One-syllable article

A one-syllable article (Chinese: 同音文章; pinyin: Tóngyīn wénzhāng) is a type of constrained writing found in Chinese literature. It takes advantage of the large number of homophones in the Chinese language, particularly when writing in Classical Chinese due to historic sound changes. While the characters used in a one-syllable article have many different meanings, they are all pronounced as the same syllable, although not with the same tone. Therefore, a one-syllable article is comprehensible in writing but becomes an incomprehensible tongue twister when read aloud, especially in Mandarin Chinese pronunciation. In other regional dialect pronunciations, all syllables may not sound alike.

Background

One-syllable articles were popularised in Yuen Ren Chao's book Language Problems (simplified Chinese: 语言问题; traditional Chinese: 語言問題; pinyin: Yǔyán Wèntí, 1968), where he would showcase three poems: Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den, Aunt Yi, and Record of the Hungry Chickens Perching on the Machine.[1] Originally having been produced earlier, they were each used to demonstrate the limits of romanizing Literary Chinese, the reason being that Literary Chinese represents Old Chinese and Classical Chinese: The former being of a completely different phonology to modern Mandarin Chinese,[2] and the latter having a significantly different grammar and syntax.[3] Therefore, when reading Chao's poems using modern Mandarin Chinese, they are completely incomprehensible, and, therefore, prove the point that romanization is unnecessary. Himself a proponent of Gwoyeu Romatzyh[1] and General Chinese,[4] he used the poems to illustrate the limits of his theory. Specifically, he believed that when studying Chinese philology, history, and literature, use of the Han script would be necessary. However, in fields such as agriculture, commerce, military affairs, and education, the Han script is unnecessary, and the more transparent Gwoyeu Romatzyh would be appropriate.[1]

Notable examples

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c Chao, Yuen Ren (1980). 语言问题 (1st ed.). Beijing: 商务印书馆. pp. 147–151. ISBN 978-7-100-02641-3.
  2. ^ Baxter, William H. (2016). Old Chinese: a new reconstruction. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-936981-2.
  3. ^ Jiang, Lihong; Ren, Mingshan; Zhu, Ye; Gao, Wenyan (2023). A general theory of ancient Chinese. Zhejiang: Zhejiang University Press. ISBN 978-981-16-6041-2.
  4. ^ Chao, Yuen Ren (1983). 通字方案. Beijing: 商务印书馆.


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