Saturday 27 March 2021

Zhuangzi on Twitter

Starts with CD pen medium, runs out of ink, turns
to fine. Waiting for brush pens

凡事亦然。始乎諒,常卒乎鄙;其作始也簡,其將畢也必巨。夫言者,風波也;行者,實喪也

From Article 3 of "Man in the World, Associated with other men"

Pinyin. In my writing above, top to bottom right to left.

Fánshì yì rán. Shǐ hū liàng, cháng zú hū bǐ; 

qí zuò shǐ yě jiǎn, qí jiāng bì yě bì jù. 

Fū yán zhě, fēngbō yě; 

xíngzhě, shí sàng yě

Legge translation: In all things it is so. People are at first sincere, but always end with becoming rude; at the commencement things are treated as trivial, but as the end draws near, they assume great proportions. Words are (like) the waves acted on by the wind; the real point of the matters (discussed by them) is lost. The wind and waves are easily set in motion; the success of the matter of which the real point is lost is easily put in peril. Hence quarrels are occasioned by nothing so much as by artful words and one-sided speeches. The breath comes angrily, as when a beast, driven to death, wildly bellows forth its rage.

My Twitter-morphic translation: Everything turns to shit. 

Isn't Zhuangzi's observation just like things so often go on Twitter? What starts off as a simple discussion, very quickly devolves into name calling and nastyness. "Quarrels are occasioned".