陆容

Lu Rong's biographical details are very limited in publicly available sources: his dates, native place, and official career are not clearly recorded, so this introduction relies mainly on his surviving works. Five of his works are held here, the best known being Shuyuan Zaji (Miscellaneous Notes from the Bean Garden), along with the Ming Dynasty Notebook Fiction Compendium and other editions of the same title. These works show Lu Rong as a writer of biji, or miscellaneous notes, covering social customs, historical anecdotes, and personal observations, with some discussion of ideas. His content is broad and his tone plain, often preserving details of contemporary manners and institutions in seemingly trivial matters. His books are classified under classic works, social culture, history, and Eastern philosophy, indicating that readers use them both as historical sources and as a way to understand the observations and views of traditional scholars. Shuyuan Zaji has long been valued by students of Ming dynasty biji, and it is through this work that Lu Rong is remembered.