Ma Zhiyuan was born in 1250 and died in 132 1. He was a famous playwright in Yuan Dynasty. Most (now Beijing) people. Ma Zhiyuan's name is unknown. The name "Dongli" was later used to show Tao Yuanming's ambition. His time was later than that of Guan Hanqing, Bai Pu and others. His birth year should be before the Yuan Dynasty (starting from 1264), and his death year should be between the Zhi Zhi Reform and the first year of Taiding (132 1- 1324). Ma Zhiyuan, together with Guan Hanqing, Zheng Guangzu and Bai Pu, is known as the "Four Masters of Yuan Opera" and a famous dramatist and essayist in Yuan Dynasty. When I was young, my career was bumpy, and I was a scholar in middle age. He was an official in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and later served as the director of the Ministry of Industry in Dadu (now Beijing). In his later years, Ma Zhiyuan was dissatisfied with the current situation, lived in seclusion in the countryside, entertained himself with a cup, and was buried in his ancestral home after his death.

Life story is unknown. From his Sanqu works, we can know that when he was young, he was keen on fame and had the political ambition of "helping the world and taking cloud hands", but he never realized it. After twenty years of wandering, he saw through the humiliation of life, and then he had the idea of retiring from the nymphs, and lived a leisurely life as a friend in the forest and an outsider in his later years. Ma Zhiyuan participated in the creation of zaju in his early years and was a major member of Zhenyuan Bookstore. He had contacts with Wang Bocheng, Wang Hua and Li Er, and was one of the famous "Four Masters" at that time. Ma Zhiyuan has been engaged in the creation of zaju for a long time, and his fame is also great, and he is known as the "number one composer". There are 65,438+05 kinds of his works, including Autumn Colors in the Han Palace, Monument to Blessing, The Story of Yueyang Tower, Tears in Shirts, Sleeping in Chen Tuan, Ren Fengzi, Dream of the Huangliangmeng, etc., all of which are his cooperative works with several artists. The most famous is Autumn in Han Palace. Sanqu has Dongli Yuefu. Xiao Ling's "Jing Tian Sha Qiu Si" is well-known and is known as "the ancestor of Qiu Si".