Donglin liezhuan 東林列傳

Donglin liezhuan 東林列傳 "Collective biographies of the Donglin Faction" is a collection of biographies of members of the Donglin Faction (Donglin dang 東林黨) of the late Ming period 明 (1368-1644) compiled by the early Qing-period 清 (1644-1911) scholar Chen Ding 陳鼎 (b. 1650). As a young man, he lived in Yunnan, and was therefore an eyewitness of local events in the region. He also wrote the books Dian-Qian tusi hunli ji 滇黔土司婚禮記 on native marriage customs, Dian-Qian jiyou 滇黔記遊 (a travel report), Liuxi waizhuan 留溪外傳 (unofficial biographies), Shao Feifei zhuan 邵飛飛傳 (the biography of a local female hero), and many more.

The first draft to the Donglin liezhuan was the 60-juan long Zhongyizhuan 忠義傳 "Biographies of loyals and righteous" that included more than 4,600 paragraphs of biographical information of Ming-period officials and scholars. After Chen Ding retired to a private life he refined the literary style of his biographies and finally gave shape to the 25-juan long Donglin liezhuan.

The Donglin liezhuan is arranged in the same sequence as the name list Donglindang renbang 東林黨人榜 that includes more than 180 persons. The style follows Gong Yizheng's 龔頤正 (1140-1201) Yuanyoudang jizhuan 元祐黨籍傳 from the Song period 宋 (960-1279) and makes use of Gong's book as a main source.

The Donglin liezhuan is very detailed and is generally rated as a quite reliable source about the factional strife between the eunuch clique around Wei Zhongxian 魏忠賢 (1568–1627) and the Donglin Faction with representatives like Gu Xiancheng 顧憲成 (1550-1612), Gao Panlong 高攀龍 (1562-1626), Qian Yiben 錢一本 (1539-1610), Yang Lian 楊漣 (1572-1625), Zuo Guangdou 左光斗 (1575-1625), Huang Zunsu 黄尊素 (1584-1626) or Zhou Xunchang 周順昌 (1584-1626).

There is a print from the Kangxi reign-period 康熙 (1662-1722) that was republished as a facsimile in 1982 by the Jiangsu Renmin Press 江蘇人民出版社. It is also included in the imperial series Siku quanshu 四庫全書.