tang Poems adds three poems. Other attributed works include 《河東先生龍城錄》, 《揚子新注一卷》, 《纂圖互注揚子法言十卷》, 《弦子記一卷》, 《李赤傳》, 《梓人傳》, 《種樹郭橐駝傳》, 《捕蛇者說》, 《河間傳一卷》, and 《宋清傳》. Other associated titles include 《文集(柳宗元)》, 《注揚子法言》, and 《非國語》.

Reception

Su Shi characterized his poetry with the phrases “溫麗清深” and “外枯而中膏，似淡而實美.”