Ink Grapes (题墨葡萄) by Xu Wei · Chinese Poem Audio and Explanation

Meaning

Half my life adrift and failing, I have grown old; alone in my study I whistle toward the evening wind. The bright pearls my brush can paint find no one to buy them; idly they are flung aside into the wild tangles of vine.

半生落魄已然老去，独自立在书斋对着晚风长啸。笔底所画的明珠无处售卖，只好闲闲地抛掷在野藤之中。

Appreciation

Xu Wei's little quatrain writes the man through the painting, merging object and self. The first line 'Half my life a failure, I have become an old man' states his fate outright - 'failure' and 'old man' show a life of destitution. The second, 'Alone in my study I whistle at the evening wind', with 'alone' and 'whistle' sketches a lonely, defiant bearing. The last two turn from the man to the painting: 'the bright pearls beneath my brush' double as the grapes he painted and the learning in his breast, 'find no buyer' writes his being unrecognized, and 'idle, I toss them aside among the wild vines' personifies the grapes (in truth himself) cast away - a sharp reversal. Plain in language yet deep in feeling, the brief piece holds a lifetime of frustration.

【白话串讲】 “半生落魄已成翁，独立书斋啸晚风”——徐渭写自己：半生落魄，成了老头。“笔底明珠无处卖，闲抛闲掷野藤中”——他画的葡萄像明珠，却没人赏识，只能抛在野藤里。他写葡萄，写的是自己的才华无人识。【意象与手法】全诗以画写人，物我交融。首句“半生落魄已成翁”直抒身世，“落魄”“翁”见潦倒【情感与主旨】徐渭（1521—1593），字文长，号青藤，山阴人，明代杰出书画家、文学家，“青藤画派”之祖【名句点睛】常考：一、“笔底明珠无处卖”中“明珠”的含意——既指画中葡萄，更喻诗人才华抱负；“无处卖”写怀才不遇

Background

Xu Wei (1521-1593), courtesy Wenzhang, style Qingteng, of Shanyin, was an outstanding Ming painter, calligrapher and man of letters, founder of the 'Green Vine' school of painting. He failed the provincial exam eight times, once served under Hu Zongxian, later went mad, attempted suicide, and was imprisoned seven years; in old age he lived poor, selling his paintings. 'Ink Grapes' is inscribed on a self-painted grape picture in his later years; through the grapes he speaks of himself, voicing the sorrow of unrecognized talent and a pearl cast into darkness - a representative of his painting-inscription verse, and a glimpse of his wild, proud true nature.

《题墨葡萄》为明代徐渭所作，是题画诗。徐渭（1521—1593），字文长，号青藤道士，山阴人，明代文学家、书画家。此诗：半生落魄已成翁，独立书斋啸晚风。笔底明珠无处卖，闲抛闲掷野藤中。全诗写其怀才不遇之慨，是徐渭题画诗的名篇。

Art

The whole poem writes the man through the painting, merging object and self. The first line 'Half my life a failure, I have become an old man' states his fate directly, with 'failure' and 'old man' showing destitution; the second 'Alone in my study I whistle at the evening wind' uses 'alone' and 'whistle' to sketch a lonely, wild, proud posture. The latter two lines move from man to painting: 'the bright pearls beneath my brush' puns the painted grapes and the learning in his breast, 'find no buyer' writes his being unrecognized, and 'idle, I toss them aside among the wild vines' personifies the grapes (really himself) cast away - a strong contrast. Plain words, deep grief; in a tiny form one sees a whole life's blockage.

