The Burden of Female Talent: The Poet Li Qingzhao and Her History in China

Widely considered the preeminent Chinese woman poet, Li Qingzhao (1084–1150s) occupies a crucial place in China’s literary and cultural history. She stands out as the great exception to the rule that the first—rank poets in premodern China were male. But at what price to our understanding of her as a writer does this distinction come? The Burden of Female Talent challenges conventional modes of thinking about Li Qingzhao as a devoted but often lonely wife and, later, a forlorn widow. By exa...