Ouyang Xiu

Chinese writer and philosopher

• Born: 1007
• Birthplace: Mianyang (modern Sichuan Province), China
• Died: 1072
• Place of death: Yingzhou (modern Anhui Province), China

A political figure and innovative writer of prose and poetry, Ouyang Xiu substantially shaped the Confucian tradition that dominated China for almost a thousand years.

Early Life

The father of Ouyang Xiu (oh-yahng shew) held an office in the Chinese civil service system. When Ouyang Xiu was a very young child, his father died. His mother undertook his education. As he grew to young adulthood, the Chinese society of the Song Dynasty (Sung; 960-1279) was undergoing marked change. The previous dynasty, the Tang (T’ang; 618-907), had been dominated by aristocratic families and influenced by the military. During this period, however, the economy had expanded rapidly, and the gentry, steeped in Confucian learning, were becoming more powerful. To increase their influence, they sought to regularize the civil service system, entrance to which was gained increasingly through a series of examinations in Confucian writings. Because Confucian learning was a step to political power, writing style and the careful selection of classical models in prose and poetry were of utmost importance. The model style of the late Tang and early Song, known as “parallel prose,” had grown rigid and formalistic, enforcing conventions of length, grammar, and diction on writers.

Ouyang Xiu, studying alone, discovered the works of an influential Tang period writer, Han Yu (Han Yü; 768-824). Believing Han Yu’s style, guwen (ancient style), to be a much better vehicle for expressing ideas than parallel prose, Ouyang began to practice it. Because he wrote in the unconventional guwen style, he failed his first two attempts at the examinations, in 1023 and 1027. The resourceful young man thereupon presented an established scholar, Yan Shu (Yen Shu), with samples of his writings in the guwen style. Yan Shu was so impressed that he began to sponsor Ouyang, who rose rapidly, gaining his doctorate in 1030 with very high marks.

Life’s Work

Ouyang Xiu began his career as a prefectural level (county) judge from 1031 to 1034 in Luoyang, formerly the capital city. Confucian bureaucrats led lives of studied leisure, with minimal official duties. They vied in writing poetry and prose and engaged in rounds of banquets. Ouyang wrote many ci (songs), poems meant to be sung to popular tunes. His ci were lively songs of love and romance, often performed by the singing girls who attended the fetes. During this period, Ouyang married, but his wife died in childbirth.

In 1034, his reputation as a writer came to the attention of the court. He was promoted to the position of collator of texts at the capital, Kaifeng, where he compiled an annotated catalog of the Imperial Libraries. He increasingly distinguished himself as a prose writer in both the guwen style and the wooden parallel style in which court documents were still written. He remarried, but he lost his second wife to childbirth in 1035.

Ouyang was drawn into a battle between conservatives and reformers, triggered by an official, Fan Zhongyan (Fan Chung-yen), who attempted to make the court and the emperor more responsible to the opinions of the Confucian bureaucrats. The Confucian political system had many merits, such as the great stability and continuity that it provided Chinese society, but it also had many defects. The system was, like Confucianism itself, rigidly hierarchical, based on differences in gender, age, education, and social status. It was difficult to challenge established authority, and political quarrels often involved vituperative personal attacks. In the increasingly bitter conflict between reformers and conservatives, Ouyang’s patron, Fan Zhongyan, was demoted. Ouyang courageously came to Fan’s defense and was exiled in 1036, as he had expected. In 1037, Ouyang married his third wife, with whom he would live the rest of his days.

Posted to a remote region of Hubei Province, Ouyang wrote a history of the Five Dynasties Period (907-960) between the Tang and Song Dynasties, Xin wudai shi (1036; a new history of the Five Dynasties), which eventually became part of the official corpus of dynastic histories, an unusual honor for a work that was not produced under court direction. Confucians value historical studies as the highest form of intellectual work, believing that history reveals models for human behavior.

The tide at court turned in favor of the reformers, and in 1040, Ouyang Xiu was invited back, under the patronage of Fan Zhongyan, but he declined. Henceforth he came to be known as a man who would not trade on friendship for personal advantage, a rare stand within the Confucian world. He was soon recalled to his former post as collator of texts. By 1042, the reformers were dominant, and Ouyang became policy critic, then drafting official, both influential posts.

Ouyang’s powerful writing and reputation as an independent thinker made him a key figure in the reform program, but clique fighting sharpened. When Fan Zhongyan was accused in 1043 of forming a “faction,” for which there was no place in the Confucian system, Ouyang wrote a remarkable essay on partisanship in which he argued that it was proper for gentlemen to ally to express positions on political issues. The essay became a classic political statement and was denounced by authoritarian emperors as late as the eighteenth century.

The iconoclastic reformers were very vulnerable, and soon their fortunes declined again; many were sent into exile. Ouyang was attacked on moral grounds, perhaps because of his reputation as the {I}bon vivant{/I} author of romantic songs. In 1045, he was accused of having sexual relations with his sister’s stepchild, a very serious charge in the family-centered Confucian culture. Although acquitted, he was again exiled, to Yingzhou, where he served in a series of prefectural governorships. One of the values for which Ouyang was later remembered was his insistence that gentlemen, though in exile, should not be bitter but rather should cultivate their inner essence and live productive and carefree lives. He lived out these values in Yingzhou.

