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Su Shi

蘇軾

Su Shi (1037 - 1101),¹ better known as 蘇東坡 Su Dongpo, was one of the Song dynasty's most influential poets and essayists. His brother Su Che was also a poet.²

See Xu Jian's History 6a2.

Qinshu Daquan (QQJC Vol. V) has quite a number of articles and poems by him that concern qin; see.

Folio 16, #53 (V. 362/3; seven selections)
Folio 17, #56 (V. 384)
Folio 17, #57 (V. 384)
Folio 18, #55 (V. 403),
Folio 19A, #31 (V. 418),
Folio 19A, #33 (V. 419),
Folio 19B, #91 - #93 (V. 431; 3 poems),
Folio 19B, #161 (V. 441),
Folio 20A, #53 - #55 (V. 447, 3 poems), and
Folio 20B, #56 - #58 (V. 455/6, two poems).

In other cases Qinshu Daquan has stories that mention him and qin; see.

Folio 17, #32 (includes a poem; V. 379)
Folio 17, #39 (mentions him with 武崇穆 Wu Chongmu; V. 380) Explanations for the melody Xiangsi Qu (Gu Qin Yin)³ have several different introductions, all concerning Su Dongbo and a female ghoest who played the qin. In the version translated by Van Gulik,⁴ Su Dongpo hears someone playing a sad song outside his window. When he goes to look he sees a young woman, who immediately disappears. In the morning when digging in that area he finds an old qin.

It does not include the following,⁵

If you say music from the qin does rise,
Why in its case will the strings not sing?
If you say sound in the fingers lies,
Why from your fingers do we hear no ring?

Some handbooks say he wrote the melody He Wu Dongtian. And his lyrics set to qin melodies (by others) include the following,

Zui Weng Cao,
Qian Chibi Fu and
Hou Chibi Fu
Footnotes (Shorthand references are explained on a separate page)

1 33250.234 眉山人，洵子，轍兄，字子瞻 from Meishan, son of Su Xun, brother of Su Che, style name Zizhan. Sources include:

Nienhauser, Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature, p.729.
Michael A. Fuller, The Road to East Slope, The Development of Shu Shi's Poetic Voice
Burton Watson, Selected Poems of Su Tung-p'o
Xu Yuanzhong, Su Dong-po - A New Translation
Lin Yutang, The Gay Genius, The Life and Times of Su Tungpo
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2 蘇轍 Su Che (1039 - 1112)
Su Che, style name 子由 Ziyou, though overshadowed by his older brother Su Shi, was one of the "Eight Great Prose Masters of the Tang and Song". (Indiana Companion, p.727)
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3 相思曲 Xiang Si Qu; also called 古琴吟 Gu Qin Yin. See details in the introduction to the 1585 version.
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4 Lore, pp.159-160,
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5 The translation is based on that of Xu Yuanzhong, Song of the Immortals, p.212. The original (see p.423) is:

若言琴上有琴聲，放在匣中何不鳴？
若言聲在指頭上，何不於君指上聽？
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