Su Shi (1037-1101), self-styled Dongpo Jushi, was a Northern Song writer, calligrapher and gourmand. One of the Eight Great Prose Masters of Tang-Song, he excelled in poetry, prose, ci, calligraphy and painting - a rare polymath.
His life was a string of reversals: exiled to Huangzhou after the "Crow Terrace Poetry Case", then again to Huizhou and Danzhou (Hainan), each farther than the last. Yet he never despaired: in Huangzhou he farmed land, styled himself "Dongpo", and invented "Dongpo pork".
His lines live on: the heroic "the great river rolls east, waves washing away the heroes of a thousand ages"; the serene "through mist and rain I live my life at ease"; the familial "may we live long and share the moon's beauty across a thousand miles".
Su Shi's appeal lies in his earthy humanness: he cooked, brewed wine, built the Su Causeway in Hangzhou, made friends everywhere, and even bickered with the monk Foyin. The common folk loved him because he never put on airs.
Lin Yutang's biography calls him "a happy optimist at heart and a compassionate moralist". For Chinese learners, reading a few of his ci is the best doorway into the spirit of the Chinese literati.
Su Shi (1037-1101), courtesy Zizhan, self-styled Dongpo Jushi, is a rare Chinese polymath: great poet, great ci-writer, great calligrapher, gourmet, and a beloved official.
Born in Meishan, Sichuan, he passed the imperial examination at twenty, startling the capital; even the chief examiner said "I should step aside for this young man."
His life was not smooth. Framed for a poem, nearly executed in the famous "Wutai poetry case", he was exiled to Huangzhou, living in hardship yet writing his finest works.
In Huangzhou he cultivated a patch of wasteland, named it "Dongpo" (East Slope) and styled himself accordingly. There he wrote the Red Cliff fu and the immortal Niannujiao: Chibi Remembrance.
That piece begins: "the great river flows east, its waves washing away the heroes of a thousand ages." Bold beyond compare.
He was also a gourmet. His invention "Dongpo pork" remains a famous Hangzhou dish; his Ode to Pork teaches braising with everyday wit.
Most moving is his attitude to hardship. Exiled to Hainan, then the remotest place, he still taught, wrote and ate lychees, cheerfully writing "three hundred lychees a day - I would gladly stay a southerner forever."
In Dingfengbo he wrote of walking calmly through rain while others scurried: "in a straw cloak through mist and rain, I go my own way." This ease won endless admiration.
His famous line: "may we live long and share the moon a thousand miles apart" - written to his brother on Mid-Autumn night, still the most used blessing among Chinese.
Exiled three times, each farther, he stayed optimistic: "ask my life achievements - Huangzhou, Huizhou, Danzhou." The exiles became his achievements.
Lin Yutang called him an "incorrigible optimist". Indeed, whatever hardship came, he digested it with poetry and food.
Why be unhappy? Because you have not read Su Shi. Reading him, Chinese learners grasp the most carefree Chinese attitude to life.
