Enemies on all sides Wu Rong saw the death of the Tang Dynasty, and the poet s life was tortuous

Mondo Culture Updated on 2024-02-10

Enemies on all sides Wu Rong saw the death of the Tang Dynasty, and the poet's life was tortuous

Enemy on the belly and back"The original meaning of this idiom was to describe outstanding literary talents, and later extended to praise others for their profound skills and ability to cope with all kinds of adversity, and also used to describe the loneliness and helplessness after being attacked by many enemies. This idiom comes from the fifth-generation writer Wang Dingbao's "Tang Jiayan - Haixu Doesn't Meet":"Zi Houcai has eight strands, and he became famous behind the enemy on all sides.

The original meaning of this idiom and the two later extended meanings are the same as those mentioned in Tang Yulin's book"Zihua"--Haixiu Bieye, that is, the late Tang Dynasty poet Wu Rong -- is closely related.

Wu Rong was a native of Shanyin, Yuezhou (now Shaoxing, Zhejiang). In the last years of the Tang Dynasty, the princes of the court, the clan, the countryside outside the palace, the mediocrity of the reigning monarch, natural disasters and military disasters, the turmoil of the government and the opposition, and the dissatisfaction of the people's lives, this tragic scene had a great impact on the poetry of the late Tang Dynasty.

As a poet of the late Tang Dynasty, Wu Rong's poetic style was not only influenced by social chaos, but also by his friends Shi Guanxiu, Pi Rixiu, Tortoise Meng, Fang Gan, Han Guan and others. Therefore, compared with poets with a single style, Wu Rong's works are diverse in form, including satirical works that point out the country, drunken erotic works, and works that exonerate indifference and laziness or coldness, narrow-mindedness, and uninhibitedness.

Wu Rong's poems, no matter what genre or subject matter they are based on, all show Wu Rong's ** between career and loneliness, which is closely related to the chaotic and contradictory society of the late Tang Dynasty and his unsmooth career.

Wu Rong was born in the fourth year of Tang Xuanzong's reign (850), and began to take the imperial examination in the sixth year of Tang Xianzong (865), but failed repeatedly until he received his diploma in the first year of Tang Zhaozong's Longji (889). Wu Rong not only had a bad road to the imperial examination, but even his career after entering the official career was very bumpy.

In the first year of Longwu (889), Wang Jian, the assassin of Langzhou, requested the appointment of a new Xichuan Jiedu envoy because of his attack on Chen Jingxuan, and expressed his willingness to submit to the new Jiedu envoy, and Gu Yanlang, the envoy of Dongchuan Jiedu, also requested that Chen Jingxuan be transferred. In June, Tang Zhaozong appointed Chen Jingxuan as the envoy of the Longwu Festival, and reappointed Wei Zhaodu as the envoy of the Xichuan Festival, and Wu Rong was ordered to accompany Wei Zhaodu to the Shu State.

After Wei Zhaodu arrived in Chengdu, Chen Jingxuan refused to accept the orders of the imperial court, so Wei Zhaodu led the army to attack Chengdu, which lasted three years, and finally failed to conquer Chengdu, and the palace had to withdraw its troops.

Wu Rong was unwilling in Shudi, so he returned to the palace, once served as the imperial historian, and was exiled to Jingnan because of ***, until he was called into Beijing in the third year of Ganning (896), and successively served as Langzhong of the Ministry of Rites, the revision of the Hanlin Academy, and the secretary of the county guard.

Wu Rong finally returned to the capital, but the situation in Guanzhong became more and more chaotic. First, the eunuch Liu Jishu imprisoned Tang Zhaozong and made the crown prince Li Yu the emperor. Later, Prime Minister Cui Yin and Chief Guard Sun Dezhao killed Liu Jishu, and Tang Zhaozong was reinstated. In order to get rid of the eunuchs, Cui Yin actively allied with Zhu Wen, and even ordered Zhu Wen to lead troops into Beijing, while the eunuch Han Quanzhi and others actively formed an alliance with Li Maozhen of Fengxiang and Wang Xingyu of Dingning to confront them.

So Zhu Wen seized the opportunity, led an army of 70,000 to cross the river to capture Tongzhou and Huazhou, and the troops came outside Chang'an City, killed Han Quanjiao and other eunuchs, and then led Tang Zhaozong to Fengxiang, where he met with Li Maozhen in Guanzhong, and then went to war.

In the first year (901), Wu Rong, who had often witnessed the war in Guanzhong, had no choice but to flee the capital and take refuge in exile in Weng Xiang (on the border with Tongguan County in present-day northwestern Henan Province) for three years (903), when the situation stabilized after Zhu Wen defeated Li Maozhen, and Wu Rong was recalled to the imperial court as a scholar, and later promoted to a scholar.

In the same year, Wu Rong died at the age of 54, and a few years after his death, the Tang Dynasty fell. Wu Rong's official fortunes have been up and down in his life. He was reused several times, but was again transferred or exiled; Not only did he have a bad career, but he almost witnessed the demise of the Tang Dynasty. In such troubled times, Wu Rong's status can really be described as such"Embattled"。

Related Pages