Review of the Research on Zhang Yan in the Past 20 Years

Zhang Yan (1248-1321?) was a famous writer of ci poetry in the transitional period between the Song Dynasty and the Yuan Dynasty. Little research was made on him before 1980, yet, since then, more and more attention has been paid to him and much has been achieved in the study of his family background, his life, his ci poetry and his theory, which shows that the research on him has reached a new level.