Su Shi was twenty-two years old when he was a scholar. His political career was spent in the fierce struggle between the old and new parties within the ruling class in the Northern Song Dynasty. His attitude towards Wang Anshi's political reform is conservative. He has repeatedly stated the disadvantages of the new law and demanded his release because of his disagreement with Wang Anshi's political views. He has served as a local official in Mizhou (now Zhucheng, Shandong Province), Xuzhou (now Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province) and Huzhou (now Huzhou, Zhejiang Province). Later, he was arrested and imprisoned for impeaching him and slandering the court with poetry. After he was released from prison, he was demoted to Huangzhou (now Huanggang, Hubei) as the assistant ambassador of Yong ying. When Song Zhezong was in power, the old Party was in power, and Su Shi was transferred to Hanlin Bachelor, Du Shi and Longtuge Bachelor. Because he has been released for many years, he has experienced the benefits of the new law. Then he abandoned the new law and opposed it. So, he went abroad again, and served as the prefect of Hangzhou, Yingzhou, Yangzhou, Dingzhou and other places, and did some good things that were beneficial to the people. After Song Zhezong's Zhao Xu came to power, he began to use the new party and dissolved the old one. Su Shi was exiled to Huizhou (now Huizhou City, Guangdong Province) and Danzhou (now Dan County, Hainan Island, Guangdong Province). Evonne and Hui Zong acceded to the throne, were pardoned, returned to the north, and died in Changzhou Guest House.
Su Shi is a great man with many achievements in literature and art. His poems, words, essays, calligraphy and paintings all have their own distinctive styles and unique achievements, which have had a great influence in history. His poetry creation swept away the tedious bad habits in the early Song Dynasty, which opened up a new road for the development of Song poetry and laid a unique face for Song poetry. His excellent poems reflect the sufferings of the people, expose and satirize the decay of the ruling class, express the great ambition to make contributions, and depict the magnificent rivers and mountains of the motherland, which has strong romantic characteristics. In the creation of ci, he is a master of innovation, and his contribution far exceeds that of his previous poets. With his own creative practice, he expanded the life content reflected in his ci, such as chanting history, visiting immortals, mourning, farewell, boarding a boat, feasting and enjoying, as well as landscape scenery, pastoral scenery, meditation and philosophical discussion. He wrote almost everything. He broke the original narrow fence of Ci, changed the traditional concept that Ci is a colorful subject, and opened up a broad world for the development of Ci. Taking poetry as his word, he expanded the word to the situation of "no intention to enter, nothing to say", and made new attempts in form, language and rhythm, and achieved great success. His poetic style is bold and unrestrained, his brushwork is vigorous, fresh and natural.
Su Shi was politically frustrated and relegated for a long time. His experience was very bumpy, but he was always optimistic and heroic. On the other hand, due to the influence of Laozi and Zhuangzi's thoughts, his poems, words and essays often reveal negative thoughts such as detachment, seclusion and narcissism. Even in those positive works, these negative elements are also mixed. In art, he used argument as a word and used too many allusions, which influenced the image of the word to varying degrees and even had a bad influence on later generations. There is Dongpo Yuefu, with more than 300 words.