Li Yu (Li Yü) 1611-1680
He was born into a literary family in Zhejiang in the last decades of the Ming dynasty. He obtained a modest post in the civil service in 1635, but the political instability of the times prevented him from having a stable career and he was often on the road. In 1657 he moved to Nanjing, where he lived for twenty years, establishing the famous Mustard Seed Bookstore and writing prolifically for a general audience. Playwright, essayist, critic, poet, fiction-writer (and garden-designer), he is noted particularly for his comic genius.
Works available in English:
A Tower for the Summer Heat (Patrick Hanan). New York: Columbia University
Press, 1998.
Silent Operas (ed. by Patrick Hanan). Hong Kong: Renditions Paperbacks, 1990.
The Before Midnight Scholar (Richard Martin). London: Corgi, 1967.
The Carnal Prayer Mat (Patrick Hanan). New York: Ballantine Books, 1990.
The Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting (ed. by Mai-Mai Sze). Princeton,
N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1956.
The Prayer Mat of Flesh (Richard Martin) New York: Grove Press, 1967.
Twelve Towers: short stories (Nathan Mao). Hong Kong: Chinese University of
Hong Kong, 1975.
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