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Statue of Du Fu in Chengdu. Photo by Fanghong –

Top 10 Amazing Facts About Du Fu

Du Fu or Tu Fu was a prominent Chinese poet of the Tang Dynasty. Along with Li Bai (Li Po), he is frequently called the greatest of the Chinese poets.

His own greatest ambition was to help his country by becoming a successful civil servant, but he proved unable to make the necessary accommodations.

 His life, like the whole country, was devastated by the An Lushan Rebellion of 755, and the last 15 years of his life were a time of almost constant unrest.

Initially unpopular, his works came to be hugely influential in both Chinese and Japanese culture. He has been called Poet-Historian and the Poet-Sage by Chinese critics, while the range of his work has allowed him to be introduced to Western readers as “the Chinese Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Shakespeare, Milton, Burns, Wordsworth, Béranger, Hugo or Baudelaire”.

1. The life of Du Fu was made up of his poems where morality and history were prominent

Statue of Du Fu in Chengdu. Photo by Fanghong –

Traditionally, Chinese literary criticism has placed great emphasis on knowledge of the life of the author when interpreting a work, a practice which Watson attributes to “the close links that traditional Chinese thought posits between art and morality”.

 This becomes all the more important in the case of a writer such as Du Fu, in whose poems morality and history are so prominent.

Another reason, identified by the Chinese historian William Hung, is that Chinese poems are typically extremely concise, omitting circumstantial factors which may be relevant, but which could be reconstructed by an informed contemporary.

2. Du Fu was born in 712 near Luoyang, Henan province

Bronze (?) statue of the Chinese Tang Dynasty poet Du Fu (c. 712 – 770) in Chengdu, Sichuan, China.Photo by Somchai –

Most of what is known of Du Fu’s life comes from his poems. Like many other Chinese poets, he came from a noble family (they claimed descent from the emperor Yao) which had fallen into relative poverty (although Hung estimates that his family income was still eleven times that of an averagely comfortable family).

He was born in 712: the birthplace is unknown, except that it was near Luoyang, Henan province (Gong county is a favorite candidate). In later life he considered himself to belong to the capital city of Chang’an.

3. His mother died shortly after he was born

Du Fu Thatched Cottage Museum 88. Photo by Creative Commons –

Du Fu’s mother died shortly after he was born, and he was partially raised by his aunt. He had an elder brother, who died young. He also had three half brothers and one half-sister, to whom he frequently refers in his poems, although he never mentions his stepmother.

As the son of a minor scholar-official, his youth was spent on the standard education of a future civil servant: study and memorization of the Confucian classics of philosophy, history, and poetry.

He later claimed to have produced creditable poems by his early teens, but these have been lost.

4. Du Fu would have been allowed to enter the civil service because of his father’s rank

Du Fu Thatched Cottage Museum 76. Photo by Creative Commons –

His father died around 740. Du Fu would have been allowed to enter the civil service because of his father’s rank, but he is thought to have given up the privilege in favor of one of his half brothers.

He spent the next four years living in the Luoyang area, fulfilling his duties in domestic affairs.

In the autumn of 744, he met Li Bai (Li Po) for the first time, and the two poets formed a somewhat one-sided friendship: Du Fu was by some years the younger, while Li Bai was already a poetic star.

5. Du Fu met again with his younger brother, Li Bai in 745

Du Fu Thatched Cottage Museum 175. Photo by Creative Commons –

We have twelve poems to or about Li Bai from the younger poet, but only one in the other direction. They met again only once, in 745.

In 746 he moved to the capital in an attempt to resurrect his official career. He participated in a second exam the following year, but all the candidates were failed by the prime minister (apparently to prevent the emergence of possible rivals).

Thereafter he never again attempted the examinations, instead of petitioning the emperor directly in 751, 754, and probably again in 755.

6. He married around 752 and had five children by 757

Du Fu Thatched Cottage Museum 83. Photo by Creative Commons –

He married around 752, and by 757 the couple had had five children — three sons and two daughters — but one of the sons died in infancy in 755. From 754 he began to have lung problems (probably asthma), the first of a series of ailments that dogged him for the rest of his life.

In 755 he finally received an appointment as Registrar of the Right Commandant’s office of the Crown Prince’s Palace. Although this was a minor post, in normal times it would have been at least the start of an official career.

Even before he had begun work, however, the position was swept away by events.

7. Du Fu led a largely itinerant life, being kept unsettled by wars

The An Lushan Rebellion began in December 755 and was not completely crushed for almost eight years. It caused enormous disruption to Chinese society: the census of 754 recorded 52.9 million people, but that of 764 just 16.9 million, the remainder having been killed or displaced.

During this time, Du Fu led a largely itinerant life, being kept unsettled by wars, associated famines, and imperial displeasure.

 This period of unhappiness, however, was the making of Du Fu as a poet: Eva Shan Chou has written, “What he saw around him– the lives of his family, neighbors, and strangers– what he heard, and what he hoped for or feared from the progress of various campaigns– these became the enduring themes of his poetry”.

In 756 Emperor Xuanzong was forced to flee the capital and abdicate.

8. Du Fu attempted to join up with the court of the new emperor ( Suzong)

Du Fu Thatched Cottage Museum 108. Photo by Creative Commons –

 Du Fu, who had been away from the city, took his family to a place of safety and attempted to join up with the court of the new emperor ( Suzong), but he was captured by the rebels and taken to Chang’an. In the autumn, his youngest son Du Zongwu (Baby Bear) was born. Around this time Du Fu is thought to have contracted malaria.

He escaped from Chang’an the following year and was appointed Reminder when he rejoined the court in May 757. This post gave access to the emperor but was largely ceremonial.

9. He protested against the removal of his friend and patron Fang Guan on a petty charge

Du Fu Thatched Cottage Museum 214. Photo by Creative Commons –

Du Fu’s conscientiousness compelled him to try to make use of it: he soon caused trouble for himself by protesting against the removal of his friend and patron Fang Guan on a petty charge; he was then himself arrested but was pardoned in June.

He was granted leave to visit his family in September, but he soon rejoined the court and on December 8, 757, he returned to Chang’an with the emperor following its recapture by government forces.

 However, his advice continued to be unappreciated, and in the summer of 758, he was demoted to a post as Commissioner of Education in Huazhou. The position was not to his taste: in one poem, he wrote:

“I am about to scream madly in the office/Especially when they bring more papers to pile higher on my desk.”

10. Du Fu moved on again in the summer of 759

Du Fu Thatched Cottage Museum 4. LanguageTeaching. Photo by Creative Commons –

He moved on again in the summer of 759; this has traditionally been ascribed to famine, but Hung believes that frustration is a more likely reason. He next spent around six weeks in Qinzhou (now Tianshui, Gansu province), where he wrote over sixty poems.