Chinese · 1550–1616
Tang Xianzu passed the highest civil service examination in 1583 after refusing to attach himself to the chief grand secretary, which had cost him two earlier attempts. He served in Nanjing, submitted a memorial in 1591 attacking the corruption of senior ministers, was demoted to a malarial posting in Guangdong, then governed a small county in Zhejiang until he resigned in 1598 and went home to Linchuan to write plays. His four dramas built on dreams, known as the Four Dreams of Linchuan, are all in the kunqu form, and the second of them, The Peony Pavilion, ran to fifty-five scenes and is said to have made young women weep themselves to death. He argued with the theorist Shen Jing about whether music or feeling should govern a play, and chose feeling. He died in 1616, the same year as Shakespeare, a coincidence Chinese and British institutions have been celebrating together ever since.