"A History of Chinese Calligraphy for Everyone" Author: Ishikawa Jiuyang Publisher: Hunan Fine Arts Publishing House

"A History of Chinese Calligraphy for Everyone" is a brief history of Chinese calligraphy written by Ishikawa Kyuyo, a famous Japanese calligrapher and calligraphy historian, for ordinary people to read. The writing is concise yet interesting. More than 200 calligraphy works run through 3,500 years of Chinese calligraphy history, taking us into the aesthetic hall of calligraphy art, appreciating the beauty of Chinese character culture, and reliving the memory of writing.

The book is arranged in chronological order, carefully sorting out the background and development process of various types of calligraphy from oracle bone inscriptions, bronze inscriptions to seal script, official script, regular script, and cursive script. It clearly interprets the styles of works of major calligraphy masters from Wang Xizhi to Sun Guoting, from the three masters of the early Tang Dynasty to Yan Zhenqing, from the three masters of the Northern Song Dynasty to the various masters of the Ming Dynasty, from the Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou in the Qing Dynasty to Qi Baishi in modern times.

Using brush strokes as threads, the book cites representative calligraphy works from each historical period, such as "Cao Quan Stele", "Lanting Preface", "Yanta Shengjiao Preface", "Sacrificial Essay for My Nephew", "Huangzhou Cold Food Poetry Scroll", etc. It analyzes the subtle changes in the speed, depth and angle of brush strokes in character shapes of different periods, explains the causes and impacts of the changes, and intuitively feels the changes in Chinese culture and aesthetics in the development process of calligraphy evolution.

Ishikawa Kyuyo

Born in Fukui Prefecture in 1945. Graduated from the Faculty of Law of Kyoto University. A famous Japanese calligrapher and calligraphy historian. Professor of Kyoto Seika University. Author of "History of Chinese Calligraphy for Everyone", "The End of Calligraphy" (won the Suntory Literature Award in 1990), "History of Japanese Calligraphy" (won the Mainichi Publishing Culture Award in 2002), "History of Modern Calligraphy" (won the Jiro Obutsu Award in 2009), etc.