Kang Youwei

Also known as Zi Guangsha · Hao Zhangsu

Kang Youwei, born Kang Zuyi, courtesy name Guangsha, styled Changsu, came from Nanhai in Guangdong. In 1891 he opened a school in Guangzhou, later known as the Wanmu Caotang, where Liang Qichao studied, and in the same year published A Study of the Forged Classics of the Xin Period (Xinxue weijing kao). In 1895 he organized examination candidates in Beijing to petition against the peace treaty with Japan and for moving the capital and reform, and passed the jinshi examination that year. In 1898 the Guangxu emperor received him and adopted his proposals; after about a hundred days the Empress Dowager Cixi took back power and Kang fled abroad, founding the Protect the Emperor Society in Canada in 1899. He returned in 1913, supported Zhang Xun's brief restoration of Puyi in 1917, wrote the Book of Great Unity (Datong shu), and died in Qingdao in 1927. The Qing court ordered the printing blocks of his book on the forged classics destroyed.