A native of Shehong County in modern Sichuan province, Chen Zi'ang was the son of a rich man, and did not travel to the imperial capital to take his exams until he was in his twenties.

With a flourish that startled onlookers in the city marketplace, he began by paying the asking price of a million kaiyuan tongbao for a Tartar musical instrument.

[4] As an important advisor to the Empress Wu Zetian, Chen was a firm advocate of poetry reflecting real life, and with his active interest in politics, much of his work includes suggestions of social commentary.

In my leisure hours, I have looked into the poems of the Ch'i and Liang Dynasties, and I could not help sighing when I found all genuine feeling and insight were smothered by meaningless figures of speech and a squeamish refinement of words.

[6] Chen Zi'ang is especially well known for "Ganyu" (感遇, his collection of thirty-eight poems, heavily influenced by Daoism and written in a simpler vocabulary than was typical of poetry of that time.