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莊周 Zhuāng Zhōu or 莊子 Zhuāngzǐ, "Master Zhuang," was a Chinese philosopher from the late fourth century B.C.E. He was later categorized into the "Daoist" school, understood as a competitor with more mainstream Confucianism, but no such classifications existed at his time and there is no evidence he thought of himself that way. We don't have dates for his birth or death but there is external evidence that his friend, Huizi, was employed by King Hui of Wei, who ruled from 370-319 (Lushi Qunqiu, Shěnyīnglǎn Yící 8). We have no contemporaneous information about his life beyond what is contained by the text that bears his name. We don't know why he wrote what he wrote or, to put the question differently, who he wrote it for. Trying to explore those questions is one of my goals in this project..
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