The Wu Rulun Political Arena, Make Friends

Wu Ru-lun (1840-1903) was a famous activist in the domain of politics, education and literatus in the late Qing Dynasty. In addition to the social role of litterateur, educators, Wu Ru-lun was also a famous figure in the political circle. Since the fouth years of Tongzhi, he had been employed in Tseng Kuo-fan Mu-fu, Zhang Shu-sheng Mu-fu and Li Hong-zhang Mu-fu.He also ruled Shen state and Ji prefecture of Zhili province for nearly a decade. In his fifty years old, he resigned and hold the post of schoolmaster of Baoding Lotus College. But he remained ambiguous relationship between hiself and the officialdom. Therefore, it can be said Wu Ru-lun has never been completely insulated with officialdom in his whole life.Wu Ru-lun had been in Mu-fu for long time.the master of the Mu-fu:Tseng Kuo-fan, Zhang Shu-sheng and Li Hong-zhang regarded Wu highly. Lots of colleagues who worked with Wu was exalted to the high positions, but Wu was not. The plight of his official career has vividly contrasts with his fame in the domain of education and literature. His attitude to his official career changed from positive to negative during these times, and it has relationship with his social interaction. Wu Ru-lun constantly adjusted their own role in politics in order to achieve his own aim. From Wu we can see the traditional Chinese literati how hard to adjust themselves to the pursuit of their personal goals and realize their value when the society had changed greatly.Although Wu Ru-lun didn't establish a widely thick-connected network of people, but also make friends extensively. Friends of the Mu-fu, officialdom, students, Tongcheng literati, townee, all of them made Wu Ru-lun have a wide range of contacts in politics. Therefore examining the formation, characteristics and function of his social relations networks, could help us further understanding his life, political positions and social activities, and it also help us understand the social life of the literati during the late Qing Dynasty.In this paper, we explain Wu Ru-lun's social contacts and personal connections according the time, especially his interaction with the bureaucracy. With this case, we discuss how the traditional literati make choice during the period of great social change, thus put forward the further thinking of the traditional scholars and modern transformation of traditional society.