China's great Legalist had a stutter and a former classmate who destroyed him
Han Fei, a prince of the state of Han, could not argue his case well at court because of a stutter, so he wrote instead, in one of ancient China's most brilliant styles. His ideas on power fascinated the king of Qin, but a fellow student, Li Si, reportedly helped bring about his death in 233 BC.
Born around 280 BC into the ruling family of Han during the last phase of the Warring States period, Han Fei was unusual among the era's famous thinkers for being an aristocrat. Some scholars read his writings as advice aimed at his cousin, the Han king. According to the historian Sima Qian, he studied under the Confucian philosopher Xun Kuang alongside Li Si, later chancellor of Qin. Watching his own state decline while his counsel went unheeded, he poured his thinking onto the page.
The Han Feizi, a later anthology traditionally credited to him, pulled earlier ideas into one system. From Shang Yang it took the stress on law, from Shen Buhai administrative technique, and from Shen Dao the importance of positional authority. A ruler who mastered power, technique and law, holding officials to account by matching results against their words and wielding the two handles of reward and punishment, could keep firm control. He is often compared to Machiavelli, and the strategist Zhuge Liang reportedly valued his book highly.
How much of his life story is true is debated. Sima Qian says Qin Shi Huang went to war with Han partly to meet him, then was persuaded to imprison him, and that Han Fei took his own life. Another source has him slandering a Qin diplomat and executed when the charge failed. The sinologist Goldin, writing in 2013, thinks the traditional outline is probably close to the truth, while Masayuki Sato suspects Sima Qian dramatised him as a tragic figure with Li Si as his destined rival.
After the Qin dynasty collapsed, the succeeding Han dynasty officially condemned Legalism. Yet Han Fei's theories kept shaping every later dynasty, and the Confucian dream of governing without laws never came true.
Source: Han Fei
