The Passing of Brilliance

The Passing of Brilliance is a collection of essays on intellectual history that the scholar Bao Pengshan spent more than a decade writing. It began as three books in the "History of Thought" series—Heaven-Sent Sages, Heroes in the Snare, and Creatures of a Desperate Age—which were gathered, revised, and shaped into the present single volume. The book is divided into three parts by era. Part One, "Heaven-Sent Sages," begins in the pre-Qin period and treats Laozi, Confucius, Mozi, Mencius, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Qu Yuan, and the disciples of Confucius. Part Two, "Heroes in the Snare," treats Shang Yang, Han Fei, Li Si, Zhang Liang, Chen Ping, Jia Yi, Chao Cuo, Dongfang Shuo, Sima Xiangru, Dong Zhongshu, Sima Qian, Zhu Maichen, Yang Xiong, and Wang Chong. Part Three, "Creatures of a Desperate Age," extends from the Eastern Han through the Wei, Jin, and Northern and Southern dynasties and treats Li Gu, Liang Ji, the heroes of the Partisan Prohibitions, the martyrs of Jian'an, the celebrated scholars of Wei and Jin, Zhuge Liang, Kong Rong and Mi Heng, Cao Pi, Ruan Ji and Xi Kang, Tao Yuanming, Xie Lingyun, and others. Taking individuals as the warp and their fates as the weft, the author neither invents plot nor indulges in empty pronouncements; instead he examines historical sources, institutions, and human nature together, asking how these sages, officials, heroes, and recluses actually established themselves, met with setbacks, and came to terms with their circumstances in their own times. The style combines logical sharpness with poetic warmth, making the book at once a highly readable series of critical biographies of ancient figures and a work of thought that uses the fates of the ancients to reflect on the situation of people today.