问苍茫大地

問蒼茫大地
wèn cāngmáng dàdì
quotation

Meanings

  1. 1 I ask the vast, boundless earth
  2. 2 question the immense expanse of land
  3. 3 (lit.) ask the boundless great earth

Examples

Tā zhàn zài shāndǐng, yǒu yī zhǒng wèncāngmángdàdì de háo qíng.
Standing on the peak, he felt that heroic impulse to question the boundless earth.
Wénzhāng jiéwěi yī jù " wèncāngmángdàdì ", qìshìpángbó.
The essay's closing line 'I ask the boundless earth' has a grand, sweeping force.

Tips

history
From Mao Zedong's (毛泽东) 1925 ci 《·长沙》 (Spring at Qin Garden: Changsha). The climactic line is 『大地沉浮?』— 'I ask the boundless earth: who masters the rising and the sinking?' Written at age 32 while revisiting Changsha and looking out from Orange Isle (橘子), the line is a rhetorical challenge about who will decide the fate of China.
usage
Always quoted with or implying its pair 『沉浮』. describes the hazy, limitless quality of a vast landscape — especially at dusk or under autumn sky.

Stroke Order

wèn
cāng
máng