Fiona’s Reviews > Speaking of Chinese: A Cultural History of the Chinese Language > Status Update

"In writing one sees the 'hanging needle', the dropping dew; crashing thunder, falling rock, flying bird, startled beast. Heavy as breaking clouds, light as the cicada's wings, graceful as the new moon, independent as the stars- it equals the exquisiteness of nature and is not to be accomplished by human effort."

-A Tang dynasty calligrapher, on how Chinese calligraphy draws from Nature.