of Szechwan), whose leaders were the famous Three Sus.
The greatest of the three was Su Tung-p'o (1036-1101); the others were
his father, Su Shih, and his brother, Su Che. It is characteristic of
these Shu poets, and also of the Kiangsi school associated with them,
that they made as much use as they could of the vernacular. It had not
been usual to introduce the phrases of everyday life into poetry, but Su
Tung-p'o made use of the most everyday expressions, without diminishing
his artistic effectiveness by so doing; on the contrary, the result was
to give his poems much more genuine feeling than those of other poets.
These poets were in harmony with the writings of the T'ang period poet
Po Chue-i (772-846) and were supported, like Neo-Confucianism, by
representatives of trade capitalism. Politically, in their conservatism
they were sharply opposed to the Wang An-shih group. Midway between the
two stood the so-called Loyang-School, whose greatest leaders were the
historian and poet Ss[)u]-ma Kuang (1019-1086) and the philosopher-poet
Shao Yung (1011-1077).

In addition to its poems, the Sung literature was famous for the
so-called _pi-chi_ or miscellaneous notes. These consist of short notes
of the most various sort, notes on literature, art, politics,
archaeology, all mixed together. The _pi-chi_ are a treasure-house for
the history of the culture of the time; they contain many details, often
of importance, about China's neighbouring peoples. They were intended to
serve as suggestions for learned conversation when scholars came
together; they aimed at showing how wide was a scholar's knowledge. To
this group we must add the accounts of travel, of which some of great
value dating from the Sung period are still extant; they contain
information of the greatest importance about the early Mongols and also
about Turkestan and South China.

While the Sung period was one of perfection in all fields of art,
painting undoubtedly gained its highest development in this time. We
find now two main streams in painting: some painters preferred the
decorative, pompous, but realistic approach, with great attention to the
detail. Later theoreticians brought this school in connection with one
school of meditative Buddhism, the so-called northern school. Men who
belonged to this school of painting often were active court officials or
painted for the court and for other representative purposes. One of the
most famous among them, Li Lung-mie