Collected Poems of Cao Zhi

The collected poetry and prose of Cao Zhi, third son of the warlord Cao Cao and a celebrated prodigy at his father's court, whose fortunes collapsed after his elder brother Cao Pi became the first emperor of Wei in 220 and, suspicious of Cao Zhi's talent and past favor, confined him to a series of remote, closely watched fiefs for the rest of his life. His mature poetry, written under that surveillance, is generally judged the finest of the early pentasyllabic tradition inaugurated by the Nineteen Old Poems, combining technical polish with unusually direct expressions of frustration, exile, and thwarted ambition; the probably apocryphal 'Seven Steps Poem,' reputedly composed on demand to save his life, remains the most quoted.