Li Vle-'da-'jatA Dazhao or Li Ta-chao (b. Oct. 6, 1888, Hebei prov¬ ince, China—d. April 28, 1927, Beijing) Cofounder with Chen Duxiu of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Chief librarian and professor of his¬ tory at Beijing University, Li became inspired by the success of the Rus¬ sian Revolution and began to study and lecture on Marxism. In 1921 the study groups Li had created formally became the CCP. Li helped the new party carry out the policy of the Communist International (see Comintern) and cooperated with the Nationalist Party of Sun Yat-sen. His career was cut short when he was seized and hanged by the warlord Zhang Zuolin, but his ideas of a revolution of the impoverished peasantry were brought to fruition by Mao Zedong.
Li Vle-'hurj-'jaqN Hongzhang or Li Hung-chang (b. Feb. 15, 1823, Hefei, Anhui province, China—d. Nov. 7, 1901, Beijing) Chinese states¬ man who represented China in the series of humiliating negotiations at the end of the Sino-French War (1883—85), Sino-Japanese War (1894-95), and Boxer Rebellion (1900). Much earlier in his career, Li had helped with the suppression of the Taiping Rebellion (1850-64) and had put down the Nian Rebellion (c. 1852-68). At that time, he came in contact with West¬ erners (notably England’s Charles George Gordon) and Western weapons and became convinced that China needed Western-style firepower if it wanted to protect its sovereignty. In 1870, when Li was appointed governor-general of the capital province, Zhili, he was able to build arse¬ nals, found a military academy, establish two modern naval bases, pur¬ chase warships, and undertake other “self-strengthening” measures. Through modernization he hoped to preserve traditional China, but within traditional China Li’s innovations could not develop fully, and he was fatally hampered by the system he was trying to protect.
Li Keran or Li K'o-jan orig. Li Yongshun alias Sanqi (b. March 26, 1907, Xuzhou, Jiangsu province, China—d. Dec. 5, 1989, Beijing) Chinese painter and art educator. While studying at the Shanghai Art Col¬ lege he was influenced by Kang Youwei, who advocated merging Eastern and Western art to create a new century in Chinese painting. At the Hang¬ zhou National Art College (1929-32) Li studied with the French teacher Andre Claoudit and developed an abstract and structural painting style that showed the influence of German Expressionism. In 1932 he became a member of the leftist Yiba Art Society. In the 1940s he began to paint cowboys and water buffalo, revitalizing this traditional subject matter with an innovative technique of splashed ink. He joined the faculty of the Beijing National Art College in 1946. While he emulated ancient Chinese calligraphy, his training in oil painting also taught him to apply Western elements, such as chiaroscuro, to his work. In his later years, Li attracted many students and followers, who formed the “Li School” of the 1980s.
Li Po See Li Bai
Li Rui (b. Jan. 15, 1769, Yuanhe, China—d. Aug. 12, 1817, Yuanhe) Chi¬ nese mathematician and astronomer who made notable contributions to the revival of traditional Chinese mathematics and astronomy and to the
development of the theory of equations. Having failed the Chinese civil service examinations several times, he could obtain no official position and had to make a poor living as an assistant to various mandarins. From about 1800 he began to study the works of the 13th-century mathemati¬ cians Li Ye and Qin Jiushao. He found that traditional Chinese methods of solving higher-degree equations had several advantages over algebraic methods that had been recently imported from the West. His Kaifang shuo (1820; “On the Method of Extraction”) contains his work on the theory of equations: a rule of signs, a discussion of multiple roots and negative roots, and the rule that nonreal roots of an algebraic equation must exist in pairs.
Li Shanlan also known as Li Renshu or Li Qiuren (b. Jan. 2, 1811, Haining, Zhejiang province, China—d. Dec. 9, 1882, China) Chinese mathematician. He mastered both traditional Chinese and available West¬ ern mathematical treatises at a precocious age. In Shanghai in 1852, he met Alexander Wylie of the London Missionary Society and agreed to collaborate on the translation of Western works. Along with his near con¬ temporary Hua Hengfang, Li left a permanent impression on Chinese mathematical nomenclature and exposition. From 1869 Li was professor of mathematics at the Tongwen Guan college, the first Chinese person to hold such a Western-style position in mathematics.
Li Shaojun Vle-'shau-'juuA (fl. 2nd century bc, China) Chinese alche¬ mist. He was the first person to assert that the Daoist’s ultimate goal was to achieve the status of xian, immortal sage, and he was responsible for much of the mystical content of popular Daoist thought. Claiming to be several centuries old, he gained the confidence of the great Han emperor Wudi and persuaded him that he could become immortal by praying to Zao Jun, a mythical Chinese figure who produced gold dinnerware that conferred immortality, and by eating from a vessel that had been trans¬ muted into gold. Because of Li’s influence, prayers to Zao Jun became established in Daoist ritual, and Zao Jun came to be considered the first great Daoist divinity.
Li Si \'le-'su\ or Li Ssu (b. 280 bc?, Chu state, central China—d. 208 bc, Xianyang, Shaanxi province) Minister of the Qin dynasty in China who utilized the ideas of Hanfeizi to make the Qin the first centralized Chinese empire. His ordering of the “Qin bibliocaust”—the burning of all books— earned him the opprobrium of future generations of Confucian scholars.
Li Sixun or Li Ssu-hsun (b. 651—d. 716) Chinese painter. Li, who was related to the Tang imperial family, led an active political life and was given the honorary rank of general. His son, Li Zhaodao, was also a famous painter, and thus the father is sometimes called Big General Li and the son Little General Li. While no genuine works survive, both Li Sixun and Li Zhaodao are known to have painted in a highly decorative and meticulous fashion, employing the precise line technique derived from earlier artists such as Gu Kaizhi and Zhan Ziqian. Li is considered the chief exponent of a decoratively coloured landscape style of the Tang dynasty and the founder of the so-called Northern school of professional painters.
Li Ta-chao See Li Dazhao
Li Tang or Li T'ang (b. c. 1050—d. c. 1130) Chinese painter. He earned the highest rank in the academy of painting of Emperor Huizong, and after the North fell to the Mongols he went to the South and entered the acad¬ emy of Emperor Song Gaozong. His landscapes serve as a vital link between the earlier, and essentially Northern, variety of monumental land¬ scape, and the more lyrical Southern style of the Ma-Xia school (based on the work of Ma Yuan and Xia Gui). Li perfected the brushstroke tex¬ ture known as the “ax stroke,” which gives a tactile sense to painted rocks and suggests the precise and comprehensive reality that Southern Song artists sought to give their landscapes.
Li Ye literary name iingzhai (b. 1192, Luangcheng, Hebei province, China—d. 1279, Yuanshi) Chinese mathematician and scholar-official who contributed to the solution of polynomial equations in one variable. When the Mongols invaded his home district in 1233, Li wandered home¬ less in Shanxi, Shandong, and Henan provinces. During this period he composed his main work, Ceyuan haijing (1248; “Sea Mirror of Circle Measurements”), which contains 170 problems based on one geometric diagram of a circular city wall circumscribed by a right-angled triangle. Although the problems are highly contrived, they enabled Li to list some 692 algebraic formulas for triangular areas and segment lengths. In 1264 Li was appointed to the Hanlin Academy by Kublai Khan. Li strongly criti-