The Calligrapher — Zhào Mèngfǔ 赵孟頫

Yuan master whose elegant regular and running script revived classical tradition.

Yuan calligrapher (1254–1322), master of regular script/running script/cursive script — Yuan reviver of classical elegance who could write any script beautifully and did. Yuan dynasty

Cultural Story

Yu Garden in Shanghai was built in 1559 by Pan Yunduan for his aged father, a private retreat whose name, yu, promised ease and pleasure. The character yu is that leisure, the yi yu Ouyang Xiu warned could undo a house. From the Ming rockery the same stroke named the yu ju opera of Henan and the yu yu of a mind that hesitates at the fork before it chooses.

Common words & phrases

• 犹豫 hesitate · hesitation
• 豫剧 Henan opera
• 豫园 Yu Garden
• 逸豫 leisure · ease
• 豫备 prepare · get ready

Read the story behind the character

A theater sells a yu ju night, the bright Henan sung drama of the plain, and a visitor queues for Yu Garden's lanes. A driver sits in yu yu at the junction, unsure which exit to take, and a planner yu bei the hall before the crowd. The character yu still means the opera, the garden, and the pause.

Why this character belongs on skin

Elephants move without hurry because nothing hunts them. 豫 carries the elephant under its strokes, and with it the animal's way of being—unrushed, monumental, at ease inside its own weight. The character means contentment, the pleasure of 逸豫, of ease earned and unhurried; it names a whole hexagram in the I Ching, Enthusiasm—thunder rising out of the earth, joy that is not giggled but felt in the marrow. Ancient writers used 豫 for the autumn light on a city wall, for the mood of a sage who has stopped arguing with the seasons. There is warmth in it, and slowness, the sensuality of someone who lets the evening last. Modern life sprints; the elephant declines. To wear 豫 is to keep a private equator under your skin, a climate of calm that deadlines cannot tax. It says: joy at the pace of great animals, delight without apology, ease as a discipline. Small against the wrist, it hums like low sun. You will find yourself walking slower, and better.