Collect various interesting store names, slogans, couplets, slogans, etc. in life.

Recently, a portrait of workers, peasants and soldiers raising their fists during the Cultural Revolution hung in a toilet in a place with a slogan: Comrades, charge!

There is a famous couplet in the drugstore: I hope that people in the world will live longer, why not put medicine on the shelf to make dust

Qing Dynasty writer Ji Xiaolan was smart and studious since childhood, and had many interests. His private school teacher, Mr. Shi, is a very old-fashioned scholar, and Xiaolan is very disgusted with him. One day, Xiaolan went to feed the house sparrow and dug a deep hole in the brick wall. After feeding the house finch, she returned it to the hole and blocked it with bricks to prevent it from flying away. Later, when he was discovered by Mr. Shi, he threw the house bird to death, returned it to the cave and blocked it, and wrote a couplet on the wall:

The fine-feathered poultry died after being bricked

When Xiaolan went to feed the house bird again, she found that it was already dead. He was wondering in his heart when he suddenly saw a couplet on the wall. He concluded that it was Mr. Shi's work, so he continued to write the next couplet:

Mr. Shi, a rough-haired beast

Mr. Shi met Dawei Annoyed, she felt that Xiaolan should not insult the teacher, so she used the pointer to question Xiaolan. I saw Xiaolan explain calmly: "I wrote it according to Mr.'s first couplet. If there is 'fine', there must be 'coarse'. If there is 'feather', there must be 'hair'. If there is 'home', there must be 'wild'. ’, if there is a ‘bird’, there must be a ‘beast’, if there is a ‘brick’, there must be a ‘stone’, if there is a ‘last’, there must be a ‘first’, and if there is ‘death’, there must be a ‘life’, so I wrote about rough beasts. Mr. Shi, if it shouldn’t be written like this, please rewrite it.”

Mr. Shi thought about it for a long time, twirling his beard, but could not come up with a satisfactory second line. Finally, he sighed helplessly and threw down the pointer. , and walked away.

Ji Xiaolan came to Hangzhou on a trip south, and his friends held a banquet for him to cleanse himself from the dust. During the banquet, as usual, there was a series of correct answers. Ji Xiaolan was quick in thinking and could make perfect sentences when speaking. His friends were convinced and praised him as an orphan in the North. Xiaolan disagreed and said: "There are talented people in the north all over the Great Wall. How can we start talking about this?" A friend said: "I once traveled to the north and published a couplet. Everyone waved their hands." Xiaolan was half-believed and doubtful. Asked: "Brother, is it so difficult to write a sentence?" The friend said: "It's average." Then, he read the first couplet:

The twin towers are faintly visible, and the seventh floor is in all directions

Ji Xiaolan After hearing this, he burst out laughing and said: "They didn't bother to answer such a simple sentence and just waved their hands to show their approval!" The friend asked in confusion: "Then, what is their second line?" Xiaolan said:

I shook my hand with my fingers, three long and two short

After hearing this, my friend suddenly realized.

Qianlong’s wonderful gift to a long-lived old man

According to legend, when Emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty visited the West Lake, he saw a long-lived old man in Lingyin Temple. This old man was 141 years old. age. Qianlong made an impromptu couplet and presented it to the old man:

The flower armor blooms again, plus thirty-seven years

The ancient and rare double celebrations, one more spring and autumn inside

This It is a couplet containing numerical operations. Not only do the words and sentences in the upper and lower couplets match each other, but the operations are performed in the same way and the results are equal. The "sixtieth" in the first couplet refers to sixty years old; if you multiply it by two, you will be one hundred and twenty years old; plus three, seven and twenty-one, it will add up to one hundred and forty-one years old. The "ancient and rare" in the second line refers to seventy years old; for double celebrations, it is twice as old. If you add one spring and autumn, you add one year old, which is exactly one hundred and forty-one years old.

Qianlong couplet performers

According to legend, Emperor Qianlong was good at couplets and often used them to play people. Once, he disguised himself and drank with Zhang Yushu in a restaurant. During the dinner, he took advantage of the drunkenness to point to a singer named Ni and wrote the first couplet: "Wonderful girl Ni's girl", and asked Zhang Yushu to pick it up. This first couplet is a split couplet of the two characters "Miao" and "Ni". Zhang Yushu couldn't get it right for a while. The singer casually replied at the side: "Zhuge is a great speaker", splitting the word "big" into two. Qianlong greatly appreciated it and ordered Zhang Yushu to give him three glasses of wine. Unfortunately, the wine had been finished and the pot was poured. When the singer saw this, she smiled and said to Qianlong: "'Water and cold wine, one point, two points, three points', sir, please enlighten me on the second line." The first line implies the radicals of the first three words, and also adds numbers. Qianlong blushed with embarrassment. Fortunately, a flower seller walked downstairs at this time, and Zhang Yushu had an idea and said: "There are hundreds of thousands of lilac flowers," and it is said that he was relieved. , Emperor Qianlong no longer used couplets easily

Qianlong and Ji Xiaolan wrote back to each other

There was a restaurant in Beijing called "Tiantianju" in the Qing Dynasty.

Once Qianlong passed by this restaurant and praised the elegance of its name, so he wrote a couplet based on the name of the restaurant. The first couplet is:

The guest lives in a natural place, but he is a guest in the sky

But the second couplet But he couldn't ask for it. Because the second line must meet the following conditions: the last five characters are the inversion of the first five characters. It must be semantically complete, harmonious, and have a beautiful artistic conception. It is indeed difficult, so he ordered his subordinates to correct it. Just when everyone was thinking hard, Ji Xiaolan had already written the second couplet:

The monk traveled to Yunyin Temple, the temple hid in the clouds and wandered the monks

This couplet is neat and tidy, with perfect artistic conception, winning over all the ministers. of praise. It is said that later generations also had a couplet about this:

When people pass by a big Buddhist temple, the Buddha in the temple is bigger than others

Su Dongpo's dumb couplets are interesting

Su Dongpo was demoted to the Yellow Emperor After leaving the state, he lived there for several years. One evening, he and his friend monk Foyin went boating on the Yangtze River. Su Shi suddenly pointed to the left bank with his hand and smiled without saying a word. Foyin looked around and saw a yellow dog gnawing on a bone. He suddenly realized something and threw the cattail leaf fan inscribed with Su Dongpo's poem into the water. The two looked at each other and couldn't help laughing.

It turns out that this is a dumb couplet. The first couplet of Su Shi means:

The dog gnaws the (monk) bone on the river

The second couplet of Buddha's seal means:

The corpse of Dongpo is flowing in the water (Dongpo Poetry)

Zhu Zhishan competes with three talents

Zhu Zhishan, one of the "Four Talents in Wuzhong" in the Ming Dynasty, was famous for his talent and quick writing and thinking.

Once, when he came to Hangzhou for a visit, people invited him to visit him. There was an endless stream of people asking for help and books, which made him very busy. Unexpectedly, all good things come to an end, and he accidentally offends Xu, a prominent official in Hangzhou, who accuses Zhu Zhishan of showing off his academic skills, being arrogant and arrogant. One day, Xu invited three of the most talented and arrogant people in the city to challenge Zhu Zhishan.

The three talents came with pride and preparation. Scholar A wanted to take the lead and deliberately made things difficult, so he wrote a couplet saying:

The deer sleeps alone in the house

The five characters all use the same rhyme, which is not easy. With Zhu Zhishan in mind, he said to the sun casually:

Chickens crow in Xixi

The words also use the same rhyme.

