Stories about Calligraphy

One, the occasional creation of Flying White

Cai Yong of the Han Dynasty was not only a literary scholar, but also a famous calligrapher. The "flying white book" is his original creation. What is called "flying white book"? You will know after listening to this story.

Cai Yong is not a closed door reading, writing, he often traveled, in order to capture the inspiration, rich experience. On this day, he sent the articles he had written to the Hongdu Gate, where the royal collection of books was kept. The people there are quite big, who came to have to wait outside the door for a while. While Cai Yong was waiting to be received, a few craftsmen were painting the wall with brooms dipped in lime water. He then stood to the side and watched.

At first, he was just killing time. But as he watched, he saw something. He saw the craftsman's broom, and a white mark appeared on the wall. Because the broom seedling is relatively thin, can not dip much lime water, the wall is not too smooth, so a broom down, the white road is still some places exposed to the wall skin.

Cai Yong took a look, the eyes can not help but a light. He thought, in the past, writing with a pen dipped in ink, a down, the pen road is all black. If like a craftsman brushing the wall, so that the black pen road to reveal some silk or paper, that is not more vivid and natural? Thinking of this, he came down in the mood. He handed in his article and immediately ran home.

Cai Yong returned home, can not take a break, ready pen, ink, paper and inkstone. Thinking about the scene when the artisans brush the wall, put pen to paper. Who knows that it is easy to think, do it is difficult. At first, either the paper is not exposed, or the exposed part is too raw.

He was not discouraged at all and tried again and again. He finally mastered how much ink he dipped into the ink, the size of his force and the speed of his strokes, and wrote a white stroke that was hidden in the black, which made the characters float and move with a distinctive flavor.

Cai Yong's original method of writing, soon popularized, and became the "flying white book". Until today, it is still used by calligraphers.

Two, Xizhi for the goose?

Wang Xizhi loved to write from childhood. It is said that he usually walk, but also at any time with the finger gestures to practice the word, day after day, even the clothes are scratched. After learning and practicing hard, Wang Xizhi's calligraphy reached a very high level. Because he came from a scholarly family, and because of his outstanding talent, all the ministers in the court recommended him to become an official.

He worked as an assassin and a right army general (people also called him Wang Right Army). Later he became an official in Huiji County. He did not like to live in the prosperous capital city, and when he saw the beautiful scenery of Huiji, he loved it so much that whenever he had time, he would visit the landscape with his friends. Once, Wang Xizhi and his friends held a banquet at the Lan Pavilion in Shanyin, Huiji County. They drank wine and wrote poems.

At the end, Wang Xizhi wrote a piece of writing on the spot to commemorate the banquet, which is the famous "Preface to the Lanting Collection". That Lanting Preface, written by Wang Xizhi's own handwriting, has always been regarded as a treasure of China's calligraphy art, but it is a pity that its real handwriting has been lost.

Wang Xizhi's calligraphy became more and more famous. People at that time treated the characters he wrote as treasures. It is said that once he went to the house of his disciple, who received him warmly. When he sat down at a new table, he saw that the surface of the table was smooth and clean, which aroused his interest in writing, and asked his disciple to bring him a brush and ink.

The student was overjoyed, and immediately brought the brush and ink to Wang Xizhi. Wang Xizhi wrote a few lines on a few cases, kept it as a souvenir, and went back.

A few days later, the disciple had something to do and went out. His father went into the study to clean up, and when he saw that the new cases were dirty with ink, he used a knife to scrape off the characters. When the student came back, the handwriting on the cases had disappeared. The student was upset about this for several days.

On another occasion, Wang Xizhi went to a village. There was an old woman carrying a basket of hexagonal bamboo fans to sell at the market. The bamboo fan was very simple, without any decoration, could not attract the interest of the passers-by, and looked like it could not be sold, the old woman was very anxious.

Wang Xizhi saw this situation, very sympathetic to the old woman, went up to her and said: "You have no paintings and no words on this bamboo fan, of course, can not be sold. I will give you the inscription, how?" The old woman did not recognize Wang Xizhi. The old woman did not know Wang Xizhi, see him so enthusiastic, also gave him the bamboo fan to write.

Wang Xizhi lifted his pen and wrote five characters on each fan, then returned them to the old woman. The old woman, who could not read, found his writing scrawling and was very upset. Wang Xizhi comforted her by saying, "Don't be anxious. You only tell the person who bought the fan that the words on it were written by Wang Youjun." As soon as Wang Xizhi left, the old woman did as he said.

The people at the fair saw that it was really Wang Youjun's calligraphy, and they all rushed to buy it. A bucket of bamboo fans was sold out immediately.

Many artists have their own hobbies, some love to plant flowers, some love to raise birds. But Wang Xizhi had his own special hobby. Wherever there was a good goose, he was interested in seeing it or buying it back to enjoy. There was a Taoist priest in the place of Shanyin who wanted Wang Xizhi to write him a volume of Tao Te Ching.

But he knew that Wang Xizhi refused to copy the scriptures for others easily. Later, he inquired about Wang Xizhi's fondness for white geese, so he specially raised a batch of geese of good breeds. When Wang Xizhi heard that the Taoist priest's house had good geese, he really ran to see them. When he approached the Taoist priest's house, he was seeing a flock of geese floating leisurely on the water surface in the river, with all the snow-white feathers, reflecting the high red roof, which was really amusing.

