The Calligrapher — Chǔ Suíliáng 褚遂良

Tang chancellor and regular-script master of elegant, balanced strokes.

Tang calligrapher (596–658), master of regular script — Tang master of graceful, tensile regular script favored by the imperial court. Tang dynasty

Cultural Story

Almost never seen alone, the character 躅 pairs with its twin as 踯躅, the slow, hesitant pacing of someone who cannot decide to leave or to stay. The foot radical carries the weight of a step taken and taken back. It is the walk of grief and of waiting — forward, then stopped, then forward again, the feet uncertain of where the body ought to go next.

Common words & phrases

• 踯躅 pace up and down · hesitate

Read the story behind the character

A passenger 踯躅 at the platform edge, phone in hand, torn between two trains and two cities. He is not lost so much as unwilling, the feet performing the doubt the mind will not name. The word is old for a feeling that has not changed: the long loiter of someone who has somewhere to be and is not yet ready to arrive there, whoever is waiting on the other end.