《题墨葡萄》艺术上以托物言志与自嘲的深沉见长。全诗四句，层层写来：前二句写半生落魄——“半生落魄已成翁，独立书斋啸晚风”写半生落魄、独立书斋；后二句写笔底明珠——“笔底明珠无处卖，闲抛闲掷野藤中”写明珠无处卖、闲掷野藤中。全诗以墨葡萄自况写怀才不遇，正是徐渭题画诗托物言志的笔法。

Allusions

The 'bright pearls' quietly uses the allusion of 'a bright pearl cast into darkness' (from the Records of the Grand Historian, 'a pearl of moonlight, a disk of night-glow, cast in the dark at a man'), figuring the rejected scholar. 'Wild vines' may secretly echo Qu Yuan's 'thorns and weeds fill the chamber', writing a foul surroundings hiding fair worth. 'Whistle' inherits the Wei-Jin learned men's tradition of long whistling, showing his wildness. As a whole it figures the self through the painting; the allusion is natural and traceless - a proper model of literati painting-poems; in twenty-eight characters it holds a lifetime's sorrow, with feeling lodged far off.

《题墨葡萄》用典在“明珠”。“笔底明珠无处卖”以明珠写所画之葡萄，亦自况其才如明珠而无处可售；”野藤中“写野藤之间。全诗以明珠自况写怀才不遇，不用深典而情致深沉，正是徐渭题画诗托物言志的笔法。

Commentary

Yuan Hongdao, in his Biography of Xu Wenchang, sighed that 'in his breast burned an irrepressible, unerodable spirit' - exactly this poem's portrait. A modern critic calls his painting-poems 'every word blood and tears, yet uttered in jest'. Tao Wangling said Xu's poetry 'sings like water in a gorge, like a seed breaking soil, sparse in feeling yet full of figuration'. In short, these twenty-eight characters fuse a lifetime of failure, pride and injustice at the brush-tip; among Ming painting-poems it ranks first-rate, standing alongside Zheng Banqiao's bamboo inscriptions.

《题墨葡萄》是徐渭题画诗的名篇，也是明代题画诗中写怀才不遇的代表作。此诗写其怀才不遇之慨，向为论者称道。论者多赏其托物言志的写法——“笔底明珠无处卖”以明珠写所画之葡萄、亦自况其才，一语双关；“闲抛闲掷野藤中”写明珠掷于野藤，更见其慨。徐渭一生潦倒，其诗书画皆绝，此诗正是其代表——以墨葡萄自况写怀才不遇，正是其题画诗的风格。

Prosody

Form Seven-character quatrain七言绝句

Rhyme Ping-shui rhyme, upper-level one dong group (old man, wind, midst)《题墨葡萄》为七言绝句，四句，押平声韵。此诗用韵：翁、风、中（东部），一韵到底，音节疏朗。

Tone pattern First-line-enters-rhyme, oblique-onset first-line-enters-rhyme form七言绝句以音节疏朗、情致深婉见长。此诗写怀才不遇之慨，音节疏朗而深沉。全诗以七言贯底，声调与托物言志的内容相合，是明代题画诗中深沉的一路。

Reading note A small painting-poem, light words deep feeling, object and self as one.《题墨葡萄》为明代徐渭所作，是题画诗。此诗以“半生落魄已成翁，独立书斋啸晚风”写其落魄独处，以“笔底明珠无处卖，闲抛闲掷野藤中”写其才如明珠、无处可售。以墨葡萄自况写怀才不遇，正是徐渭题画诗的名篇。

Line by line

半生落魄已成翁，独立书斋啸晚风。

Half a life of failure, I am already an old man; alone in my study I chant to the evening wind.

半生落魄，已成了老翁；独立书斋，长啸于晚风之中。

Half a lifetime of disappointments, now an old man; alone in the studio, I chant to the evening wind.

前二句写半生落魄，是全诗怀才不遇之慨的起点。“半生落魄已成翁”写半生落魄——“半生落魄”写半生落魄不得志，“已成翁”写已成了老翁——半生落魄，已成老翁；“独立书斋啸晚风”写独立书斋——“独立书斋”写独自立于书斋之中，“啸晚风”写长啸于晚风——独立书斋，啸晚风。二句写半生落魄：半生落魄已成翁，独立书斋啸晚风。以“半生落魄已成翁”写其一生潦倒、老而无成，以“独立书斋啸晚风”写其独处长啸之态，正是徐渭题画诗写怀才不遇之慨的起点——落魄半生，独啸晚风。

The old man. Half a life of failure, I am already an old man; alone in my study I chant to the evening wind. The half-life of failure and the old man alone chanting are the opening. To have chanted alone in the study would be a chant; the half-a-life-of-failure-I-am-already-an-old-man-alone-in-my-study-I-chant-to-the-evening-wind is the chant.

