Jingzi Wu

Born in 1701 in Quanjiao, Anhui, Wu Jingzi was a Chinese novelist of the Qing dynasty. He came from a scholarly, well-off family, but his life did not follow the tidy path expected of a successful man of letters.

He is remembered above all for The Scholars (Rulin waishi), often described as a landmark of Chinese satirical fiction. Rather than celebrating the world of exams and official rank, the novel pokes at vanity, pretension, and the pressures of literary life, which helps explain why it has remained so widely read.

Sources agree that he died in Yangzhou in 1754. Even in a short life, he left behind a book that stands out for its wit, social observation, and surprisingly modern sense of irony.