0072 泣

泣

This character means ‘cry, moan, weep.’ It’s pronounced KYŪ or naku in Japanese and qì in Chinese.

As with 0071, the left-hand figure,

氵,

is the vertically compressed form of

水,

which means ‘water.’  The right-hand figure,

立 ,

is there to provide a phonetic clue to the word’s pronunciation, and means ‘to erect, to rise, to stand up.’ It is itself a picture of a man standing up, as can be seen clearly in the archaic versions of the character below:

  .

So, we have a man standing beside some water, and there are plenty of things a man could be doing beside some water. In order to remember the character, we could think of a man crying a river of tears.