"The most striking characteristic of Po Chü-i's poetry is its verbal simplicity. There is a story that he was in the habit of reading his poems to an old peasant woman and altering any expression which she could not understand. The poems of his contemporaries were mere elegant diversions which enabled the scholar to display his erudition, or the literary juggler his dexterity. ... No poet in the world can ever have enjoyed greater contemporary popularity than Po."
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Sources
Arthur Waley, A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems (1919), pp. 166 and 168
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bai_Juyi
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Bai Juyi
Bai Juyi (also Bo Juyi or Po Chü-i; Chinese: 白居易; 772–846) was a renowned Chinese poet.
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