Thank you for your question and for the invitation. "Can you learn calligraphy well without learning calligraphy?" It is estimated that this question is based on the proposition that calligraphy is the foundation of calligraphy.
Maxima has said many times about the proposition that "calligraphy is the foundation of calligraphy", and it has two sides. On the one hand, as the basis of calligraphy, it is mainly based on the calligraphy system after the Tang Dynasty as an important reference.
Because, before and after the Tang Dynasty, the Chinese calligraphy system had major developments and changes.
That is, after the Tang Dynasty, Chinese calligraphy has fully entered the era of calligraphy with "calligraphy, calligraphy, and cursive writing" as the mainstay.
After the Tang Dynasty, China has a very important system in the future, that is, the imperial examination, which is the spiritual sustenance of the greatest hope of the readers, and the requirements of the imperial examination for calligraphy are very high, especially if the calligraphy is not good, it directly affects the nomination of the imperial examination. Therefore, the status of the script is very important, and the readers attach great importance to it.
If you do not learn the script well first, then even if you learn the calligraphy and cursive writing well, it will be useless.
Therefore, learning calligraphy is the foundation of calligraphy since the Tang Dynasty, which is a special historical positioning that calligraphy can be used as a "calligraphy foundation".
In addition, if you first learn the calligraphy well, it is indeed of the basic meaning of calligraphy for calligraphy and cursive writing, which is no problem.
Please see the seal book written by a 15-year-old boy under the guidance of the teacher. It is estimated that there is no direct study of seal books based on the script.
However, we look at it from practice. If you learn the script well, it does not mean that you are naturally easy to write and cursive.
Calligraphy has its own difficulties. It is difficult to make the calligraphy neat and exquisite, it is difficult to linger in the line of writing, and it is difficult for cursive to fly and express the chest.
If you want to learn calligraphy and cursive writing well, you also need to open up another door and re-learn. Therefore, learning to write well is not the same as learning good calligraphy and cursive writing, and it is not the same as learning Lishu and Seal Calligraphy, even if you have a calligraphic foundation of Calligraphy.
This is because the pen and structure of calligraphy are not the same.
Italics have their own pen system, xingshu has a pen system, and cursive has a cursive pen system, all of which cannot be completely replaced by each other.
For example, modern calligraphers, Tian Yingzhang and Lu Zhongnan, who are favored by everyone, should have no problem with their calligraphy, but their writing is not as good as their calligraphy.
For example, Mr. Ouyang Zhongshi, someone turned out his calligraphy, it is indeed not very good, but Ouyang Zhongshi's calligraphy is much higher than Tian Yingzhang and Lu Zhongnan's calligraphy achievements.
Good calligraphy mainly depends on quality, if it is marked by "writing it out", it is meaningless.
Therefore, there must be quality in writing. For example, the cursive script must have the qualified quality of the calligraphy, the writing must have the quality of the cursive, and the cursive must have the quality of the cursive.
If it does not reach the "qualified" quality, then it cannot be regarded as "good" at writing calligraphy, let alone a calligraphic art work.
In this sense, the so-called "calligraphy is the foundation of calligraphy" does not say that if the calligraphy is good, the cursive writing is naturally good. Just say, there is a foundation.
So, what if you have a "letter" foundation?
We can't just write in letters, not in cursive, cursive, right?
In the process of entering the study of calligraphy and cursive writing, if there are new requirements for calligraphy and brushwork, we have to re-learn, because writing is not equal to calligraphy, and many penmanship structures are different from calligraphy. This is still not enough for those who have only studied the script.
Therefore, we see that not only because the script is good, it means that other books are also easy to write.
Earlier we were talking about learning calligraphy in the system of "calligraphy, calligraphy, cursive writing".
However, calligraphy has more than just a system of "calligraphy, calligraphy and cursive writing".
Chinese calligraphy is broad and profound, in addition to this mainstream calligraphy system after the Tang Dynasty, there is also a calligraphy history system.
