Wang Xizhi

Chinese calligrapher

• Born: c. 307
• Birthplace: Linxi, Shandong Province, China
• Died: c. 379
• Place of death: Near Shanyin, Zhejiang Province, China

By refining the styles of earlier calligraphers and developing new ones, Wang Xizhi, through his innovative brushwork, set the aesthetic standards for all subsequent calligraphers in China, Korea, and Japan.

Early Life

In 317 c.e., because of military onslaughts by non-Chinese “barbarians,” the Western Jin Dynasty (Chin; 265-316 c.e.) was forced to evacuate southward, reestablishing itself in refuge as the Eastern Jin (Chin; 317-420 c.e.). Wang Xizhi (wahng shur-dzur) was born some years before this move in what is today the province of Shandong, where the Wangs enjoyed the status of a leading aristocratic family. His father, Wang Kuang (Wang K’uang), was the cousin of Wang Dao (Wang Tao), a prominent minister of the Western Jin, who advocated moving to the south. Both Wang Kuang and Wang Dao were praised for helping save the Jin through this fortuitous move.

Many of Wang Xizhi’s relatives, besides being active in politics, were literati well versed in philosophy, literature, and the arts, especially calligraphy, the technique of writing characters with brush and ink. Chinese characters, the oldest continuous form of writing in the world, evolved from primitive markings on Neolithic pottery, to first millennium b.c.e. graphs carved on tortoise shells and scapulae used in divination, and later to a complex script preserved on cast bronze ritual vessels and stone tablets. By the second century b.c.e., characters were being written on silk and bamboo slips using bamboo brushes with animal hair tips dipped in ink made from molded lampblack hardened with glue and dissolved in water on an ink slab.

As writing changed from carving, casting, and etching to a means of expressing, through a flexible brush, nuances of aesthetic feeling on a receptive surface such as silk or paper, the art of beautiful writing emerged. Writing had become not only a means of communication but indeed an expression of sentiment made manifest in ink. The ability to use the brush as both an artist’s and a calligrapher’s tool was a hallmark of the cultured gentleman. “A person’s true character is revealed in one’s calligraphy” according to a Chinese maxim; the facility to write Chinese characters in an elegant hand was judged to be a sign of talent and breeding.

Calligraphy is a discipline learned through practice and imitation. Wang was introduced to the “four treasures of the scholar’s studio”—the brush, the ink stick, the ink stone, and paper or silk—in his youth by his father, who was adept in the li (“clerical”) style of writing, and an uncle, Wang Yi, a master of the xing (“running”) style. These styles of writing had evolved from earlier calligraphers’ experiments with character forms and the movement of writing implements over the ages. Beginning with the Shang-period jiaguwen (“oracle bone”) script, calligraphic styles progressed through the inscribed guwen (“ancient”) script on bronze implements, the dazhuan (“large seal”) script on Warring States-era ritual vessels, and the clerical style on Han Dynasty bamboo slips, to the kaishu (“block”) script of the first century or so. By Wang’s time, the running style, aptly named since the strokes run together, along with zhangcao (“official grass”), were new styles emerging out of these historical predecessors.

As a teenager, Wang became a disciple of the noted calligrapher Lady Wei. She was impressed with his talent, reportedly saying, “This child is destined to surpass my fame as a calligrapher.” Later, to broaden his knowledge of past masters’ brushwork, Wang traveled the land examining inscriptions preserved on stone stelae. In the south, he encountered specimens of Li Si (Li Ssu; 280?-208 b.c.e.), the Legalist prime minister of the Qin Dynasty (221-206 b.c.e.), whose decrees unified the scripts of the rival feudal states into a single one based on Qin models. He was also impressed by the zhenshu (“regular”) script works of Zhong Yao (Chung Yao), a Wei premier, and Liang Hu, noted for his large characters. The masterpieces of Cao Xi (Ts’ao Hsi), Cao Yong (Ts’ai Yung), and Zhang Chang (Chang Ch’ang) also had an effect on him. From their examples he learned the theoretical and technical essences of calligraphy to enable him to go beyond imitation to creativity.

