On Intersemiotic Transposition

Abstract

Under Hui-tsung, the last emperor of the Northern Sung whose reign ended in 1126, candidates for admission to the Imperial Painting Academy were habitually asked to compose a brush-and-ink painting that rendered in visual images a given line of verse. One of the most famous paintings, which exists only in legend, was executed in response to the following line from Wang Wei's (699?-761) eight-line poem Visiting the Temple of Accumulated Fragrance: