The literati-officials who dominated political affairs in the Song Dynasty (960-1279) generally entered officialdom after passing the civil service examinations.What, then, characterized the early stages of their official careers? Although this was a stage experienced by virtually every literatus who went on to become an official, previous scholarship has either passed over it briefly or omitted it altogether, focusing instead on the various political activities of established literati-officials.Yet literati-official politics was constituted through the concrete actions of individuals, and the different stages of each literati-official’s life were interconnected and mutually influential.Without examining the early stages of their official careers, our understanding of literati-official politics remains incomplete and our ability to observe it in its entirety is consequently limited.An examination of the formative years of a literati-official’s career therefore needs to be grounded in specific individuals, with representative cases serving to illuminate broader patterns.Wei Liaoweng (魏了翁, 1178-1237), a leading Neo-Confucian scholar who began his official career in Sichuan during the middle and late Southern Song, provides a particularly representative case.An examination of his activities in office and his intellectual and social interactions during the early stages of his career makes it possible to trace concretely the process through which a literatus became a literati-official.Such an examination is significant not merely for reconstructing the career development of an individual literati-official, but also for developing a more comprehensive understanding of literati-official politics from its foundations.