Speaking of Tang Bohu, I think everyone is no stranger. He was a famous painter, calligrapher and poet during the Ming Dynasty in China, and Zhu Zhishan, Wen Zhengming, Xu Zhenqing and the four talents of Jiangnan in the same period. The story of Tang Bohu's three laughs and autumn fragrance has long been a household name, and the famous Hong Kong film star Stephen Chow portrayed Tang Bohu as a witty and humorous talent who is both literate and martial, and the image is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. In your mind, Tang Bohu must be a handsome-looking, talented, and handsome rich man. However, the real Tang Bohu in history is just the opposite, his early life was bumpy and bumpy, with twists and turns, and in his later years he was even more destitute and depressed.
Tang Bohu, mingyin, character Bohu, was born in Suzhou into a family that has been in business for generations, and his father, Tang Guangde, made a living by running a tavern, and the family also had a brother and a sister. It should be known that in the four classes of feudal society, merchants, peasants, industrialists and merchants are in the last class, not to mention that their family is only a small business, far from being called a rich businessman, so Tang Bohu is at best a well-off family, not a rich second generation. Although he was born in a business family, Tang Bohu was not born to do business materials, but was a reading wizard. When he was 15 years old, he took the child exam and was admitted to xiucai with the first result in Suzhou Province, which can be described as a famous one. Three years later, he married Xu Shi, the daughter of the famous men, and formed a happy little family.
Seeing that, Tang Bohu was about to pass the imperial examination step by step into the career path, the light of the lintel, but the fate of the people, from the age of 24, in just one year, first his parents died of misfortune, and then his sister who had just married also died young, when he had not yet had time to come out of the grief of losing his parents and sister, and then, his beloved wife Xu Shi and his young son left him one after another, and the originally happy family of seven, but only he and his brother were left to rely on each other. In a short period of time, the huge family changes made Tang Bohu depressed and unable to extricate himself for a long time, and he once wrote in the "Book of Youwen Zhengming": "Misfortune is many deaths, mourning and chaos are sought, parents and wives, heeled and disappeared." "To express the pain in his heart."
Finally, under the advice of his friend Zhu Zhishan, Tang Bohu regained his strength and immersed himself in reading and preparing for the imperial examination, hoping that one day he would be able to obtain a meritorious name to comfort the spirit of the deceased relatives in heaven. Genius is a genius after all, at the age of 29, Tang Bohu won the championship in one fell swoop when he went to Ying Tianfu to participate in the township examination, and the world called him "Tang Xieyuan". This move made Tang Bohu seem to see the title of the next year's pension list, enter the career path, exert his ambitions, and reach the peak of his life, however, fate once again made a joke with him.
In the second year after zhongju, just when Tang Bohu was preparing to enter Beijing to participate in the examination, he met a person Xu Jing, and was implicated by this person and was vaguely involved in the famous "Hongzhi Ji Wei KeChang Fraud Case", and even went to prison for this reason, and this fraud case also completely changed Tang Bohu's fate. The details of the case are not listed here, but according to Tang Bohu's intelligence, I think he could not have obtained his meritorious name by bribing the chief examiner, and can only be said to have met someone who was unladylike and unjustly wronged. After this case, Tang Bohu and Xu Jing, who were the personnel involved, were stripped of their ranks and were not allowed to participate in the imperial examination for life.
After that, in view of his status as Xie Yuan, the state still arranged for him to work as a small official in Zhejiang Province, which is the work of a grass-roots civil servant in Zhejiang in today's words, however, the arrogant Tang Bohu felt that this job was simply a humiliation to him, refused to yield, resigned his official position in a huff, and returned to his hometown in Suzhou. Not long after he did not want to go back, his second wife saw that he did not want to make progress, and his future was uncertain, and he actually abandoned him. His career was hopeless, and Tang Bohu, who was alone, was willing to degenerate from then on, and was depressed, borrowing wine all day to pour sorrow, wandering between the flower streets and willow lanes, making a living by selling calligraphy and paintings, and the reputation of the talented man must have come from this.
After more than ten years of chaotic mixing, Zhu Chenhao, the king of Ning at that time, heard of Tang Bohu's talent and wanted to hire him as his staff. It may be that in his heart, he was quite unwilling to read poetry and books for many years, full of experience, but the situation of the hero's useless place, coupled with the fact that his life had reached an unsustainable point at that time, Tang Bohu, who had been in the shape of a wave for many years, once again came out of the mountains and came to the Ning King's Mansion in Nanchang. But he found that this King Ning was plotting a rebellion, and the reason why he invited himself was precisely for this purpose. At this time, Tang Bohu's heart was really full of mixed feelings, and he couldn't help but sigh why heaven was teasing himself so much. In order to save his life, Tang Bohu had to pretend to be crazy and stupid, and even did not hesitate to take the naked way to abuse himself, and the unbearable King Ning finally drove him out of the palace. A few years later, King Ning did indeed rebel, but only forty-three days later he was pacified by Wang Shouren, and Tang Bohu also saved his life because he immediately broke away from King Ning.
After leaving the Ning King's Mansion, Tang Bohu's heart was completely dead, and he had to admit his fate, and it seemed that he was destined to study and become an official in this life, and his fame and fortune were gone. After that, after nearly ten years of mourning than death, on the second day of December in the second year of Jiajing (1523 AD), Tang Bohu finally completed his life in poverty and illness, leaving this world that wantonly teased him and brought him endless pain.
Tang Bohu's talents, in the end, had nowhere to show, and had to rely on cheap sales of calligraphy and paintings for a living, and finally left the world alone in poverty. The reasons for Tang Bohu's tragic life are manifold, some of which are irresistible external factors, but they also have a great relationship with his arrogant personality and the way he handles things. His character was lonely and arrogant, making enemies everywhere and being hated by others; his ignorance of people frustrated him and led him astray; his debauchery made him notorious and unpopular; his fragility in heart made him depressed and self-willed. Throughout Tang Bohu's life, it can be said that his fate is uncertain, with twists and turns, but it is also thought-provoking, which is worthy of warning from future generations!