Sound over Ideograph: The Basis of Chinese Poetic Art ZONG-QI CAI Abstract The author argues that Chinese characters have shaped Chinese poetic art not through their ideographic form but through their monosyllabic sound. Specifically, the pauses in a Chinese poetic line tend to be determined by sound patterns. Since monosyllabic sound is nearly always endowed with meaning, sound patterns tend to be semantic groupings as well. These groupings of meaning, in turn, determine syntax and, by extension, the organization of an entire poem. Given the semantic denseness of Chinese poetry, this structure is crucial to the overall meaning of a poem, to how we read or understand it. So what we have is something like sound 0 prosodic pattern 0 semantic grouping 0 syntax 0 structure. A multilayered integration of all these elements seems to represent the gestalt of Chinese poetic form, with monosyllabic sound as its foundation. At its best, this gestalt engenders a dynamic interplay of all its elements, from which poetic vision emerges. Keywords Chinese poetic language, monosyllabic Chinese characters, Chinese prosody, pro- sodic and thematic rhythm, syntax and structure What’s unique about Chinese poetic art? To what extent has the Chinese lan- guage given rise to it? These questions weren’t raised by traditional Chinese critics working exclusively within their own tradition. Not until Chinese poetry came to the West in the eighteenth century did such questions begin to emerge and engage Sinologists and lovers of Chinese culture. In the early twentieth century, Ezra Pound brought out Ernest Fenollosa’s essay “The Chinese Written Character as a Medium for Poetry, ” inspiring an upsurge of interest in the poetic implications of Chinese characters among Western poets and critics as well as Sinologists. The Journal of Chinese Literature and Culture • 2:2 • November 2015 DOI 10.1215/23290048-3324212 • Ó 2016 by Duke University Press 545