Ouyang Xiu

Ouyang Xiu was a Chinese historian, calligrapher, epigrapher, essayist, poet and politician of the Song dynasty, considered the central figure of the Eight Masters of the Tang and Song. Largely self-taught, he passed the jinshi exam in 1030 and revived the Classical Prose Movement begun by Tang masters two centuries before, promoting it in the imperial examinations. A leading proponent of the Qingli Reforms of the 1040s, he was demoted when Fan Zhongyan fell in 1045, and later headed the compilation of the New Book of Tang, completed in 1060, and wrote the Historical Records of the Five Dynasties on his own. He retired in 1071 after opposing the New Policies of Wang Anshi.