Scroll translation

[MayaSBL]

I received a scroll from a friend with calligraphy on it. Can someone help me translate it?

 

[Majestic]

Hello, this poem is Chinese, and unfortunately I can't find an English translation.

This reference may help you in your search. The poem is by Chen Baisha

Chen Baisha - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

“君子居险夷,乃与恒人异”是什么意思_百度知道

“君子居险夷,乃与恒人异”是什么意思这句出自书画院旧存知名画家国画兰花，款跋题诗“荫崖百草枯，兰蕙多生意，君子居险夷，乃与恒人异”，此画表现的正是高贵难得的清廉文化，作者为齐门画派传人，国际书画家协会

zhidao.baidu.com

 

[Toritoribe]

隂崖百草枯蘭蕙多生意君子居險夷
乃與恒人异壬午年清雨兰寫

As Majestic-san wrote, the right column and the first 5 characters in the left column are a Chinese poem 題画蘭 "Orchid".

隂崖百草枯、蘭蕙多生意。君子居險夷、乃與恒人异。
Many plants wither on a shady cliff, but orchid naturally grow richly.
Whether in a severe or safe place, gentlemen are different from ordinary people.

The last 7 characters show that your picture of orchid was drawn on a rainy day (probably in autumn) in 2002.

 

[MayaSBL]

Thank you for translating it. My friend was sure it was Japanese. How can I tell the difference between Japanese and Chinese calligraphy when there are no hiragana/katakana characters?

 

[Majestic]

It can be difficult to tell the difference unless you speak Japanese or Chinese. The poem could be a Chinese classical poem written by a Japanese person. The poem could by a Japanese poem written in Chinese style (kanbun). For this poem, I took one of the phrases and put it into a search engine, and that led me to discover the poem and the poet. But until I did that I wasn't completely sure what or where this came from. Well, I had an idea that it isn't Japanese because some of the kanji used are not found in Japanese - but even still I wasn't 100% sure.

 

[Toritoribe]

It's not uncommon to write a classical Chinese poem in a Japanese scroll, so "a real Chinese poem is used there" doesn't prove that it's a Chinese scroll. As for your scroll, as Majestic-san mentioned, 兰 is a simplified Chinese character mostly used in Mainland China or Singapore, and never used in Japanese. Similarly, 异 is used as an alternative of 異 there, but this usage is found only in modern simplified Chinese. 异 is also used in Japanese, but it can't mean 異.