Writers › Writer / Poet
Fu Xuan
Western Jin writer and thinker best known for his yuefu ballads and the Fuzi, who rose to Colonel Director of Retainers.
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 Xiuyi · Fu Chungu
Fu Xuan, courtesy name Xiuyi, came from Niyang in Beidi and lived from 217 to 278. Orphaned and poor in youth, he became a learned writer, served Cao Wei as Count of Chungu, and under the Jin was raised to Viscount and held the posts of Palace Censor, Minister of the Imperial Stud and Colonel Director of Retainers. He often memorialized the throne and urged reform of the military-farm shares. His yuefu ballads, such as Qin Nuxiu xing, Qiu Hu xing and Jiuqu ge, are his best-known verse; his Fuzi survives only in reconstructed form, and Zhang Pu of the Ming compiled the Fu Chungu ji.
Life and times
Dates 217 CE–278 CE