Su Shi (pronounced ‘sue shrrr‘; also known as Su Dongpo) is one of Chinese history’s greatest figures.
In an era of flourishing culture, he stood out as a talented writer, poet, painter, classicist, and more.
And as an official he experienced great power and success, as well as imprisonment, poverty and exile.
But throughout his life, one trait was consistent: brilliance in whatever he turned his mind to.
Early life
Harmonizing with a Poem by Qin Guan (1079 AD) by Su Dongpo, ink on paper, running script. National Palace Museum, Taipei. Image source: National Palace Museum’s Open Data collection)
Su Shi (苏轼 [Sū Shì]) (1037 – 1101 AD), courtesy name Zichan, was born near the city of Meishan in Sichuan Province during the Song dynasty (960 – 1279 AD).
He was born into a wealthy and literary family. His father, Sun Xun (1009 – 1066 AD), was a silk merchant and scholar who later became an official.
Su Xun had failed the imperial exams used to select officials three times. In frustration, he burned his practice essays and did not consider working in government for a decade.
Early education
The young Su Shi received a good education and began to show the signs of his future literary greatness. So too did his younger brother Su Zhe (1039 – 1112 AD) (often referred to in English as Su Che).
The brothers spent years in deep study of the Chinese classics. At least part of this study was led by Su’s mother. The focus of education in this era lied particularly on the following texts:
- The Analects of Confucius
- Mencius
- The Great Learning
- Maintaining Perfect Balance
- Two chapters of the Book of Rites
And at aged 17, Su married his first wife, Wang fu.
1056 -1057: The Three Sus visit the capital
In 1056, when Su Shi was 19, he went with his father and brother to the Song dynasty’s capital, Kaifeng, Henan Province. The three soon became well-known there as ‘The Three Sus’.
This was because Su and his brother had great success in the Jinshi civil service exams in 1056. Su did the best out of all candidates nationally, and his brother was not far behind.
And meanwhile, their father had gained a government position based on merit (not exams). He did this by impressing the great Song dynasty scholar-official Ouyang Xiu (1007 – 1072 AD) and others with his original essays.
Unfortunately, Su’s mother passed away in the same year. Just as their renown reached new heights, the three Su’s returned home to Meishan for a four-year period of mourning.
Su’s unique examination essays
The exam essays Su Shi wrote displayed great literary skill and innovative thinking. In total there were fifty essays on the following subjects:
- Famous historical figures (20 essays)
- Governance of the people (6 essays)
- Staffing bureaucracies (6 essays)
- Principles of government (5 essays)
- Maintaining Perfect Balance (a Confucian classic) (3 essays)
- Military preparation (3 essays)
- Military strategy and border relations (3 essays)
- High-ranking ministerial positions (2 essays)
- Trade and finance (2 essays)
Ouyang Xiu remarked that Su’s exam essays showed he would ‘surely lead the literary world one day.’The essays reveal how strong-minded and independent Su’s was. They also give hints of his future approach to politics and criticisms of policies:
夫人胜法，则法为虚器。法胜人，则人为备位。人与法并行而不相胜，则天下安。今自一命以上至于宰相，皆以奉法循令为称其职，拱手而任法，曰，吾岂得自由哉。
– Su Shi (应制举上两制书)
If people dominate policies, policies become empty vessels. If policies dominate people, people become mere fillers of positions. But if both work together harmoniously, the empire will be at peace.
Today, form lowly positions up to the prime minister, all officials think that upholding policies is what fulfils their duties. Entrusting policies, they fold their arms and say: ‘How can I be free to act independently?’
1063 – 66: Notary in Fengxiang, passing of Su Xun
Between 1061 – 1062, Su return to capital to sit a special decree exam. This exam was given to further assess noted potential talent. Afterwards, he was appointed to work as a notary in Fengxiang (in today’s Baoji city, Shaanxi Province).
His first wife passed away in 1065 and father passed away in Kaifeng 1066. Su and his brother accompanied their father’s coffin for approximately 925 miles (1,428km) from Kaifeng to Meishan.
Their official mourning period lasted for around three years. During this time, he married his second wife, Wang Runzhi.