Awakened to new inspirations, he reportedly lamented that he had wasted years in studying under Lady Wei. “I [then] changed my master,” he wrote, “and have been taking lessons from the monuments.” He absorbed all the styles that he encountered, adapting them to create new versions. Besides the running style, he was especially proficient in the cao (“grass”) style, an abstract, cursive form of writing whereby individual strokes of a character are effortlessly blended together while the brush rapidly moves across the writing surface, producing characters as flowing as “grass undulating in the breeze.”

Life’s Work

Wang Xizhi held several government positions, including Censor of Kuaiji (K’uai-chi) and General of the Right Army (Yujun), a title frequently affixed to his surname. He held posts in the provinces of Hubei and Zhejiang, but he was far better known as a calligrapher than as a government official.

Many anecdotes, perhaps apocryphal, but repeated nevertheless in most Chinese biographies of Wang, attest his brilliance and dedication to his art. One such legend relates that he would practice writing from morning until dusk beside a pond at the Jiezhu (Chieh-chu) Temple in Shaoxing. Forgetting even to eat, he would copy characters repeatedly until he was satisfied. He washed out his brush and rinsed off the ink slab so frequently in the pond that its waters eventually turned black, and it became known as “Ink Pond.”

Wang would practice even when he did not have paper, using his sleeve as a substitute. His writing was extremely forceful. Once, at Fenyang, he asked a craftsman to carve out the characters he had written on a board; the worker reported that the power of his brush strokes had been impressed through three-quarters of the wood, giving rise to the phrase “penetrating three-fourths of the wood” as a metaphor for profundity and keenness. His wife, a noted calligrapher in her own right, often could not get him to stop writing even to eat; once she found him absorbed in his work, munching on sticks of ink that he absentmindedly had mistaken for food.

On another occasion, a Daoist monk, taking advantage of Wang’s love of geese, connived to induce him to write out a Daoist text for him by arranging for a particularly fine gaggle to swim near the artist’s boat. Instead of selling the geese to Wang, who wanted them badly and was willing to pay a high price, the monk asked him to write out the Huangting jing (fourth century c.e.; The Primordial Breath, 1992) in exchange for the fowl. Wang promptly obliged and sailed off with his beloved geese in tow, leaving the clever monk with an invaluable treasure. Wang’s fascination with geese was rooted in his admiration of their gliding movement in the water and their bearing, traits he studied to improve his use of the brush.

On another occasion, Wang supposedly encountered an old woman selling fans beside a bridge in Shaoxing. When she asked him to purchase one, he inquired as to how many she was able to sell each day. Admitting that her fans were out of fashion, the woman grumbled that she could barely make ends meet. Taking pity on her, Wang offered to write some poems on the fans and urged her to sell them at a high price. Though skeptical and thinking that her fans were spoiled by his writing, she followed his advice, and within a short period of time all the fans were sold. Now realizing the value of his calligraphy on her wares, she hounded Wang to decorate more, even pursuing him to his home. In desperation, he hid behind a stone grotto in the garden; later generations referred to this site as the “Old Woman Evading Stone.” The bridge where the fans were reportedly inscribed is still popularly called the “Fan Writing Bridge.”

The best-known event in Wang’s life happened in 353 c.e. On the third day of the third lunar month, he joined a group of some forty men of letters, including Sun Tong (Sun T’ung) and Xie An (Hsieh An), to celebrate the spring festival at a scenic spot near Shaoxing, famous for the rare orchids supposedly planted there by a king of the fifth century b.c.e. There, at the Orchid Pavilion, they drank, challenged one another with word games, played chess, and composed poems. To commemorate the occasion, Wang wrote a preface to a collection of poetry created there by himself and his friends. This 324-character, twenty-eight-line masterpiece, the Lanting xu (after 353 c.e.; “preface to poems made at the Orchard Pavilion”), became treasured as one of Wang’s greatest accomplishments.

