In One Who Knows Me, Anna Shields argues that the performance of friendship occupied an important place in the literary experiments and innovations of the mid-Tang (780s–820s), a famous generation that included men such as Han Yu (768–824), Liu Zongyuan (773–819), Bai Juyi (772–846), and Yuan Zhen (779–831). Coming to the capital Chang'an from lesser lineages in the provinces to compete for fame and office in the annual examinations, men such as these required a space of their own, away from the imperial court and the mansions of the great clans. Deprived of powerful connections, they sought to make a reputation for themselves by cultivating ties of friendship. By being known to a small group of talented and virtuous peers, they could hope to become known to men of influence, both by the compositions they addressed to their peers and by the compositions their peers addressed to them. But friendship did not simply create an alternative path to patronage, alongside the broad avenue traveled by young men of privilege. Because friendships were elective rather than ascriptive, and defined by equality and trust rather than by hierarchy and dependence, they created a space for literary experimentation. At gatherings in the capital, then in correspondence between their places of appointment, and finally by the graveside, these men devised new literary forms and new stylistic modulations to prove the authenticity of their friendship, both to their friends and to others. Their insistence on authenticity did not conflict with the overt instrumentality of these friendships, because only by knowing others could one be certain that they possessed the ability to “know oneself” (zhiji) as well as the talent and the virtue to express that knowledge to outsiders. Rather than encouraging cynical self-interest, therefore, these friendships invited deep reflection on the possibility of knowing and being known, and on the possibility of attesting that knowledge in writing.

To demonstrate this intricate argument, Shields avoids “the representation of friendship in Tang anecdotal literature” and limits her analyses “to texts that present themselves as overtly autobiographical, such as letters, poetic exchanges, farewell prefaces (song xu), and funerary texts intended for performance or inscription” (p. 9), using those texts both as records and as products of the friendships she examines. She has arranged the chapters by the life course of this generation of literati, presenting the reader with a manner of group biography that follows the development of mid-Tang discourses on friendship and the transformation of literary genres along with the eventful careers of these new men.

Chapter 1 compares the practices and discourses of friendship in the Tang Empire to those of other periods in Chinese history, as well as to periods in the European past, in order to establish “useful models for understanding, in broad outline, the relationship between shifts in social and political structures and the representation of friendship in premodern texts” (p. 48). Chapter 2 examines the early, delicate efforts by this new generation to advertise their talent in Chang'an. Bai Juyi and Yuan Zhen sought to become known by excelling in conventional styles and genres, Han Yu and his circle by subverting them. Chapter 3 presents a series of superb analyses of the exchange poetry and linked verse these men composed in office and in exile. Shields explains how the poets used borrowed rhymes, allusions, and shifts in voice to express their grief and to comfort their friends, while they addressed at the same time a wider audience that might be persuaded, by the authentic integrity of the poems, to help the careers of both the sender and the recipient. Chapter 4 uses the genre of the letter (shu) to examine the epistemology of friendship: the sender's confidence in making himself known, the recipient's dismay at finding himself misunderstood, and the letter writer's despair at the lack of a response. Chapter 5 discusses the final compositions by which friends might promote the character of their friends and the integrity of their group, notably funerary inscriptions and offering texts.

Shields presents a moving analysis of the offering texts, but the section on funerary inscriptions neglects the opportunity to compare the simple, archaic prose in the transmitted compositions of mid-Tang literati to the intricate, ornate prose found on excavated inscriptions for members of the great clans. This is regrettable, because the funerary inscription is the only genre for which such a comparison is possible, and the comparison would doubtless improve our understanding of the literary strategies by which these new men distinguished themselves.

By demonstrating the centrality of the discourse and practice of friendship during the mid-Tang, Shields has revealed new depth, coherence, and meaning in a well-studied body of literature. Her connection of this discourse and practice to the broader social and political changes of the period, moreover, makes an important contribution to the historiography of the Tang-Song transition and to the comparative study of friendship. The elegance of the arguments and the beauty of the examples make the book a pleasure to read, and a pleasure to recommend to scholars of other periods and other cultures. Shields is clearly a scholar capable of knowing, and capable of being known.