Seeing that the second scholar was in trouble, Zhu Zhishan came forward, shaking his head, and recited a couplet:

The boy hits the tung tree, but the tung tree does not fall, and the boy is unhappy

< p>Use homophony. Zhu Zhishan thought about it a little and responded with homophones:

Ma Gu eats mushrooms, the mushrooms are so fresh, Magu is so immortal

Bing Xiucai saw that Zhu Zhishan was not stumped yet, so he worked hard to come up with something One couplet:

Half of a man’s human body

Refers to the lower half of the first three characters, which is cleverly constructed and contains a connotation of contempt. Zhu Zhishan asked Bing your surname with a smile, and Bing Xiucai said his surname was "Zhu". Zhu Zhishan said to the Japanese:

Mr. Zhu's Three Bull Heads

Refers to the upper half of the first three characters. Not only is it a subtle coincidence, the work is steady and appropriate, but it is also sarcastic and pungent.

When the three scholars heard this, they looked at each other, were speechless, and had to leave in despair.

Wang Xizhi’s wonderful calligraphy Spring Couplets

One year, the calligrapher Wang Xizhi of the Eastern Jin Dynasty moved from his hometown in Shandong to Shaoxing, Zhejiang. It was the end of the year, so Wang Xizhi wrote a couplets for his family. Posted on both sides of the door. The couplet is:

Spring Breeze, Spring Rain, Spring Scenery

New Year, New Year, New Scenery

Unexpectedly, because Wang Xizhi’s calligraphy is world-class and admired by people at the time, this couplet has just been posted. When he came out, he was taken away at night. After his family told Wang Xizhi, Wang Xizhi was not angry. He wrote another note and asked his family to post it again. This note reads:

The Orioles Cry in the North Star

The Southern Suburbs of Yanyu

Unexpectedly, when I looked at it at dawn, it was taken away again. But today was already New Year's Eve, and the next day was the first day of the Lunar New Year. Seeing that every door in the neighborhood had Spring Festival couplets hung up, but the door of her own house was empty, Mrs. Wang was so anxious that she urged her husband to find a way.

Wang Xizhi thought for a moment, smiled slightly, and wrote again. After writing, he asked his family to cut off a section of the couplet and post the upper half on the door:

Unparalleled blessings

Misfortunes never come alone

As expected, someone came to steal the secret again at night. But looking under the moonlight, I saw that these couplets were written very unluckily. Although Wang Xizhi is a famous calligrapher, he cannot take away this pair of couplets full of dangerous predictions. The person who came to steal it had no choice but to sigh and sneak away under the cover of night.

At dawn on the morning of the first day of the Lunar New Year, Wang Xizhi went out in person to paste the lower halves he had cut yesterday. At this time, many people were watching. When everyone saw it, the couplet became:

Unparalleled blessings have arrived today

Misfortune never comes alone last night

Everyone saw it, cheered in unison, and clapped their hands and praised it.

Xie Jin cleverly wrote Spring Festival couplets

The Ming Dynasty’s Xie Jin lived across from a wealthy man’s bamboo forest. On New Year's Eve, he posted a Spring Festival couplet on his door: Opposite the door are thousands of bamboos, and there are thousands of books in the house. The rich man saw it and asked people to cut down the bamboo. Xie Jin understood its meaning deeply and added a word to the upper and lower couplets: The door is opposite to a thousand bamboos, and the family has thousands of books. The rich man became even more angry and ordered the bamboo to be dug up by the roots. Xie Jin laughed secretly and added another word to the upper and lower couplets: There are thousands of bamboos in front of the door, but there are thousands of books in the home. The rich man was stunned with anger.

Ouyang Xiu Miao's story of leaving the seclusion

When he was a boy, Ouyang Xiu's family was extremely poor and he traveled around to find a living and study. When he was twelve years old, he hurriedly walked to the gate of Xiangyang City with his book bag on his back. He saw that the city gate was closed. He looked up and saw a veteran guarding the city. He raised his hands and saluted, "Can you please open the door and let the students into the city?" "The old soldier didn't dare to open the city gate against the rules, but when he heard that he was a very polite and eloquent primary school student, he felt compassion and said: "As a scholar, I will tell you that you are right and let you enter the city; yes, you will be allowed to enter the city. If you don't come out, you can come in tomorrow morning." The veteran read out the first couplet.

