“Empty hills, no one in sight,
only the sound of someone talking;
late sunlight enters the deep wood,
shining over the green moss again.”
"Deer Fence" (鹿柴), trans. Burton Watson
Variant translations:
No one is seen in deserted hills,
Only the echoes of speech is heard.
Sunlight cast back comes deep in the woods,
And shines once again upon the green moss.
Translated by Stephen Owen
On the empty mountain, seeing no one,
Only hearing the echoes of someone's voice;
Returning light enters the deep forest,
Again shining upon the green moss.
Translated by Richard W. Bodman and Victor H. Mair
Original
空山不見人，但聞人語響。 返景入深林，復照青苔上。
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
Wang Wei 14
a Tang dynasty Chinese poet, musician, painter, and statesm… 699–759Related quotes
The London Literary Gazette (10th January 1835) Versions from the German (Second Series.) 'The Coming of Spring'—Schiller.
Translations, From the German
Fiction, The Colour Out of Space (1927)
Context: West of Arkham the hills rise wild, and there are valleys with deep woods that no axe has ever cut. There are dark narrow glens where the trees slope fantastically, and where thin brooklets trickle without ever having caught the glint of sunlight. On the gentle slopes there are farms, ancient and rocky, with squat, moss-coated cottages brooding eternally over old New England secrets in the lee of great ledges; but these are all vacant now, the wide chimneys crumbling and the shingled sides bulging perilously beneath low gambrel roofs. The old folk have gone away, and foreigners do not like to live there. French-Canadians have tried it, Italians have tried it, and the Poles have come and departed. It is not because of anything that can be seen or heard or handled, but because of something that is imagined. The place is not good for imagination, and does not bring restful dreams at night.
“One moment flying in green sunlight, then the sky suddenly grey and dark.”
Source: Code Name Verity
“Our roots are in the depths of the woods-on the banks of streams and among the mosses.”
Motto on Galle's studio doors (Musée de l'École de Nancy).
Asters, reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 45.
Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 282
Source: How the Irish Saved Civilization (1995), Ch. VI What Was Found