Zhu Xi
Zhu Xi, whose family originated in Wuyuan County, Huizhou (in modern Jiangxi province), was born in Fujian, where his father worked as the subprefectural sheriff. After his father was forced from office due to his opposition to the government appeasement policy towards the Jurchen in 1140, Zhu Xi received instruction from his father at home.Many anecdotes attest that he was a highly precocious child. It was recorded that at age five he ventured to ask what lay beyond Heaven, and by eight he understood the significance of the Classic of Filiality (Xiaojing). As a youth, he was inspired by Mencius’ proposition that all people could become a sage. Upon his father's death in 1143, he studied with his father's friends Hu Xian, Liu Zihui, and Liu Mianzhi. In 1148, at the age of 19, Zhu Xi passed the Imperial Examination and became a presented scholar. Zhu Xi's first official dispatch position was as Subprefectural Registrar of Tong'an (同安縣主簿), which he served from 1153 - 1156. From 1153 he began to study under Li Tong, who followed the Neo-Confucian tradition of Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi, and formally became his student in 1160.
Yue Fei
Yue Fei's second biography, is a wuxia novel titled "Shuo Yue Quan Zhuan" (), was written by Qian Cai (錢彩), who lived sometime during the reigns of the Kangxi and Yongzheng (1661–1735) emperors of the Qing dynasty. A dating symbol in its preface points either to the year 1684 or to 1744. It was banned during the reign of the Qianlong Emperor. There are two main versions of this novel in existence. The original one had 80 chapters. There was an illustrated edition of this version published in 1912. The other version also had 80 chapters and was published during the reign of the Tongzhi Emperor (1861–1875). Starting in 1964 and finishing in 1995, Sir Yang Ti-liang, former Chief Justice of Hong Kong, current Chairman of the Hong Kong Red Cross, combined the first chapters of these works (in an attempt to weed out the overabundance of supernatural elements) to create a 79-chapter version with 961 pages, which he translated into English. It is currently sold under the title "General Yue Fei" ().