Scholars › Philosopher / Thinker
Zhong Rong
Liang dynasty critic whose Grades of Poetry ranked more than 120 poets of five-character verse, from the Han to his own day, in upper, middle and lower classes
A thatched pavilion open on three sides stands among tall bamboo; one person sits with their back turned at the veranda rail beside a zither and a stack of bamboo slips, while a stone path runs to a calm pond reflecting clouds and distant hills.
Also known as Zi Zhongwei
Zhong Rong, courtesy name Zhongwei, came from Changshe in Yingchuan; the Liang History (Liang shu) calls him a seventh-generation descendant of the Jin palace attendant Zhong Ya. As a student at the Southern Qi academy in the Yongming era he won the notice of Wang Jian for his grasp of the Book of Changes. Under the Liang he served on the staffs of the princes of Linchuan and Hengyang, memorialised against handing out ranks to unqualified soldiers, and died in office as secretary to Xiao Gang, Prince of Jin'an. His Grades of Poetry (Shipin) assesses 122 poets, placing eleven in the upper grade, thirty-nine in the middle and seventy-two in the lower, and traces each one's stylistic descent. His decision to put Tao Yuanming in the middle grade and Cao Cao in the lowest has been argued over ever since. The Qing historian Zhang Xuecheng paired the book with The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons (Wenxin diaolong) as the first specialist works of criticism.
Life and times
Dates c. 466 CE–c. 518 CE