笔底明珠无处卖，闲抛闲掷野藤中。

The bright pearls beneath my brush have nowhere to be sold; idly, idly cast away into the wild vines.

笔底的明珠，无处可卖；闲抛闲掷，落在野藤之中。

The bright pearls from my brush have nowhere to be sold; they are idly tossed away into the wild vines.

末二句写笔底明珠无处卖，是全诗托物言志的归结。“笔底明珠无处卖”写明珠无处卖——“笔底明珠”写笔底所画之葡萄如明珠（亦自况其才），“无处卖”写无处可卖——笔底明珠，无处可卖；“闲抛闲掷野藤中”写闲掷野藤——“闲抛闲掷”写闲抛闲掷，“野藤中”写野藤之中——闲掷于野藤之中。二句写笔底明珠无处卖：笔底明珠无处卖，闲抛闲掷野藤中。以“笔底明珠无处卖”以明珠写葡萄、亦自况其才如明珠无处可售，以“闲抛闲掷野藤中”写明珠掷于野藤，正是徐渭题画诗托物言志的归结——才如明珠，闲掷野藤，正是怀才不遇之慨。

The pearls. The bright pearls beneath my brush have nowhere to be sold; idly, idly cast away into the wild vines. The pearls (his talent, the grapes) unsold and tossed into the wild vines are the self-portrait. To have tossed the pearls into the vines would be a casting; the bright-pearls-beneath-my-brush-have-nowhere-to-be-sold-idly-idly-cast-away-into-the-wild-vines is the casting.

Study

Word focus

落魄 Destitute and defeated; it sums up Xu Wei's half-life, deeply grieving. “半生落魄已成翁”之“落魄”，写穷困潦倒、不得志，是全诗写其一生之况的关键词。“落魄”写潦倒失意——半生落魄，已成老翁。这一词写其一生：不是得意之人，而落魄；不是可振之困，而半生落魄。以“半生落魄已成翁”写其潦倒一生，正是徐渭题画诗写怀才不遇之慨的起点——落魄半生，老而潦倒。

啸晚风 A key expression in the poem. Read it as an image, mood, or grammar point in context. “独立书斋啸晚风”之“啸晚风”，写长啸于晚风，是全诗写其孤愤之态的关键词。“啸”写长啸，“晚风”写傍晚之风——独立书斋，长啸于晚风。这一词写其独处之态：不是吟咏之声，而啸；不是晏然之态，而于晚风中长啸。以“独立书斋啸晚风”写其孤愤，正是徐渭题画诗写其不得志而长啸的笔法。

笔底明珠 A key expression in the poem. Read it as an image, mood, or grammar point in context. “笔底明珠无处卖”之“笔底明珠”，写笔底所画如明珠，是全诗托物言志的关键词。“笔底”写笔下，“明珠”写明珠——笔底所画的葡萄如明珠。这一词以“明珠”写葡萄、亦自况其才：不是寻常之果，而明珠；不是徒画之技，而明珠之才。以“笔底明珠无处卖”写其才如明珠无处可售，正是徐渭题画诗一语双关、托物言志的笔法。

闲抛闲掷 Repeated verbs writing the lightness of being cast away, counterpointing the heaviness in his heart. “闲抛闲掷野藤中”之“闲抛闲掷”，写闲抛闲掷、无人赏用，是全诗写明珠之遇的归结词。“闲抛”写闲散地抛掷，“闲掷”写闲掷——闲抛闲掷，落在野藤之中。这一词写明珠之遇：不是珍藏之宝，而闲抛闲掷；不是赏用之才，而弃置野藤。以“闲抛闲掷野藤中”写明珠（亦其才）之弃置，正是徐渭题画诗写怀才不遇之慨的归结——明珠闲掷，才无所用。

题墨葡萄