Ouyang’s mother died in 1052. Although he could have returned to court shortly thereafter, he withdrew for the full two years of formal mourning sometimes practiced at the death of a parent. His mother occupies a special place in Confucian legend, along with the mother of the great philosopher Mencius (c. 372-c. 289 b.c.e.), who also educated her son under adverse circumstances.

During this exile, Ouyang’s reputation grew. His shi (poems), though they were valued for their adherence to classical tradition, had a carefree and lighthearted air that was rare in previous poetry. Their serenity, achieved through Confucian self-cultivation, continued to be influential in later generations. He also compiled an important catalog of archaeological artifacts. Ouyang was very happy during this period, doing the things that he loved, which included hosting literary gatherings at his Old Drunkard’s Pavilion, where abundant wine was poured by witty and attractive singing girls. In 1054, however, he was recalled to court.

At court, Ouyang produced another history, Xin Tang shu (1060; the new Tang history). In 1057, he conducted the doctoral examinations, insisting that they be written in guwen and be judged on their substance rather than their adherence to classical forms. In 1059, he wrote one of the most beautiful pieces in Chinese literature, “The Sounds of Autumn,” a fu (rhapsodic prose poem). The fu, like parallel prose, was a classical form that had grown stiff and formal. Ouyang Xiu and his protégé Su Dongpo (1036-1101) managed to revivify the genre.

Ouyang Xiu next served as prefect of Kaifeng, as policy critic, and as assistant chief minister, his highest office. He now counseled gradual reforms to avoid the backlash fatal to his earlier efforts. He was instrumental in promoting a period of benevolent rule under two emperors between 1060 and 1066. Problems arose at court, however, and in 1067, enemies charged that Ouyang had committed incest with his daughter-in-law.

Although the ensuing investigation cleared him, Ouyang, now sixty years old, resigned. He was appointed to a post near his estates in Yingzhou. In 1069, another former protégé, the statesman-poet Wang Anshi (1021-1086), undertook a doomed program of radical reforms. Criticizing the program as ill-advised, Ouyang repeatedly requested permission to resign. Finally, in 1071, it was granted. He returned to his estate in Yingzhou, but he did not long enjoy his freedom, for in the summer of 1072, he died of unknown causes.

Significance

Ouyang Xiu made a lasting mark in many areas of human endeavor. As the “literary master” of the Song period, his prose and poetry became models for later generations. He contributed major works in history and archaeology, and his methods for writing genealogies became the standard in China. He was a much sought-after writer of epitaphs, one of the highest Confucian literary pursuits. His prose and poetry have been translated into the world’s major languages and may be found in standard anthologies. While achieving these heights, he also had an important political career.

Like many universal minds, Ouyang was not to be the greatest name of his generation in any one field. His friends Su Dongpo and Mei Yaoqian (Mei Yao-ch’ien; 1002-1062) surpassed him in writing poetry, his political rival Sima Guang (Ssu-ma Kuang; 1019-1086) bested him in writing history. Nevertheless, because of the breadth of his abilities and his optimistic and lighthearted attitude, coupled with intense self-cultivation, it was Ouyang Xiu who became a model scholar, political figure, and Confucian gentleman for generations of Chinese.

Bibliography

Egan, Ronald C. The Literary Works of Ou-yang Hsiu (1007-1072). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1984. Includes a good critical introduction to Song literature. An excellent analysis of the writings of Ouyang Xiu, with much biographical information. The appendices include translations of some of his prose pieces, and his poetry is reproduced throughout.

Lai, Monica, and T. C. Lai. Rhapsodic Essays from the Chinese. Hong Kong: Kelly and Walsh, 1979. This work reproduces six essays in the fu form, including Ouyang Xiu’s famous piece “The Sounds of Autumn.” The work includes reproductions of paintings depicting Ouyang writing the piece, as well as facsimiles of the original in his calligraphy and a printed contemporary edition. It also includes another important fu, “The Red Cliff,” written by Su Dongpo.

Liu, James T. Ou-Yang Hsiu: An Eleventh-Century Neo-Confucianist. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1967. The classic study of Ouyang Xiu, with more attention to biography and political life than in the work of Egan, listed above. Based on a wide reading of classical and modern Chinese sources. Liu should be considered the foremost biographer of Ouyang.

Ouyang, Xiu. Love and Time: Poems of Ou-yang Hsiu. Edited and translated by J. P. Seaton. Port Townsend, Wash.: Copper Canyon Press, 1989. A collection of Ouyang Xiu’s poems, translated into English.

Pine, Red, trans. Poems of the Masters: China’s Classic Anthology of T’ang and Sung Dynasty Verse. Port Townsend, Wash.: Copper Canyon Press, 2003. A collection of poetry from the Tang and Song Dynasties that contains the works of Ouyang Xiu, among others. Indexes.