Wēn Tíngyún 溫庭筠 (c. 812 – c. 870, zì Fēiqīng 飛卿), of Tàiyuán Qí 太原祁 ancestral seat (descended from the early-Tang chief minister Wēn Yànbó 溫彥博). His career was conspicuously failed: he repeatedly attempted the jìnshì but never passed; his speed at composition (he could finish his policy fù with arms folded after bā chā — eight crossings — earning the nickname Wēn Bāchā) became stuff of anecdote rather than examination success. He was officially associated with the Niú faction, and his career was harmed by the same factional dynamics that constrained Lǐ Shāngyǐn. He died in poverty around 870.
Wēn is, with Lǐ Shāngyǐn 李商隱, the founding pair of WǎnTáng ornate verse — the WēnLǐ 溫李 partnership. He is also, more importantly for the long history of Chinese literature, the first major cí 詞 poet — the Huājiān jí 花間集 (940, compiled by Zhào Chóngzuò) collects 66 of his cí, more than any other contributor, and treats him as the canonical Huājiān bǐzǔ 花間鼻祖 (founding ancestor of the Huājiān style). His cí — Púsà mán, Gēnglòu zǐ, Mèng Jiāngnán — established the small-verse erotic-introspective vocabulary that defined the form for the next several centuries.
Principal works in the corpus: Wēn Tíngyún shī jí KR4c0077 (the SBCK 7-juǎn Sòng-print verse edition); Wēn Fēiqīng shī jí jiānzhù KR4c0078 (the WYG 9-juǎn commentary edition by Zēng Yì + Gù Yǔxián + Gù Sìlì). His cí are not in these collections (they appear in the Huājiān jí, separately catalogued). CBDB id 447567 has no dates; standard reference works give c. 812 – c. 870, used here.