The switch is early and the pass is late. Let the guest pass

Ouyang Xiu thought for a while and said: "It's easy to make a pair. "It's hard to get right, sir, please get it right first." The veteran said loudly, "I want you to get it right!" Ouyang Xiu said with a smile, "The student has already done it." After thinking about it, the soldier suddenly understood and immediately went down to the tower. city ??gate. It turns out that the second couplet is:

It’s easy to make a counterpoint, but it’s hard to make a counterpoint, sir, please do it first

——The above is selected from "Collection of Ancient and Modern Couplets" (Zhou Manzhong, 1981, Fujian People's Publishing House ) and "Collection of Chinese Couplet Stories" (Bacheng, 2002, Inner Mongolia University Press)

Qian Xuesen studies ancient Chinese literature from the perspective of thinking

Dai Ruwei Comrade Qian Comrade Xue Min:

I have been thinking recently: since abstract (logical) thinking must be used in literary creation. Image (intuition) thinking and inspiration (enlightenment) thinking, aren't our country's thousands of years old literary works the crystallization of these three kinds of thinking? Then why don’t we learn and explore thinking from Chinese fus, poems, lyrics, songs and essays? They are the richest springs.

The easiest thing is couplets, which were the basic skills of literati thinking in old China. It's also easiest to analyze human hands. For example, the most well-known ones are:

May Huangmeitian

Samsung Brandy

This is the simplest, just the word and the word match. A little more complicated is the couplet between Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai:

It is impossible to build a boat on the island, but the boat cannot fly across the island (Mao Zedong)

In Tianxin Pavilion, pigeons are in the pavilion, but pigeons fly in the pavilion and cannot fly ( Zhou Enlai)

This is not only a pair of words, but also has a clever meaning.

A deeper story is the story of Ji Xiaolan, a famous scholar in the Qing Dynasty, who was stumped by a warrior on a river boat. The boat the warrior took had sails, while Ji Xiaolan's boat had no sails and needed a oar. Wufu's couplet is: "Two boats are running parallel, and the oar speed is not as fast as the sail." Here we use the homophony of "Oar Speed" and "Lu Su", and the homophony of "Fan Kuai" and "Fan Kuai" to show that writing is not as good as martial arts. Ji Xiaolan was wrong for a while and was trapped for several days, feeling depressed. It wasn't until I arrived in Fuzhou a few days later to preside over the college examination ceremony that I suddenly realized when I heard the music that the second couplet should be:

Eight notes are played in unison, how can the flute be as clear as Xiao He's

Here "the flute is clear" "" is homophonic to "Di Qing", "Xiao He" is homophonic to "Xiao He", and martial arts is not as good as literature. This couplet is not only about the form, the words are paired with each other, but also uses allusions through homophony to achieve confrontation.

This kind of literary examples is extremely rich, and the long couplet has developed to the Kunming Daguan Tower long couplet, each couplet has nine crosses. What’s more, Deng Xiaoping lived in Changlian every day, with 250 crosses per couplet! The true grand view is a treasure house and the hard work of our country’s literati. From the perspective of thinking, the process of couplets is: the first couplet of the first couplet gives a structure, and the person in the second couplet of the corresponding couplet is asked to find parts according to this given structure, Yu. Words are filled in this structure, and the thinking consists in searching the think tank for materials. This is the thinking of couplets and couplets - searching into the structure.

My own experience is that the so-called image (intuitive) thinking is the opposite of the above-mentioned couplet: there is material, but no structure. The task of thinking is to gather images, that is, structures.

On the contrary, doesn’t it also complement each other? If we summarize China's extremely rich couplet literature, can't we contribute to the study of image (intuitive) thinking? Isn't it a beginning to know that image (intuition) thinking is to put together a structure from fragmentary materials? It is worthwhile to study ancient Chinese literature from the perspective of thinking.

Is this true? Please advise.

Best regards

Salute!

Qian Xuesen

September 18, 1994

——This article is excerpted from Qian Xuesen Library