Diffusion of borrowed Scenery and sharawadgi
A major feature of modernity is the increased speed in dispersing and diffusing knowledge through the printed word, travel, and correspondence. Sir William Temple (1628–1699) was a statesman and essayist who traveled throughout Europe. His essay Upon the Gardens of Epicurus; or Of Gardening, in the Year 1685 described what he called “Chineses” landscaping.
Among us, the beauty of building and planting is placed chiefly in some certain proportions, symmetries, or uniformities; our walks and our trees ranged so as to answer one another, and at exact distances. The Chineses scorn this way of planting, and say, a boy, that can tell an hundred, may plant walks of trees in straight lines, and over-against one another, and to what length and extent he pleases. But their greatest reach of imagination is employed in contriving figures, where the beauty shall be great, and strike the eye, but without any order or disposition of parts that shall be commonly or easily observed: and, though we have hardly any notion of this sort of beauty, yet they have a particular word to express it, and, where they find it hit their eye at first sight, they say the sharawadgi is fine or is admirable, or any such expression of esteem. And whoever observes the work upon the best India gowns, or the painting upon their best screens or purcellans, will find their beauty is all of this kind (that is) without order. (1690:58)
Multiple authors have attempted to trace the etymology of sharawadgi to various Chinese and Japanese terms for garden design, two philosophies that greatly differ in adherence to feng shui directional principles, proportional codes of site orientation and placement of buildings and plants. Two Chinese authors suggested the Chinese expressions sale guaizhi "quality of being impressive or surprising through careless or unorderly grace" (Chang 1930) and sanlan waizhi "space tastefully enlivened by disorder" (Ch'ien 1940). E. V. Gatenby (1931) proposed English sharawadgi derived from Japanese sorowaji (揃わじ) "not being regular", an older form of sorowazu (揃わず) "incomplete; unequal (in size); uneven; irregular". S. Lang and Nikolaus Pevsner (1949) dismissed these two unattested Chinese terms, doubted the Japanese sorowaji, and suggested that Temple coined the word "sharawadgi". P. Quennell (1968) concurred that the term could not be traced to any Chinese word, and favored the Japanese etymology. Takau Shimada (1997) believed the irregular beauty that Temple admired was more likely characteristic of Japanese gardens, owing to the irregular topography upon which they were built, and compared the Japanese word sawarinai (触りない) "do not touch; leave things alone". Ciaran Murray (1998, 1999) reasons that Temple heard the word sharawadgi from Dutch travelers who had visited Japanese gardens (perhaps accompanied by the German Engelbert Kaempfer), when the Dutch East India Company had a factory at Dejima, Nagasaki. Murray emphasizes that Temple used "the Chineses" in blanket reference inclusive of all Oriental races during a time when the East-West dialogues and influences were quite fluid. He also notes the similarity between sarawadgi and the southern Japanese Kyūshū dialect pronunciation shorowaji.
The Oxford English Dictionary enters Sharawaggi or Sharawadgi without direct definition, excepting a gloss under the Temple quotation, "… have a particular Word to express it ". It notes the etymology is "Of unknown origin; Chinese scholars agree that it cannot belong to that language. Temple speaks as if he had himself heard it from travellers", and cites Lang and Pevsner (1949). The OED cites two other early usage examples by Alexander Pope (1724) "For as to the hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Paradise of Cyrus, and the Sharawaggi's of China, I have little or no Idea's of 'em" and Horace Walpople (1750) "I am almost as fond of the Sharawaggi, or Chinese want of symmetry, in buildings, as in grounds or gardens."
Temple misinterpreted wild irregularity, which he characterized as “sharawagdi”, to be happy circumstance instead of carefully manipulated garden design. His idea of highlighting natural imperfections and spatial inconsistencies was the inspiration for fashioning early 18th-century "Sharawagdi gardens" in England. The most famous example was William Kent’s “Elysian field” at Stowe House built around 1738.
Read more about this topic: Borrowed Scenery