1. Composition
When Wang Xizhi wrote Preface to Lanting, he just typed a draft for the preface to a collection of poems of Lanting, and he didn't want to create a calligraphy work that will be handed down to future generations. Therefore, the size of words and the spacing between lines are all unintentional. The word "Zhi" varies in size and form, which depends entirely on the position of the word and the relationship between the upper and lower words. Therefore, this state of "being good without Yoga Yu" is the result of the author's own skill, cultivation and the psychological conditions at that time. (refer to Sun Guoting's viewpoint of "Five Combinations and Achieving Success" in Shu Pu)
Second, the spirit of running script
The spirit of running script pays attention to the coherence between strokes, characters and lines. The last stroke of the last word and the first stroke of the next word determine the position and writing method of the first and last strokes of the word "Zhi", thus determining the structure and brushwork of the whole word.
Third, there are many accidental factors in the process of writing. For example, the timing of dipping ink determines the intensity and dryness of words, and the state of literary thinking determines the fluency and stagnation of pen use.
to sum up, not only the word "zhi", but also every word in the Preface to Lanting has its corresponding position and situation. Not only the Preface to Lanting, but any classic calligraphy art work is itself a vital organism, and it is the same crystallization of man-made and nature. At present, there is a kind of copybook that combines words into poems or couplets, which itself separates the beauty of the whole article. Real creation should not use that kind of copybook as "reference material".
The Preface to the Holy Teaching, written by Huai Ren, is the originator of this kind of copybook.