The Calligrapher — Ní Zàn 倪瓒

Yuan literati master of spare, noble regular script.

Yuan calligrapher (), master of regular script/running script — Yuan recluse painter-calligrapher of spare, dry, unworldly elegance. Yuan dynasty

Cultural Story

礴 exists almost only inside 磅礴, the word Zhuangzi used for a power that pervades the ten thousand things as one. Later critics applied it to landscape painting — mountains whose mass seems to press the whole scroll outward with breath and force.

Common words & phrases

• 磅礴 vast · grand · boundless
• 大气磅礴 grand and imposing

Read the story behind the character

The word still carries grandeur: travel hosts describe 大气磅礴, magnificently sweeping, gorges; reviewers praise a film’s 磅礴 score. One rarely writes 礴 alone — it is a character that only appears on stage, so to speak, in the company of 磅.