HAN YU: REMEMBERED

Hán Yù, (768—824), sometimes called Han Changli, was born in Nanyang, Henan, China, was a precursor of Neo-Confucianism as well as an essayist and poet, during the Tang dynasty. The Indiana Companion calls him "comparable in stature to Dante, Shakespeare or Goethe" for his influence on the Chinese literary tradition. He stood for strong central authority in politics and orthodoxy in cultural matters. An orphan, he went to Chang’an in 786, but needed four attempts to pass the jinshi exam, finally succeeding in 791. In the last few years of the 8th. Century, he began to form the literary circle which spread his influence so widely. He gained his first central government position in 802, but was soon exiled.