One Night (1080 – 1083) by Su Shi, running script, ink on paper. 27.6 x 45.2cm. National Palace Museum, Taipei. (Image source: National Palace Museum’s Open Data collection)
1069 – 1070: Return to Kaifeng, opposition to New Policies
When the Su brothers returned to the capital in 1069, a new emperor was on the throne: Shenzong (r. 1067 – 1085 AD).
Shenzong wanted to reform the dynasties’ out-of-control finances and improve its weakening military. To achieve these goals, he appointed the reformist Wang Anshi (1021 – 1086 AD).
Wang had introduced what many considered a radical set of reforms, called the New Policies (新法 [Xīnfǎ]) in a famous ‘Ten Thousand Word Memorial’ (上万言书 [Shàngwàn Yánshū]). These policies touched on almost every aspect of Song economics, education, and society itself.
Wang’s appointment and mandate to make such sweeping reforms was unusual. About a century later, the intellectual Zhu Xi (1130 – 1200 AD) wrote that it was something ‘that comes only once in a thousand years.’
Su argued (amongst other things) that the people were against the polices, which would change their lives in many ways.
In some ways, this reflected what he had argued in his exams. In others, it was slightly hypocritical. After all, he had strongly argued that serious reforms were needed.
者物论沸腾，怨讟交至，公议所在，亦可知矣，而相顾不发，中外失望 […]何事不生？
– Su Shi (上神宗皇帝书)
Today opinion everywhere is in tumult. Anger and outrage are everywhere. Public opinion is clear. And yet [officials] look at each other and say nothing, which disappoints everyone in the capital and in the provinces […] What disaster will follow?
Su and his fellow opposition continued to criticise the new policies throughout the next decade. This would have bad consequences for most of them eventually…
1071 – 1079: Governor in the provinces
Between 1071 and 1079, Su spent time working as an official in the following places:
- 1071 – 1073: Hangzhou (in today’s Zhejiang Province)
- 1074 – 1076: Mizhou (today’s Zhucheng, Shandong Province)
- 1077 – 1079: Xuzhou (in today’s Jiangsu Province)
- 1079 (for 3 months): Huzhou (in today’s Zhejiang Province)
During this time, Su proved himself to be a capable and caring official.
For example, he was commended by the emperor for camping out on a wall in Huzhou as it was fortified during a flood. He then repeatedly petitioned the government for funds to build a new wall for the same purpose.
He was eventually successful and able to hire seven thousand labourers to complete the task (complete with a tower – Yellow Tower).
It was also during this time that his reputation as a great poet grew. He wrote poems on different kinds of topic, including the wall at Huzhou:荡荡清河堧，黄楼我所开。
-Su Shi, ‘Seeing Off Revenue Officer Zheng’
秋月堕城角，春风摇酒杯。
[…] 人事固多乖。
他年君倦游，白首赋归来。
登楼一长啸，使君安在哉。
Vast fields sit beside the clear river
where I built the Yellow Tower.
The autumn moon overlooks the city wall,
a spring breeze sends ripples across the wine in the cup […]
So contrary are human affairs!
One day, white-haired and tired of your travels,
you’ll sing ‘The Return’ and climb this tower.
Letting out a long sigh, you’ll wonder:
‘Where is the prefect [Su Shi] now?’
Su also liked to write and send friends poems mocking the New Policies. Many – including his brother and Su’s good friend and conservative but calm fellow calligrapher Huang Tingjian (1045 – 1105 AD) – pleaded with him to stop.
Huang wrote to his nephew:
Su’s writing is the best in the world. His only shortcoming is that he likes to rebuke people – in this, you must not follow his example!
– Huang Tingjian
Unfortunately, Su couldn’t help himself.
1079: Arrest and imprisonment
Su was recalled to Kaifeng in 1079. Here he was arrested and charged with slander against the court and emperor, then escorted under armed guard to jail in Shanqiu, Henan Province.
Along the way, his possessions were searched and about eighty percent of his manuscripts destroyed.
I said goodbye to my wife and children. I left a letter for my brother, Su Zhe. It contained instructions on handling my posthumous affairs, because I was certain I would die. As we crossed the Yangzi River, I wanted to throw myself into it. But it was impossible to do so with the guards so close to me. When I was in prison, I intended to starve myself to death.
– Su Shi
Su was in jail for 4 months. Contemporary reports from fellow prisoners suggest Su was likely tortured physically during interrogations (although the emperor had instructed jailers not to be particularly cruel to him). The anguish of an impending exceution no doubt weighed heavily on him, too.
