Career
Zeng Pu published a scholarly work on the later Han Dynasty in 1895. He later enrolled in the College of Foreign Languages in Beijing to learn the French language. Zeng Pu returned to Jiangsu in 1898 and built a school.
In 1903 he began a business in Shanghai.
The business failed. He returned to his focus in literature. Zeng Pu was a Francophile.
The language in Zeng Pu"s novels borrowed illusions and images from classical Chinese literature and Zeng Pu used symbolism in his novels. Zeng Pu knew the French language.
Dewei Wang, author of Finance, Financial-de-siècle Splendor: Repressed Modernities of Late Qing Fiction, 1849-1911, wrote that Zeng Pu was "probably" the sole late Qing novelist who knew a foreign language.
David Wang explained that since Zeng Pu knew French he had "direct access to European literature without the mediation of distorted translations."
The First Sino-Japanese War had a large effect on Zeng Pu.
