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Su Shi (蘇軾) (1037-1101) was a writer, poet, artist, calligrapher and statesman of the Song Dynasty, one of the major poets of the Song era. His zi or courtesy name is Zizhan (子瞻) and his hao or pseudonym Dongpo Jushi (東坡居士, i.e., Resident of Dongpo (see below), and he is often referred to as Su Dongpo (Traditional: 蘇東坡 Simplified: 苏东坡; Sū DōngPō).
Life
Su Shi was born in Meishan, near mount Emei in what is now Sichuan province. His brother Su Che (蘇轍) and his father Su Xun (蘇洵) were both famous literati. In 1057, he and his brother passed the municipal (highest-level) civil service examinations to attain the degree of jinshi, a prerequisite for high government office at that time. Throughout the next twenty years, he held a variety of government positions throughout China; most notably in Hangzhou, where he was responsible for constructing a pedestrian causeway across the West Lake that still bears his name: sudi (蘇堤).
He was often at odds with a political faction headed by Wang Anshi. This faction's rise to power eventually resulted in Su Shi being exiled twice to remote places; first (1080-1084) to Huangzhou (now in Hubei province), and the second time (1094-1100) to Huizhou (now in Guangdong province) and Hainan island. The Dongpo Academy in Hainan was built on the site of his residence in exile. In Huangzhou, Su Shi lived at a farm called Dongpo ('Eastern Slope'), from which he took his literary pseudonym. He died in Changzhou, Jiangsu province.
Work
Su Dongpo excelled in the shi, ci and fu forms, as well as prose, calligraphy and painting; some of his notable poems include the First and Second Chibifu (赤壁賦 The Red Cliffs, written during his first exile), Chibi Huai Gu (念奴嬌.赤壁懷古Remembering Chibi, to the tune of Nian Nu Jiao) and Shui diao ge tou (水調歌頭 Remembering Su Zhe on the Mid-Autumn Festival,中秋節). The bulk of his poems (around 2400) are shi, but his poetic fame rests largely on his 350 ci. He founded the haofang school, which cultivated an attitude of heroic abandon. In both his written works and his visual art, he combined spontaneity, objectivity and vivid descriptions of natural phenomena. He also wrote essays on politics and governance such as Liuhoulun (留侯論).
Trivia
It is said that, once during his free time, Su Dongpo decided to make stewed pork out of boredom. Then an old friend visited him in the middle of the cooking and challenged him to a game of Chinese chess. Su had totally forgotten of the stew during the game until a very fragrant smell came out from his kitchen and he was reminded of it. Thus Dongpo's Pork (東坡堤), a famous dish in Chinese cuisine, was discovered by accident.
External links
"Su Shi"