Liu Ling

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Liú Líng ( Chinese  劉伶 ; * around 220 ; † around 280 ) was one of the Daoist Chinese poets of the Seven Wise Men of the Bamboo Grove ( 竹 林七賢 ).

Life

Little has been left on the dates of his life. He is said to have been small and unattractive in appearance. Liú Líng grew up in Pelkuo in An Wei . He lived during the Three Kingdoms Period and the Western Jin Dynasty . Alongside Ruan Ji , Xi Kang , Shan Tao , Ruan Xian , Xiang Xiu and Wang Rong , the Daoist was one of the seven wise men in the bamboo grove.

When traveling he always carried a barrel of rice wine with him in his luggage. One of his entourage was a servant who was tasked with ensuring that Liú Líng, if he should drop dead, would be buried exactly at this point.

His thirst for rice wine once ended in a drinking binge, during which he drank 27 liters of rice wine . His desperate wife poured out his supplies of rice wine and then smashed all of his amphorae . Liú Líng then continued drinking without jugs.

His wife then asked him to stop drinking, arguing that this could only succeed if he swore an oath to the gods with sacrificial meat and sacrificial wine. Liú Líng, on the other hand, asked the gods not to heed his wife's complaints and prayers and drank the rice wine with one gulp.

When he was drunk, he would often remove all clothes and walk around naked even when visiting. He justified this with:

“Heaven and earth are roof and floor to me. My rooms are trousers and a coat for me, may I ask gentlemen: What are you doing in my trousers? "

Liú Líng felt neither heat nor shivering when he was drunk and believed that he was particularly close to the Dao. He was first pictured as a rice wine drinker on a grave site in Nanjing .

He left only one poem.

Jack London processed his reading experiences about Liú Líng in his biographical story John Barleycorn .

literature

  • Donald Holzman: Poetry and politics. The life and works of Juan Chi AD 210-263 (= Cambridge studies in Chinese history, literature and institutions ). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1976.
  • William Frederick Mayers: The Chinese reader's manual. A handbook of biographical, historical, mythological and general literary reference. 1874, reprint: Probsthain & Co., London [et al.] 1910.
  • Herbert A. Giles: A Chinese biographical dictionary. Quaritch; Kelly & Walsh, London [et al.] 1898.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Ulrich Holbein: Unholy fools. 22 images of life. Wiesbaden 2012, ISBN 978-3-86539-300-5 , p. 42 f.
personal data
SURNAME Liu, Ling
ALTERNATIVE NAMES 劉伶
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Chinese poet
DATE OF BIRTH around 220
DATE OF DEATH at 280