Wāng Zhōng 汪中 (1745–1794), zì Róngfǔ 容甫, native of Jiāngdū 江都, Yángzhōu, Jiāngsū. The great Yángzhōu kǎozhèng polymath and gǔwén prose master of the late Qiánlóng era, regarded by 阮元 Ruǎn Yuán and the Yángzhōu school as the single greatest prose-stylist of the eighteenth century. Born into poverty; widowed mother Madame Zōu raised him alone after his father’s early death; supported himself as a bookseller’s clerk in Yángzhōu. Zhūshēng throughout his life (never advanced through the metropolitan examinations) but treated by the Yángzhōu salon (the Mǎ 馬 brothers, 阮元, 王念孫) as a peer. His Āi yánchuán wén 哀鹽船文 (1769, on the Yízhēng salt-fleet fire) made him famous overnight and became the canonical example of late-Qīng fù-style commemorative prose. Major works: Shùxué (4 juan, nèipiān KR4f0060 + wàipiān); Róngfǔ xiānshēng yíshī KR4f0061 (poetry); the foundational rehabilitations of Xúnzǐ (Xúnqīngzǐ tōnglùn) and Mòzǐ (Mòzǐ xù); the Zhōuguān zhēngwén 周官徵文; the Guǎnglíng duì 廣陵對 (Yángzhōu historical geography). His son 汪喜孫 Wāng Xǐsūn (1786–1848), a Hànlín scholar, posthumously printed the works in 1815 with a preface by Wáng Niànsūn. ECCP 813–815 (Hellmut Wilhelm); CBDB id 65767.