This scroll’s brushwork and composition were likened to “fairies flying among the clouds and dancing on the waves.” Each character displayed his genius, and even where several characters, such as zhi (repeated twenty times) and bu (used in seven places), were duplicated in the composition, calligraphic variations were employed to prevent any single character from being exactly like another. Wang later tried to duplicate this success by making copies, but he was forced to admit that even he could not surpass his original in beauty.

Eventually, he became dissatisfied with court intrigue and corruption, preferring to retire to a reclusive life in order to devote himself exclusively to study and calligraphy. His last days were spent secluded in the picturesque hills of Zhejiang Province at the Jade Curtain Spring near Shanyin, where he died, probably around 379 (some sources say 361).

Significance

Wang Xizhi is celebrated by connoisseurs of Chinese writing as the “Sage Calligrapher.” His writing style was immortalized by the phrase “dragons leaping at the gate of heaven and tigers crouching before the phoenix hall,” the words used by the sixth century Emperor Wu of the Liang Dynasty (502-557 c.e.) on being shown Wang’s works. Several of his seven sons, particularly Wang Xianzhi (Wang Hsien-chih; nicknamed the “Little Sage”) carried on their father’s legacy, becoming important calligraphers in their own right and producing equally talented progeny.

Wang Xizhi’s holographs were greatly coveted. The Lanting xu, for example, was passed on as a Wang family heirloom for seven generations, ending up in the possession of Zhi Yong (Chih Yung), a monk who was also well-known as a calligrapher. When Zhi Yong died, the scroll was entrusted to his disciple, Bien Cai (Pien Ts’ai). Emperor Tang Taizong (T’ang T’ai-tsung; r. 626-649) wanted this scroll in order to complete his collection of Wang originals. Thrice the monk refused to give it up. Wei Zheng (Wei Cheng), the prime minister, then devised a scheme whereby a confidant named Xiao Yi (Hsiao Yi), pretending to be a kind host, disarmed the monk’s suspicion by plying him with wine; taking advantage of his drunken stupor, Xiao Yi was able to steal away the scroll, which had been hidden in a wooden temple beam. The emperor was overjoyed and ordered Zhao Mu (Chao Mu) and Feng Chengsu (Feng Ch’eng-su) to make copies for distribution to his ministers for their enjoyment and study.

On his death, Taizong ordered this scroll and all other original writings by Wang entombed with him so that he could enjoy them in the afterworld. The consensus of most experts is that none of Wang’s originals exists today. Fortunately, many of his writings were carved in stone so that rubbings could be made for study, and other artists traced his originals to learn and to imitate his stroke style, thus preserving samples of Wang’s genius for posterity.

Bibliography

Froncek, Thomas, ed. The Horizon Book of the Arts of China. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1969. A concise biography of Wang is included under the heading “Wine, Weather, and Wang.” Preceding page has a picture of Wang entitled “Wang Hsi-chi Writing on a Fan,” painted by Liang Kai (Liang K’ai; c. 1140-c. 1210).

Long, Jean. The Art of Chinese Calligraphy. 1987. Reprint. New York: Dover, 2001. A general introduction, including chapters on history and the relationship of the characters to Chinese thought.

Moore, Oliver. Reading the Past: Chinese. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001. This introduction to the Chinese writing system includes illustrations of many calligraphic styles and scripts. Wang Xizhi is covered in chapter 5.

Nakata, Yujiro. Chinese Calligraphy. Tokyo: Weather Hill/Tankosha, 1983. Historical overview of Chinese calligraphy originally published in Japanese. Chapter 6, “The Masterpieces of Wang Xizhi and Wang Xianzhi,” gives a short biographical account. Numerous examples of Wang’s work are illustrated and analyzed. Appendix contains a chronology of calligraphers and their works.

Willetts, William. Chinese Calligraphy: Its History and Aesthetic Motivation. New York: Oxford University Press, 1985. Contains a short account of the writing of the Lanting xu and reproduces a section of the scroll taken from a stone rubbing. Good bibliography on Chinese calligraphy in general.

Yee, Chiang. Chinese Calligraphy: An Introduction to Its Aesthetic and Technique. 3d ed. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1973. Explains the history, philosophy, and aesthetics of Chinese calligraphy and its relationship to other genres of Chinese art.