元稹的一生行迹（779-831）
元稹（779-831），字微之，河南洛阳人，北魏皇族后裔，唐代著名诗人、新乐府运动领袖。他与白居易志同道合，共创"元和体"，世称"元白"。《离思》《遣悲怀》《莺莺传》脍炙人口，晚年官至宰相，暴卒于武昌军节度使任上。
洛阳（779） · 洛阳孤童
唐代宗大历十四年（779年），元稹出生于洛阳。他是北魏拓跋皇族后裔，八岁丧父，家道中落，随母亲郑氏寄居凤翔舅家，在贫困中发愤读书，十五岁即明经及第。
长安（803） · 长安登科
唐德宗贞元十九年（803年），元稹与白居易同登书判拔萃科，同授秘书省校书郎。两位年轻才子一见如故，自此开始了长达三十年、唱和千余首的"元白"友谊。
洛阳（悼亡）（809） · 长安登科
唐宪宗元和四年（809年）七月，元稹的爱妻韦丛在洛阳病逝，年仅二十七岁。元稹时任监察御史、奉命分司东台，悲痛欲绝，写下《遣悲怀》三首等悼亡诗，成为中国悼亡诗的巅峰。
江陵（810） · 荆通贬谪
唐宪宗元和五年（810年），元稹因弹劾权贵、与宦官仇士良等争驿舍上厅，被敷水驿宦官击伤面部，朝廷反贬他为江陵府士曹参军。他在江陵五年，忧愤中诗歌创作愈发成熟。
通州（815） · 荆通贬谪
唐宪宗元和十年（815年），元稹再贬通州司马。同年白居易亦贬江州司马。通州瘴疠之地，元稹身染疟疾、几至于死，病中惊闻挚友贬谪的消息，写下字字血泪的绝句。
通州（离思）（817） · 荆通贬谪
唐宪宗元和十二年（817年）前后，元稹在通州追忆亡妻韦丛，写下《离思》五首。贬所的孤独岁月使悼亡之情愈发深沉，曾经沧海之叹穿越时空，成为汉语爱情诗的绝唱。
连昌宫（818） · 荆通贬谪
唐宪宗元和十三年（818年），元稹自通州量移虢州长史，途经洛阳附近的连昌宫遗址。面对玄宗行宫的断壁残垣，他借宫边老人之口追溯开元天宝盛衰，写下长篇叙事诗《连昌宫词》。
越州（823） · 越州唱和
唐穆宗长庆三年（823年），元稹由同州刺史调任越州刺史、浙东观察使。他治理越州七年，兴修水利、均平赋税，又与在杭州的白居易以诗筒寄递唱和，留下"元白唱和"的千秋佳话。
武昌（831） · 武昌节镇
唐文宗大和五年（831年）七月，元稹暴疾卒于武昌军节度使任上，享年五十三岁。朝廷赠尚书右仆射。噩耗传至洛阳，白居易恸哭"君埋泉下泥销骨，我寄人间雪满头"。
The Life Journey of Yuan Zhen, the Other Half of Yuan-Bai
Yuan Zhen (779-831), styled Weizhi, of Luoyang, descendant of the Northern Wei royal house, orphaned at eight and taught by his mother, was half of the most famous friendship in Chinese letters: thirty years and a thousand exchanges with Bai Juyi — 'Yuan-Bai,' the twin name for a whole school of plain, morally serious poetry. He lost the office-game again and again — beaten by eunuchs, demoted to Jiangling, exiled to Tongzhou — and mourned his wife Wei Cong in the three 'Lament for Hardship' poems and the sea quatrain: 'Having seen the vast ocean, no other water will do.'
Timeline of the Journey
- 779 · Luoyang — Born into the fallen imperial line of the Tuoba; father dead at eight, the family poor, the mother Zheng teaching him the classics herself — classics degree at fifteen.
- 803 · Chang'an — The drafting examination passed in the same class as Bai Juyi: both collators in the Palace Library, the friendship of a lifetime begun at two identical desks.
- 809 · Luoyang — Wei Cong, his wife of seven years, dead at twenty-seven while he served as censor at the eastern capital. The 'Lament for Hardship': the borrowed curtain, the plain hairpin, the cold ashes — the classic poems of a poor marriage honored after death.
- 810 · Jiangling — Attacking the powerful as investigating censor, he was beaten by eunuchs in a post-station quarrel over a lodging — and demoted himself, to Jiangling, for the scandal. Five years of anger ripening into art.
- 815 · Tongzhou — Down again, to Tongzhou in the miasmic hills: malaria, near death — and the same year Bai Juyi exiled to Jiangzhou. The two friends' verse flew between the two exiles, 'every word written in blood.'
- 817 · Tongzhou — The 'Five Poems of Parted Thought,' remembering Wei Cong: 'Having seen the vast ocean, no other water will do; save the cloud-wrapped peak of Wu, no mountain is a mountain' — love's superlative in four lines.
- 818 · Lianchang Palace — Transferred at last, he passed the ruin of Xuanzong's pleasure-palace near Luoyang and set the whole rise and fall of the Kaiyuan years in an old man's telling: the 'Lianchang Palace Ballad.'
- 823 · Yuezhou — After the brief chancellorship and its fall, governor of Yuezhou and commissioner of Zhedong: seven years, canals and taxes set right, and the 'poem tube' exchanged down the post-road with Bai Juyi at Hangzhou.
- 831 · Wuchang — Sudden death at his post in the Wuchang commandery, fifty-three. In Luoyang Bai Juyi wept: 'You lie beneath the springs, your bones going to clay; I lodge in the world of men, my head full of snow.'
'Having seen the vast ocean, no other water will do.' The line every Chinese lover quotes was written by a man to his dead wife. Yuan Zhen kept the superlative; Bai Juyi kept the grief; neither ever recovered.