Some of his recent poetry was used as evidence against him. One of those caught with such poetry, and charged with not having reported it to the court, was Huang Tingjian. He was sent to work in a remote region, a form of exile for officials.
Fortunately, Su was spared the death penalty. In many other ages, he would perhaps not have been so lucky. This perhaps says something about the Confucian nature of the Song dynasty’s rulers.
季康子问政于孔子曰：“如杀无道，以就有道，何如？” 孔子对曰：“子为政，焉用杀？子欲善而民善矣。”
– Analects (12.19)
Lord Ji Kang asked Confucius about government. “If I killed the bad to help the good, would that be good?” Confucius replied: “You are here to govern, why kill?”
1080 – 1084: First exile (Huangzhou and then Dengzhou)
Huangzhou (not to be confused with Hangzhou) lies approximately 300 miles (482km) south of Kaifeng. It was a remote posting for Su, and one which he did not receive a salary for or any sense of how long it would last.
He moved to a farm called Dongpo (meaning ‘eastern slope’) in Huangzhou and began referring to himself asSu Dongpo. Inspired by the great poet Tao Yuanming (365 – 427 AD) (also known as Tao Qian), he began to write poems on rural themes.
He also built a studio for himself, which he named Snow Hall. Inside, he covered the walls with paintings of snow. And he would diligently try to meditate here, too.
His mood in these years seems to have alternated between high-spirited and dejected. In 1082, he wrote his solemn (and almost despairing) calligraphic masterpiece, Cold Festival Observance (see below).
He did not write explicitly political during this period. However, he did occasionally make dangerous references to politics in his poetry.
人皆生子望聪明，
– Su Shi, ‘Playfully Written After Washing My Son’ (1083)
我因聪明误一生。
但愿我儿愚且鲁，
无灾无病到公卿。
When a son is born, everyone hopes he will be intelligent.
I, through intelligence, have wrecked my whole life.
Just hope the baby will prove ignorant and stupid,
Then he will lead a tranquil life as a cabinet minister.
In 1085, the emperor Shenzong died, aged only 36. His son Zhezong (r. 1085 – 1100 AD) took over, but – for now – the real power lied with the empress dowager. The following few years saw the New Policies put on hold.
The same year, Su was appointed prefect of the coastal city of Dengzhou (today’s Penglai, Shangdong Province). Just five days later, he was recalled to the capital.
1086 – 1094: Kaifeng, Hangzhou, Yingzhou, Yangzhou and Dengzhou
Su worked as an academician to the Hanlin Academy between 1086 – 1088 and then again in 1091. This was a distinguished government role that Ouyang Xiu had previously worked in, too.
It involved overseeing interpretations of the classics. This aided the assessment of the civil service exams, which decided who the majority of future government officials would be.
In between his two stints in this role, he also served as the prefect of Hangzhou again. And afterwards, as prefect of Yingzhou, Yangzhou, and Dengzhou.
During this time, Su again displayed his abilities as a highly capable official that genuinely cared about the people. This has influenced his reputation up until today.
These were productive years for Su, in which he demonstrated repeatedly his intelligent planning, moral uprightness as an official, and concern for citizens.
Misfortune befell Su again when his second wife, Wang Runzhi, died in 1193. His concubine, Wang Zhaoyun, appears to have taken on the role of his wife afterwards. She is said to have been a bright and witty individual who had taught herself how to read.
The Su Causeway (or Su Dike) on the West Lake
The Su Causeway (苏提 [Sūdī]) (sometimes translated as Su Dike) is a 1.7-mile (2.8 km) raised track of land that crosses Hangzhou’s famous West Lake.
Before it was built, Su noted that the freshwater West Lake was not being maintained well and – as a result – shrinking.
The lake’s decline, Su argued in his petitions, would cause nearby canals to become unusable, wells to disappear, tax from alcohol brewers to fall, and more.
Su proposed and led this project, which used 100,000 labourers to complete. It involved dredging the lake to clear it of weeds as well as moving soil to create the causeway across the western side of the lake.
It can still be seen today and walked across by tens of millions every year. On southern end, there is a Su Shi Memorial Hall containing his poetry and calligraphy.
