Chapter 44 Li Yi
Li Yi (748-829), courtesy name Junyu, was born in Guzang, Longxi (now Wuwei, Gansu).A famous poet in the middle Tang Dynasty.Some people included him in the "Ten Talented Scholars of Dali".
During the Yuanhe and Changqing years, Jiang Fang wrote a very famous Tang legend "The Biography of Huo Xiaoyu", which described the love story between Li Yi, a talented scholar in Longxi, and Huo Xiaoyu, a prostitute during the Dali period.Li Yi in the story is a hypocrite who has always been in chaos and abandoned, and is cast aside by people.
Jiang Fang was a contemporary of Li Yi. Is the Li Yi in his works the poet Li Yi?
Li Yi has a big problem, that is, he is very jealous and worried about his wives and concubines. When he goes out, he has to close the door of the house and sprinkle ashes on the outside of the doors and windows, fearing that outsiders will have an affair with his wives and concubines.At that time, people called that kind of jealous person "Li Yiji".Perhaps it is for this reason that Jiang Fang regards him as the protagonist of the story.
Among the poets of the Mid-Tang Dynasty, Li Yi's frontier poems are very distinctive.His most famous "Hearing the Flute from the City at Night" was widely spread and was sung by musicians in Jiaofang.The poem is like this:
In the fourth year of Li Yi's calendar (769), he was a Jinshi and ranked first, but his official career was not smooth.Later, he entered the shogunate of Weibei Jiedushi Zang Xirang, Shuofang Jiedushi Li Huaiguang and others, and lived in the northwest frontier for many years, so his frontier poems are works with life experience.In Lu Jingliang's "Preface", he recorded his own military poems and presented them to Zuo Buque, Lu Jingliang said: "Eighteen years of work, five in the army, so it is Wen Duo's military thoughts." A little sad, really touching.
His seven unique skills are highly evaluated by later generations.Hu Yinglin of the Ming Dynasty said in "Shisou Neibian": "Seven words are perfect, under Kaiyuan, Li Yi should be the first. For example, "Going to the West City at Night", "Joining the Army to the North", "Successful Surrender", and "Wearing the Flute on a Spring Night" , can compete with Taibai (Li Bai) and Longbiao (Wang Changling), and it is not something that was obtained in the middle Tang Dynasty.” Many of his poems have been adopted by musicians for joy.His poems such as "Song of Recruiting People" and "Morning Journey" were also painted as picture screens.