Writers › Writer / Poet
Gao Zhu
Southern Song Jianghu-school poet and painter from Yuyao, a lifelong commoner whose plain and clear poems include Qingming and Xiao Chu Huangshan Si; author of the Jujian Xiaoji.
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 Jiu Wan · Jujian · Juqing · Gongbi (earlier name)
Gao Zhu, first named Gongbi, courtesy name Jiuwan and styled Jujian, came from Yuyao (today's Cixi, Zhejiang), born in 1170. He never sat the examinations and lived as a commoner, travelling to Hangzhou, Suzhou and Jinling, devoted to poetry and painting, and built himself a hermitage called Xintianchao. His poems are plain and clear, close to folk song; Qingming, Xiao Chu Huangshan Si and Qiuri Tianfu Ci are his best known. He wrote the Jujian Xiaoji and Xintianchao Yigao, and died in 1241.
Life and times
Dates 1170 CE–1241 CE