Wang Xizhi looked at the river, simply could not leave, so he sent to find the Taoist priest, asked to sell the group of geese to him. The Taoist priest smiled and said: "Since Wang Gong is such a favorite, there is no need to break the bank, I will give you all the geese.

But I have one request, which is to ask you to write a scroll of sutra for me." Without hesitation, Wang Xizhi copied a scroll of sutra for the Taoist priest, and the flock of geese was taken back by Wang Xizhi.

Third, Liu Gongquan was motivated to practice writing?

One day, Liu Gongquan and his friends held a "book party". At that time, an old man selling bean curd saw him write a few words "can write the flying phoenix family, dare to boast in front of the people", think the boy is too proud, then frowned, said: "This word is not well written, like my bean curd, soft, no tendons, no bones, still worth boasting in front of the people? "

On hearing this, the young Gongquan said unhappily, "If you are capable, write a few words for me to see."

The old man laughed brightly and said, "I don't dare, I don't dare, I am a rough man, I can't write well. However, people have people who can write much better than you with their feet! If you don't believe me, go to Huajing City and take a look."

The next day, Xiao Gongquan got up at five o'clock and went to Huajing City alone. As soon as he entered Huajing City, he saw many people gathered under a big acacia tree. He squeezed into the crowd, only to see a black and thin old man without arms bare feet, sitting on the ground, left foot pressure paper, right foot clip pen, is freely writing couplets, the handwriting like a herd of horses galloped, dragons and phoenixes, won the onlookers a burst of applause.

Small Gongquan "flop" kneeling in front of the old man, said: "I would like to worship you as a teacher, please tell me the secret of writing ......" The old man panicked with his feet to pull up the small Gongquan Said: "I am a lonely man, born without hands, only to rely on foot dexterity mix life, how can I be a teacher?"

Small Gongquan begged so hard that the old man spread a piece of paper on the ground and wrote a few words with his right foot: "Write all the eight tanks of water, the inkstone is stained with the black of the flooded pool; take a hundred parents, and only then will the dragon and the phoenix fly."

Liu Gongquan took the old man's words to heart, and from then on, he practiced calligraphy. The hands rubbed a thick callus, the elbow of the coat mended layer after layer. After practicing hard, Liu Gongquan finally became a famous calligrapher in China.

Four, character and book character

Song Dynasty, there are four major calligraphers are the most famous, namely, Su, Huang, Mi, Cai four. Su is Su Shi, Su Dongpo; yellow is Huang Tingjian; rice is Mi Fu; this is indisputable. But "Cai"? Some people say is Cai Jing, some people say is Cai Xiang, in the end who is it? The said different.

The most common saying is that originally this Cai is Cai Jing, people recognize his calligraphy attainments, but especially hate his character, so people are reluctant to recognize his status as a calligrapher. In the Song Zhezong Yuanyou years, in order to exclude dissenters, he called Sima Guang and others "treacherous party", and personally write a monument, write their "crimes", carved into a monument erected in the country.

There were many stonemasons who refused to carve this monument, and they were all killed by Kantou. When Cai Jing died, people immediately put the "Yuan You party monument" smashed to pieces. People also called him and Gaozius, Tong Guan and Yang Jian, who were in control of the government at that time, the "Four Great Traitors".

Cai Jing's character is very bad, how can people tolerate him in the ranks of the "four great calligraphers"? So he was dismissed. But "Su Huangmi Cai" and said smooth, let Cai Xiang instead.

Cai Xiang was good at learning from the essence of his ancestors, and he was especially hardworking, and his calligraphy was very distinctive. Therefore, people think he should be ranked at the top of the "Four Families", and should not be dragged down by Cai Jing to be ranked at the end of the list.

Cai Xiang was not only highly accomplished in calligraphy, but also had a very good character. When he was an official, he was so outspoken that even some powerful officials were afraid of him. When he was an official in Quanzhou, Fujian Province, he built the later very famous Luoyang Bridge and a seven-mile boulevard, which was popular with the local people.

Seeing from this, character is more important than book character, if a person can only write good words and can't do good deeds, the people must spit on him, and even in the world of calligraphy, it won't leave him a small position.

Fifth, Banqiao learning books

Ching dynasty Yangzhou "eight monsters" one of Zheng Banqiao since childhood love of calligraphy, famous ancient calligraphers of all kinds of calligraphy, he copied, after some hard work, finally and the former wrote almost exactly the same, can be messed up. But people did not appreciate his words, he himself was very anxious, more diligent than before, practicing more hard.

One summer evening, he and his wife were sitting outside in the cool, and he wrote on his thigh with his finger.

His wife angrily smacked his hand and said, "You have your body (身体), and I have mine, so why don't you write about your own body and write about someone else's?"

When he went to bed at night, Zheng Banqiao thought, everyone has his own body, writing also has its own font, it is not the same! Why do I always learn from others' fonts, but not go my own way and write my own body? Even if you learn the same as others, it's still just someone else's font, no innovation, no own style, and what's the point?

From then on, he took the strengths of each family, integration, with the official script and seal script, cursive, running, regular mixed, as the method of painting writing, and finally formed the elegant and popular **** appreciation, favorite "six and a half book", which is often referred to as the "stone paving the street body! "and became a famous painter and calligrapher in the Qing Dynasty.