Writers › Writer / Poet
Zhang Xie
Western Jin poet from Anping in Boling, an Attendant of the Yellow Gate who quit office in the troubled years; his Miscellaneous Poems are his best known work.
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 Courtesy name Jingyang
Zhang Xie, courtesy name Jingyang, came from Anping in Boling (modern Anping, Hebei) and was a Western Jin writer. He held office, rising to Attendant of the Yellow Gate, then gave it up and lived in retirement as the realm fell into chaos. Summoned in the early Yongjia years, he pleaded illness and died at home. Zhong Rong's Shipin calls him 'Zhang Xie, Yellow Gate Attendant of Jin'. Thirteen poems survive, one on history, one on immortals and eleven miscellaneous poems; the Wen Xuan includes his Miscellaneous Poems, and later editors compiled a Zhang Jingyang Ji.
Life and times
Dates Dates unknown; lived in the Western Jin (266-316 CE)