Writers › Writer / Poet
Qin Guan
Northern Song lyricist from Gaoyou, one of the four scholars of Su Shi's circle, who was exiled as far as Leizhou and died on the road home
In a study at night, a desk holds a brush pot, a porcelain vase with a plum branch, a lit red lantern, a folded fan and an unrolled blank scroll, with no one seated there, while through a round window the moon rises over a lake with a sailboat.
Also known as Zi Shaoyou · Zi Taixu · Hao Huai Hai Ju Shi · Huai Hai
- Roles
- Writer / Poet
Qin Guan, courtesy names Shaoyou and Taixu, called himself the Recluse of Huaihai and came from Gaoyou near Yangzhou. He failed the examinations at first, then visited Su Shi at Xuzhou and wrote a rhapsody on his Yellow Tower; Su compared him to Qu Yuan and Song Yu and sent his poems to Wang Anshi, who found them fresh in the manner of Bao Zhao and Xie Tiao. He passed the jinshi examination in 1085 and, on Su Shi's recommendation, served in the Yuanyou years as editor in the imperial library and the historiography office. Blacklisted with Su's faction in 1094, he was charged with tampering with the Veritable Records and sent to Hangzhou, Chuzhou, Chenzhou, Hengzhou and finally Leizhou. Pardoned by Huizong, he reached Tengzhou in 1100, where, while reciting a song lyric he had composed in a dream, he asked for water and died smiling at the cup. The History of Song records Su Shi's lament that the world would never see such a man again.
Life and times
Dates 1049 CE–1100 CE