Buy an 光陰矢の如し calligraphy wall scroll here!
光陰矢の如し is a Japanese proverb that means “time flies like an arrow.” It's very similar to the English idiom, “time and tide wait for no man,” or “life is short.”
The Kanji breakdown:
光陰 = Time (the cycle of light and dark).
[and an]
矢 = Arrow
の = are
如し = Alike
Note: Because this selection contains some special Japanese Hiragana characters, it should be written by a Japanese calligrapher.
Below are some entries from our dictionary that may match your 光陰矢の如し search...
Characters If shown, 2nd row is Simp. Chinese |
Pronunciation Romanization |
Simple Dictionary Definition |
光陰矢の如し see styles |
kouinyanogotoshi / koinyanogotoshi こういんやのごとし |
More info & calligraphy: Time and Tide Wait for No Man |
Variations: |
kouinyanogotoshi / koinyanogotoshi こういんやのごとし |
(expression) (proverb) time flies like an arrow; time and tide wait for no man; life is short |
The following table may be helpful for those studying Chinese or Japanese...
Title | Characters | Romaji (Romanized Japanese) |
Time and Tide Wait for No Man | 光陰矢の如し 光阴矢の如し | kouinya no goto shi kouinyanogotoshi koinya no goto shi |
In some entries above you will see that characters have different versions above and below a line. In these cases, the characters above the line are Traditional Chinese, while the ones below are Simplified Chinese. |
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All of our calligraphy wall scrolls are handmade.
When the calligrapher finishes creating your artwork, it is taken to my art mounting workshop in Beijing where a wall scroll is made by hand from a combination of silk, rice paper, and wood.
After we create your wall scroll, it takes at least two weeks for air mail delivery from Beijing to you.
Allow a few weeks for delivery. Rush service speeds it up by a week or two for $10!
When you select your calligraphy, you'll be taken to another page where you can choose various custom options.
The wall scroll that Sandy is holding in this picture is a "large size"
single-character wall scroll.
We also offer custom wall scrolls in small, medium, and an even-larger jumbo size.
Professional calligraphers are getting to be hard to find these days.
Instead of drawing characters by hand, the new generation in China merely type roman letters into their computer keyboards and pick the character that they want from a list that pops up.
There is some fear that true Chinese calligraphy may become a lost art in the coming years. Many art institutes in China are now promoting calligraphy programs in hopes of keeping this unique form
of art alive.
Even with the teachings of a top-ranked calligrapher in China, my calligraphy will never be good enough to sell. I will leave that to the experts.
The same calligrapher who gave me those lessons also attracted a crowd of thousands and a TV crew as he created characters over 6-feet high. He happens to be ranked as one of the top 100 calligraphers in all of China. He is also one of very few that would actually attempt such a feat.
Check out my lists of Japanese Kanji Calligraphy Wall Scrolls and Old Korean Hanja Calligraphy Wall Scrolls.