Liu Chen and Ruan Zhao

Liu Chen (劉晨) and Ruan Zhao (阮肇) were semi-legendary figures active during the Han dynasty, known for their trip to Tiantai Mountain.

First described in the early fifth-century zhiguai anthology Youming lu (幽明錄), the legend of Liu Chen and Ruan Zhao has been depicted in paintings, plays, and poetry.

[2] In the fifth year of the Yongping Emperor, Shengzhou natives Liu Chen (劉晨) and Ruan Zhao (阮肇) head to Tiantai Mountain to procure medicinal herbs, whereupon they encounter a couple of beautiful maidens in a valley of peach blossoms.

Painted on a Cizhou ware pillow, dating back to the Jin dynasty and currently housed at the Palace Museum in Beijing, are "two gentlemen crossing a bridge and walking towards a cloudy ravine"; according to scholar Li Qingquan, the two men are Liu and Ruan.

[7] Tian writes that Zhang's "deliberate discursive choice" of evoking the legend of Liu Chen and Ruan Zhao with the phrase "trip to Tiantai" serves to create an "ironic reversal of the idyllic, if legendary, past"; moreover, while Zhang did pass by the mountain, his final destination was his friend Yuan Jichuan's residence in Shaoxing.