Qu Yuan, born in the Xiling Gorge area of what is today western Hubei province, was a minister in the government of the state of Chu, descended from nobility and a champion of political loyalty and truth eager to maintain the Chu state's power. Qu Yuan advocated a policy of alliance with the other kingdoms of the period against the hegemonic Qin state, which threatened to dominate them all. Legend has it that the Chu king fell under the influence of other corrupt, jealous ministers who slandered Qu Yuan and banished his most loyal counselors. It is said that Qu Yuan returned first to his family's home town. In his exile, he spent much of this time collecting legends and rearranging folk odes while travelling the countryside, producing some of the greatest poetry in Chinese literature and expressing fervent love for his state and his deepest concerns for its future.

According to legend, his anxiety brought him to an increasingly troubled state of health; during his depression, he would often take walks near a certain well, during which he would look upon his reflection in the water and his own person, thin and gaunt. According to legend, this well became known as the "Face Reflection Well." Today on a hillside in Xiangluping in Hubei province's Zigui, there is a well which is considered to be the original well from the time of Qu Yuan.

In 278 BC, learning of the capture of his country's capital, Ying, by General Bai Qi of the state of Qin, Qu Yuan is said to have written the lengthy poem of lamentation called "Lament for Ying" and later to have waded into the Miluo river in today's Hunan Province holding a great rock in order to commit ritual suicide as a form of protest against the corruption of the era.

Popular legend has it that villagers carried their dumplings and boats to the middle of the river and desperately tried to save him, but were unsuccessful. In order to keep fish and evil spirits away from his body, they beat drums and splashed the water with their paddles. They threw rice into the water as a food offering to Qu Yuan and to distract the fish away from his body. However, late one night, the spirit of Qu Yuan appeared before his friends and told them that he died because he jumped into a river. He asked his friends to wrap their rice into three-cornered silk packages to ward off the dragon. These packages became a traditional food known as zòngzi, although the lumps of rice are now wrapped in reed leaves instead of silk. The act of racing to search for his body in boats gradually became the cultural tradition of dragon boat racing, which is held on the anniversary of his death every year.

Today, people still eat zòngzi and participate in dragon boat races to commemorate Qu Yuan's sacrifice on Duanwu, the fifth day of the fifth month of the Chinese calendar. The countries around China, such as Vietnam and Korea, adapt this festival in the process of learning Chinese culture.

Qu Yuan is regarded as the first author of verse to have his name associated to the work in China, since prior to that time, poetic works were not attributed to any specific authors. He is considered to have initiated the so-called sao style of verse, which is named after his work Li Sao, in which he abandoned the classic four-character verses used in poems of Shi Jing and adopted verses with varying lengths. This resulted in poems with more rhythm and latitude in expression. Qu Yuan is also regarded as one of the most prominent figures of Romanticism in Chinese classical literature, and his masterpieces influenced some of the greatest Romanticist poets in Tang Dynasty such as Li Bai.

Other than his literary influence, Qu Yuan is also held as the earliest patriot in China's history. His social idealism and unbending patriotism have served as the model for Chinese intellectuals to this day, particularly following the establishment of new China in 1949. For example, in the 1950's China issued a postage stamp bearing the "likeness" of Qu Yuan.

Scholars have debated the authenticity of several of Qu Yuan's works since the Western Han dynasty. The most authoritative historical record, Sima Qian's Records of the Grand Historian (Shi Ji) mentions five of Qu Yuan's works:

• Li Sao
• Tian Wen
• Zhao Hun
• Ai Ying ("Lament for Ying")
• Huai Sha

According to Wang Yi of the Eastern Han dynasty, a total of 25 works can be attributed to Qu Yuan:

• Li Sao
• Jiu Ge (consisting of 11 pieces)
• Tian Wen
• Jiu Zhang (consisting of 9 pieces)
• Yuan You
• Pu Ju
• Yu Fu

Wang Yi chose to attribute Zhao Hun to another contemporary of Qu Yuan, Song Yu; most modern scholars, however, consider Zhao Hun to be Qu Yuan's original work, whereas Yuan You, Pu Ju, and Yu Fu are believed to have been composed by others.

Translations of Qu Yuan's works into English include:

• Sun Dayu (translator). (2007). Selected Poems of Chu Yuan (Chinese-English edition). Shanghai: Foreign Language Education Press, ISBN 9787544604598.
• Hawkes, David (translator). Chapter 5 in J. Minford & J. S. M. Lau (Eds.) (2000). Classical Chinese Literature: An Anthology of Translations, Vol. I: From Antiquity to the Tang Dynasty. New York: Columbia University Press, ISBN 0-231-09676-3.

In 1944, the scholar Sun Cizhou (???) published a work stated that Qu Yuan was a lover of his king. Sun cited the poetry of Qu Yuan to prove his claim. In Qu Yuan's most important work Li Sao (Sorrow of parting), Qu Yuan called himself a beautiful man (or woman, ?? Pinyin: m?irén). A word he used to describe his king was used at that time by women to characterize their lovers.