What is involved in understanding calligraphy, especially when it is made up from a sur-prising assortment of styles? In 1647, three years after the Ming dynasty collapsed and the foreign Qing regime took over China, Wang Duo (1593--1652) produced a long handscroll for a friend in which he wrote nine of his original poems. What makes this handscroll stand out is that he daringly wrote the poems in four different calligraphic scripts, something that up to that point had rarely been done. The extraordinary diversity of these scripts and their various sizes and styles makes for a dynamic visual impact.

This article discusses the creative and heterogeneous visual elements of the scroll in relation to the poems' content, and suggests that through the subject matter of his poems Wang Duo pro-claims originality for his artistic expression, an expression that breaks with tradition. Through this politically charged experiment, Wang did no less than transform the classical tradition of calligra-phy, and become a leader in this kind of approach. This study of Wang's innovative handscroll thereby expands the dimensions through which we can understand Chinese calligraphy.