Background
The Water Margin describes Xuan Zan as an ugly-looking man eight chi tall, with a face like the bottom of a wok, an upward pointing nose, messy hair and a red beard. Xuan Zan has a large stature and excels in martial arts. He wields a saber in combat.
A prince recognises Xuan Zan's outstanding combat abilities and decides to marry his daughter to him. Xuan Zan is thus nicknamed "Ugly Prince Consort". However, the princess is not pleased with Xuan Zan's looks and dies in anguish and hatred later. Xuan Zan falls out of favour from government officials due to his looks and had since remained as an unnoticed talent. He serves in the local county office as a low ranking military officer.
Read more about this topic: Xuan Zan
Famous quotes containing the word background:
“Silence is the universal refuge, the sequel to all dull discourses and all foolish acts, a balm to our every chagrin, as welcome after satiety as after disappointment; that background which the painter may not daub, be he master or bungler, and which, however awkward a figure we may have made in the foreground, remains ever our inviolable asylum, where no indignity can assail, no personality can disturb us.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“... every experience in life enriches one’s background and should teach valuable lessons.”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)
“Pilate with his question “What is truth?” is gladly trotted out these days as an advocate of Christ, so as to arouse the suspicion that everything known and knowable is an illusion and to erect the cross upon that gruesome background of the impossibility of knowledge.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)