Semi-Cursive · gyōsho 行書 · VS4C
Semi-Cursive or gyōsho (行書) styles are a simplified and softer form of the kaisho styles. Gyōsho styles can be read by most Japanese.
仕方が無い shikata ga nai It Cannot Be Helped
It cannot be helped: there is no way, so accept it.
by Master Eri Takase
Born and raised in Osaka, Japan, Eri Takase received the rank of Shihan, master, from two calligraphy societies, the Bokuteki-kai and Bunka-shodō, and won best-of-category awards in all-Japan national competitions. She has created calligraphy for people around the world for more than thirty years, and with your order she will be creating calligraphy for you.
In a ritual as old as calligraphy itself, Master Takase prepares the ink, meditatively rubbing the ink stick against the stone until it reaches the perfect consistency for the paper. Then, properly loading the brush with ink, she brushes your scroll. And only when the scroll is just right and meets her approval, she signs it and affixes her seal, completing your original scroll.
12 1/4" × 43" (31 × 109 cm) Japanese Scrolls
The scrolls have woven damask borders and special layered Japanese paper (washi), designed to last generations by a scroll maker in Gifu, Japan, with whom we have worked for over two decades.
Gift-Ready
Your scroll arrives boxed, with a printed insert describing the words in detail.
Sending it as a gift? Add your message at checkout and we will include it with the insert.
Ships in 1-3 days from Washington State
Your scroll is brushed when you order it and completed within 1 to 3 business days.
Your scroll ships from Master Takase's studio in Washington State. Shipping is calculated at checkout. We ship worldwide.
30-day money-back guarantee
Every order is covered by our 30-day money-back guarantee. If your scroll arrives damaged, or we made an error, we replace it or refund you in full, including shipping.
Explanation
仕方が無い (shikata ga nai): there is no way, so it cannot be helped.
There is no way, so accept it: what a Japanese speaker says when a thing is beyond changing, unsatisfying, with nothing to do but let it go, and the acceptance is the point, not a report that there is no solution but a decision to stop looking. It has two further senses in speech, hopeless of a person and unbearably of a feeling. In English, writers on Japan have made it a word for how the Japanese bear what cannot be helped, which to us is a reading of a people through a phrase; in Japanese it is a phrase of daily life. The same idiom is also written 仕様が無い, said shō ga nai, and clipped to 仕方無い, and each is offered on its own.
Master Takase's block-style design of this phrase is on the spine of Heart Mountain Chronicles: The History of a Japanese Relocation Center (2024), Bernard and James Murphy's history of the Heart Mountain camp in Wyoming, where Japanese Americans were held during the Second World War. The book is on Amazon.
Learn More About These Words
We want you to be as happy with the meaning as you are with Master Takase's art. To learn more, visit Philology of 仕方が無い.