1094 – 1100: Second exile in Huizhou and Hainan
In 1094, the empress dowager died. The emperor Zhezong then gained complete power over the court and decided to revive the New Policies. This meant purging those who had previously criticised the New Policies…
Su was particularly harshly targeted. He was sent down on another remote posting, this time in Huizhou, Guangdong Province.
To add to his discomfort, he was forced to stay in a temple on the outskirts of town. Whilst here in 1096, wrote the following lines:
白头萧散满霜风，小阁藤床寄病容。
– Su Shi
报道先生春睡美，道人轻打五更钟。
My messy white hair is filled frost and wind,
my sickly body lies on a bed in a small dwelling.
When he hears that the gentleman is in a sweet spring sleep,
the monk gently rings the dawn temple gong.
It is said that after reading these lines, the Prime Minister Zhang Dun remarked that ‘Su Shi is still enjoying himself!’ and decided to up his punishment’s severity.
Su was sent to a posting on the even more remote and tropical Hainan Island. This was about as far as an official could be sent from the Northern Song capital of Kaifeng.
And the likely motivation was to bring about a rapid decline in Su’s health. Su wrote to his nephew at the time:
老人住海外如昨，但近来多病瘦瘁，不复往日，不知余年复得相见否？[.…] 饮食百物艰难 [.…] 药物酱酢等皆无，厄穷至此，委命而已。老人与过子相对，如两苦行僧耳。
– Su Shi 与元老侄孙四首
This old man is still living beyond the seas. Recently, I have become sickly and thin. I wonder whether I’ll see you again in my remaining years [.…] Varieties of food and drink here are in short supply […] There is no medicine, condiments, or sauces of any kind […] There is nothing to do but to resign ourselves to our fate. I sit facing my son Guo, the two of us are like deprived Buddhist monks.
1100 – 1101: Final return from exile
In 1100, Su received a pardon from the new Emperor Huizong (r. 1100 – 1125 AD) (himself a passionate calligrapher and artist), and given a posting in Chengdu, in his native Sichuan province.
However, this return to home and prestige wasn’t to be realised. He died en route in the city of Changzhou, Jiangsu Province, aged sixty-four.
人生到处知何似，应似飞鸿踏雪泥。泥上偶然留指瓜，鸿飞那复计东西。
– Su Dongpo
To what should human life be compared? A wild goose trampling on the snow.
The snow momentarily retains the imprint of its feet, then the goose flies away to no one knows where.
He was buried alongside his first wife, Wang Fu, on a hill in Ruzhou (today’s Linru, Henan Province). The hill is named Emei, after a mountain in Su’s hometown of Meishan.
Literary afterlife: Banned and then bestseller
Su had a profound influence on other artists and poets during his lifetime.
However, his works were banned by government officials for twenty-five years after his death. This is because of his criticisms of the New Policies, which the government attempted to revive (led in part by the unpopular prime minister Cai Jing).
Half of China was taken over by the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty (1115 – 1234 AD) in 1126. Su’s philosophy lived on in the Jin. A Qing dynasty scholar summarised the situation as:
程学盛南苏学北。
– Wang Fankang
The Chengs teachings flourished in the south, Su’s teachings in the north.
Su’s work was published at least 9 different editions during the Song dynasty alone. And since then, he has long been regarded as one of the greatest figures in all of China’s rich literary history.
Philosophical beliefs
Su held relatively conservative social and political views. He held a mixture of Confucian,Daoist and Buddhist values.
His Confucian beliefs would inform both his career and personal relations. Contrary to a popular misconception, Confucianism does not bound its adherents to blindly accept authority.
So, some of Su’s later outspokenness can be seen in the light of him following the Confucian precept of essentially speaking truth to power. This principle can be summed up by a precept of the great Confucian thinker Xun Zi (ca. 298 – 235 BC):
A minister follows the way; he does not follow the ruler.
– Xun Zi
Daoism is in many ways a more metaphysical and inward-looking system than Confucianism. Su’s thoughts on art in particular and his outlook more broadly seem to be clearly inspired by Daoist precepts (see below, ‘Daoism’s impact on Su’s art’).
His Buddhist beliefs seem to have grown during his first stay in Hangzhou. However, elsewhere he mentioned his parents’ devotion to it. During the Song dynasty, Buddhism wasn’t looked on kindly by all.
Ouyang Xiu, for example, was one of many who saw it as an essentially negative foreign influence.