Founding-Míng statesman, strategist, and man of letters; zì Bówēn 伯溫; native of Qīngtián 青田 (Chǔzhōu 處州, Zhèjiāng). Yuán jìnshì of Yuántǒng 1 (1333). Served the Yuán in minor provincial posts but resigned repeatedly over policy disputes; in 1360 was recruited by Zhū Yuánzhāng 朱元璋 at Yīngtiān 應天 (Nánjīng) and became one of the principal architects of the strategy that defeated Chén Yǒuliàng 陳友諒 (1363, Lake Poyang) and Zhāng Shìchéng 張士誠 (1367) and brought down the Yuán (1368). After the Hóngwǔ accession served as Yùshǐ zhōngchéng 御史中丞 and Tàishǐ lìng 太史令 (1368); enfeoffed as Chéngyìbó 誠意伯 (“Earl of Sincere Resolve”) in Hóngwǔ 3 (1370). Retired in 1371 and died at home in Qīngtián in Hóngwǔ 8 (1375), age 65 suì; the contemporary suspicion that he had been poisoned by Hú Wéiyōng 胡惟庸 is reflected in Liú Zhì’s 劉廌 post-mortem Yìyùn lù and is cautiously accepted by most modern scholars. Posthumous title Wénchéng 文成.
Conventionally bracketed with Sòng Lián 宋濂 as the two greatest literary figures of the founding Hóngwǔ generation. The Sìkù tíyào to his collected works KR4e0005 reads his place as analogous to that of the great JīnYuán statesmen Yēlǜ Chǔcái 耶律楚材 and Liú Bǐngzhōng 劉秉忠, but his prose as superior to theirs. His most influential single composition is the Yùlí zǐ 郁離子, a Yuán-period (c. 1356–1358) political-allegorical fable-collection composed during his retreat from Yuán office, regarded as the immediate forerunner of Míng vernacular prose. The late-Míng / Qīng folklore attribution of the divinatory Shāobǐng gē 燒餅歌 to Liú is spurious. His SBCK collection is at KR4e0006 (Tàishī Chéngyìbó Liú Wénchéng gōng jí).
Standard biographies: Míng shǐ j. 128 (with Sòng Lián); Goodrich & Fang, Dictionary of Ming Biography 1:932–938 (entry by Hok-lam Chan). Universally well-documented; no CBDB id required.