Paper is, it must be remembered, expensive so even if you have made a mistake do not throw the paper away too hastily. You can still write over the same letters many times until you have them down pat. This is beneficial also because you can then concentrate on a single character or even a single stroke of a character in these moments without having to think of the entire composition. Do not expect to be able to write a good copy the first time. Only a master calligrapher can do that. Write the same example fifty or more times. Then you will understand its every twist and turn by heart and will be able to write it without even referring to the model tehon. The calligrapher Chao Meng Fu of the Yuan Dynasty was said to have worn out the sleeves of all his garments because he was so diligent in his practice of the fundamentals.
The Chinese copy their teacher’s example by several different methods. Most popular among these is to place their paper atop their teacher’s example. This is not a good idea because in time the model will become illegible and one will then end up practising one’s own mistakes. The aspiring student too, may be likened to a little fledgling learning to fly; he gains no confidence by copying directly. It is almost as if he does not jump sooner or later, he will never learn to fly. If it puts off leaving the nest forever, the initial jump only becomes all the more difficult. A youngster may distract his watchers with a lot of fluttering and unintentional aerobatics, but that is the fastest route to learning. In Japan copying the model directly is regarded as cheating and most teachers will be able to tell the difference.
In the gyōsho the characters seem to have been dashed off quickly, but that is not the case. What gives this impression is the undulation of the stroke. It is thick and thin and in places the amount of ink on the brush the ink seems to have run out kasure. The fact is, it was written that way intentionally. Writing in this style is rather like driving, go fast on the straights, but slow down on the corners! Even in the other styles of writing the speed is not the important thing; keep a constant speed, not too fast else one has no control and not too slow as either the ink floods out and drenches the paper nijimi or the shaking of your hand will be evident to the viewer.
Teachers use an orange-red ink shuboku to correct copies of their students’ work. Corrections lead the student to realize that a copy need not be exactly the same as the model so long as the rules of writing have been respected. Here is where personal interpretation comes into play. Sometimes a character written exactly the same as the model will be corrected where it appears to con form to the model and reasons for this correction are various and intuitive. They are learned only after long experience. The most common fault is in characters that may be viewed as a pair. Individually they are good, but as a pair they are lacking in some way. When studying by oneself there is of course no teacher close at hand so it is only by writing copies many, many times and comparing them to good models that one can begin to perceive one’s weaknesses. Another good method is to turn the paper around and look at it from the back. The bad areas seem to stand out then. When you have managed to write a good copy, place it aside for a couple of days and then come back to it once more. It is certain that by looking at it afresh your sense of appreciation will have changed.
A brush usually has a life of about three years if well treated. This means washing it thoroughly after writing and taking care not to wash out all the starch. After wiping, the brush should be hung up to dry. Wash your suzuri ink slab too as the ink will dry into a solid cake if you do not.
Left handed people have to learn to write with their right hands because holding the brush in the left hand leaves the hairs pointed the wrong way and the correct pressure cannot be applied to the strokes. The same skill may be achieved, simply spend more time on the elementary steps.
Actually starting
Place your paperweight at the top of a sheet of paper and lightly place the fingers of your left hand near the bottom left of the sheet to hold the paper taut. Grasp the brush as shown.
It should not feel awkward, but in time become a living extension of your arm. Allow the power to flow down your arm on to the paper by using the brush as your conductor. The thumb locks the brush by pressure against the upper joint of the forefinger. Forefinger and middle finger exert pressure inwards and the slightly crooked ring and little fingers exert pressure to the outside. The brush should be held between a third and halfway up for most styles of calligraphy and as much as two thirds of the way up the shaft for writing semi-cursive gyōsho because the brush will require more latitude of movement. Observe the following points and you should find the brush doing just as you want.
1) Keep the palm open
2) Always keep the shaft of the brush upright
3) Keep the wrist and elbow off the surface of the table
4) Hold the brush firmly without being tense
The well known calligrapher Ogishi once crept up behind his son Okenshi to try to snatch the brush from his hand, but without success. This prompted him to remark that his son had the makings of a great calligrapher, which indeed the son did become.
Use only a third of the length of the hairs for writing. That way ink is absorbed and the springiness of the tip retained. Imagine it like a three part spring, soft at the tip, mildly stiff for the remaining length of the hairs and hard at the shaft. This is the ideal combination. If only two degrees of torque exist, the spring is lost. This “backbone” is useful at first in writing. Only at a more advanced level does the need for an “unstarched” brush arise.
When practising, place your wet copies between the pages of an old newspaper to dry or soon all your floor-space will have been used up. Reorder the point of your brush now and then on the flat of your inkstone so all the hairs of the brush come to a sharp point even when you are in the middle of writing a character. If wet circles appear around the boundaries of the characters then there is too much water for the amount of ink in the mixture. This may be true even if your ink is pitch black. Keep in mind that calligraphy is composed of two components：
Discipline- evidencing good construction in the writing of your characters, giving the lines a definite quality, training one’s eye to be able to look deeply into the models to evaluate them and developing the will to persevere in your work.
Cultivation of the art-choosing suitable styles forms, themes and medium, being aware of historical precedents and finding the necessary inspiration.
What goes into a completed work Sakuhin
The elements of a work include:
Theme shudai. The copying of a famous work rinsho of another painter will very rarely be the theme of one’s work.
Inspiration reikan is the most important thing in a piece. If inspiration is lacking even something so obvious as the character for “hot” can appear quite cold.
The structure of the character kekkōhō refers to the direction of the stroke, the lengths or lines and dots and how corners are negotiated, (see appendix).
Kūkan refers to the white space between characters and the characters in relation to the paper, and kanga the integral spacing of the lines and dots in the character.
The quality of the line sen.
The colour of the ink bokushoku.
The title dal though this may often be predetermined