A delicately-built woman with chiseled cheekbones clad in the simplest of clothes (a straw hat, a polo shirt and a pair of capri pants) perched next to a lake - it must have been at least 15 years since I first came across this photo. It immediately became my favourite. Over the years, as I… Continue reading “Either you have it or you don’t”
言慧珠是梅蘭芳最得意的弟子。有次她請一位德高望重的前輩給她的表演打分。老前輩說：「扮相、身段都好，就是沒有梅先生的那股仙氣兒。」 言慧珠就問：「何謂仙氣兒？它又是怎麽來的呢？」
Curiously enough, among the people who have managed to make the art of writing less mysterious to me is Pietro Yantorny, an illiterate shoemaker who took pride in crafting custom-made shoes in Paris for high society at the turn of the last century. Dismissing factory-made footwear as “little boxes for feet that one calls shoes,”… Continue reading No License to be imprecise
I know we have long given up on expecting members of our puppet government to walk their talk, but they aren’t exactly of zero value either, because when they face an international audience and can’t talk their talk in English properly, they can at least provide practical demonstrations of how not to use the language. Take for… Continue reading Matthew Cheung is also an incompetent in another area: English writing
This video on Douyin gave me a much-needed laugh as I waited with trepidation for the human cost of the Wuhan virus to come to light: a stern voice on a loudspeaker warns the inhabitants of a village against engaging in extramarital sex while the country is in the grip of the epidemic -“別個傳染給你，晚上你傳染給你婆娘，你婆娘傳染給隔壁老王，老王傳染給老王婆娘，那全村不都遭洗白了啊!” https://videopress.com/v/hOxFRSPU?controls=false&preloadContent=metadata The bluntness… Continue reading Some Like it Hot
Among the notes of condolence British author Claire Tomalin received when her 22 year-old daughter Susanna killed herself, the one written by New Statesman editor Anthony Howard struck me in particular. It was formal in tone, yet so intimate in substance: “I shall always remember Susanna as the marvellous, cheerful, sparkling girl who came to… Continue reading Take a cup of kindness yet
“The jerks, the breaks, and the harshness of prose” To help the audience picture the difficulty of playing the title role in the Peking opera “The Inebriated Consort” (貴妃醉酒), the producers invited an opera apprentice and a little girl to learn the part from Zhang Jing, a venerated artist who could trace her lineage back… Continue reading “The jerks, the breaks, and the harshness of prose”
民國美學大師宗白華（1897-1986）的傳記作者鄒士方，80年代初撰寫宗白華的傳記期間，曾到北京圖書館報庫讀宗抗戰時期的舊作。鄒這樣形容當時看書情景：「時值酷暑，汗流浹背，但我抄錄著宗先生在《星期學燈》上的詩意怏然的『編輯後語』，只感到渾身爽快，如置身於清涼世界，我再一次被宗老那深邃的思想和優美的語言所折服。」
Come Write Like Michelle 