Li He

Li He was a Chinese poet of the mid-Tang dynasty whose work made him one of the most idiosyncratic versifiers of his age. He wrote in classical Chinese and is also known by the courtesy name Changji and by the names Guicai and Shigui. His importance lies in a ghostly, supernatural and fantastic imagery that was unusual for poetry of his time.

He lived very briefly. He is usually placed as born around 790 or 791 and dying around 816 or 817, at the age of twenty-seven, in poor health and with a sickly appearance. His personal name sounded the same as the emperor's, and by tradition this prevented him from sitting the imperial examinations and so gaining a post in the civil service. That barrier cut short his career, and it recurs in his verse, where he laments setbacks and the frustration of a man who finds no place.

His working method was distinctive. He travelled during the day and, whenever a line came to him, he jotted it down; in the evening, back home, he completed the poem. His texts explore spirits, supernatural beings and fantastic scenes, in a dense and unpredictable style that recalls the shamanic inspiration of the Songs of Chu, an ancient anthology of southern poetry.

His fame rose and fell. For centuries his style was imitated in China until the Qing dynasty, but then literary tastes shifted and his poems were left out of the influential Three Hundred Tang Poems. Interest returned in the twentieth century, and Mao Zedong was counted among the Tang poets he most admired. Today he is regarded as an original voice within the canon.