For example, seal calligraphy and lishu are the wonders in our calligraphy art.
However, this calligraphic tradition was discontinued after the Tang Dynasty. Therefore, after the Tang Dynasty, at least 95% of the readers no longer wrote lishu and seal books.
Later, starting from the Qing Dynasty, a trend of chasing the ancients arose, and some calligraphy that was not studied and appreciated before the Tang Dynasty was re-studied as a study and became a fashion. These calligraphies include Seal Calligraphy, Lishu and WeiBei, another style of Calligraphy.
In this way, the art of Chinese calligraphy has comprehensively inherited the great tradition of Chinese calligraphy art since the Qing Dynasty: a new system of calligraphy integrating the five major calligraphies of truth, grass, li, seal and line has been formed.
In this new system, although "calligraphy, calligraphy, and cursive writing" are still the mainstream, as a calligraphy art system, seal calligraphy and lishu are once again on an equal footing with the new system of calligraphy in the Tang Dynasty in terms of artistic status. Unlike before, only calligraphy and calligraphy are the mainstream of calligraphy, and they are supplemented by cursive.
Therefore, in the new calligraphy system, there is a question of how to learn calligraphy.
We say that in ancient times, neither the Tang Dynasty nor the Qing Dynasty departed from the system of the imperial examination, as long as there is this system, the practical function of calligraphy is irresistible, so it is necessary to learn calligraphy. There is no reason not to choose.
However, today, not only are we not a system of examinations, but also because of the writing of Chinese characters, there are computers and mobile phones to help us work efficiently, so it is almost possible to spread information without writing. Moreover, this trend is already irresistibly expanding.
We can fully imagine: in the future, almost 100% of people who do not write, and writing in personal life and work, may only have a status of 10% or even lower.
Then, when we study calligraphy today, we are faced with a question: should we first learn calligraphy or first learn Lishu, seal calligraphy, or even xingshu and cursive writing?
From the theoretical possibility, as a study of calligraphy art, I think there is no longer a need to use "calligraphy" as the basis for calligraphy.
For example, this is how I learned calligraphy myself. At the beginning, I also learned the letter first, but I just felt that I didn't start, so I learned the book, and after I had the foundation of the book, I learned the book.
When I was studying Tang Kai, I didn't get started, so I learned Wei Bei, and as a result, I really got started from learning Wei Bei.
By the time I got started with calligraphy, I've been learning calligraphy for 40 years. I have spent the past 40 years in blind writing.
Of course, I was self-taught, not as a compulsory subject, but as an amateur interest.
But interest also enters the door of calligraphy? I didn't get started for a long time, and the main course I studied, painting, had a very big impact, and my painting could not improve for a long time.
Once I got started with calligraphy, I found out that, in fact, calligraphy is the same. There is no question of whether the script is the foundation or the writing is the foundation.
Theoretically speaking, the foundation of calligraphy is penmanship, and to learn penmanship, it is necessary to understand the "four strokes" of "starting, writing, closing, and receiving".
However, I have studied for decades before I found that the basis of calligraphy is actually the "four strokes", but this is the discovery of the law of calligraphy and brushwork, which is of course of great significance.
So, to learn calligraphy, we have to figure out two problems.
The first question is, what calligraphy do we want to learn?
Is it to learn the book or to learn the book of conduct, the seal book? That's to be clear.
The second question is how we must learn calligraphy in order to learn the basics of calligraphy.
If these two problems are clearly understood, choosing what font to learn calligraphy is not a problem, and it is also the basis for learning calligraphy.
If that's the case, then, would you still think that calligraphy is the only basis of calligraphy?
Of course, it is best to learn calligraphy with the guidance of a teacher, and with the guidance of a teacher, your foundation will be laid earlier. Without the guidance of a teacher, I would be like me, and it would take decades to have a foundation in calligraphy. If you expect calligraphy to bring you any benefits, it is even worse.