The phrase “warrior poet” is a strange cliché, considering how rarely those two words have had any reason to be used together, but Chinese poet Li Bai was the real thing- an actual warrior poet of the T'ang Dynasty.

In Li Bai's early years, he was a “xia,” a Chinese knight-errant. The xia were very different from other warriors such as the Japanese samurai or the European knight. Xia were vagabonds who roamed from place to place seeking opportunities to perform heroic deeds on behalf of the mistreated common people- at least in theory. I think we can assume that real xia were frequently not quite as noble as all that, but still Li Bai was one of their number. He was an expert swordsman who was said to have killed several opponents in duels during his wanderings.

Later on, he became a wandering Taoist, and in his poetry he liked to portray himself as a Taoist immortal “slumming it” down here on Earth. He caught the eye of people in high places and attached himself to the imperial court, but was eventually accused of treason and sent into exile. While in exile, he supposedly died by drowning as a result of drunkenly trying to hug the reflection of the moon in a river.

Li Bai was quite the eccentric character, but that's not the only reason he's remembered today. Along with his best friend Du Fu, he's considered one of the two all-time greatest poets of China.