DICTIONARY · CC-CEDICT

舞文弄墨

Mandarin · pinyin wǔ wén nòng mò

(idiom) to display one's facility with words
to show off one's literary skills
(original meaning) to pervert the law by playing with legal phraseology (墨 mò was a reference to 繩墨 shéng mò)

Full entryShow on map

Characters in this entry

舞: wǔ · dance, posture, prance; brandish
文: wén · literature, culture, writing
弄: nòng · do, play or fiddle with; alley
墨: mò · ink; writing

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

Explore the spelling

Mandarin tones

3–2–4–4 · wu3 wen2 nong4 mo4

Compare attested words with these syllables ↗

Dictionary tones. Connected speech can change their realization.

Connected dictionary

4character links3source references

Explore word families ↗Compare pronunciations ↗Open character structure ↗

Counts describe dictionary records, not word frequency or semantic similarity. Source identities stay separate.

Read this spelling in Classical texts

Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

舞文弄墨 · find source passages ↗

Explore Classical grammar ↗

Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

mou5 man4 lung6 mak6

Cantonese word readings for 舞文弄墨. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

CanCLID contributors · CC BY 4.0 · source & license · Data pack

Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

phrase

(idiomatic) to show off one's literary skills; to be playful with language and words (in writing); to juggle with words

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source & license · Data pack