Smoke, this is a very good thread. I know you have me on ignore, I hope you open it up to read this post, you can return me to ignore afterwards.
I do think that everyone has a mental image of what a literati or bunjin should look like. I suppose that depends on where each person first became aware of trees. Imprinting, I guess.
I grew up in Georgia, at a time before the Interstates were built, and there were huge forests of loblolly pines surrounding Atlanta. These were second growth forests, the trees were telephone pole straight, bare of branches for the first 50 feet, no real jins evident, maybe little short stubs of Jin, more like snags. Each tree was fairly bushy up top, where the branches were fairly thin. They didn't extend very far from the trunk because if the did, they would then be in the canopy of the tree next to it, and get shaded out. These trees were then very top heavy, and when the wind blew strong, they would sway a lot! Being fairly closely packed together, all the pines' trunks were straight, very little taper, and there was a bit of spreading nebari, but not much.
None of these, obviously, had a literati feel even though they had long slender trunks.
But every now and then, there would be a "lone pine". Maybe a subdivision had been cleared, and they left one or two pines on a corner lot. Or along the highway... these pines had no close neighbors to out compete for height, so their branches could grow long. The thing is, these trees are genetically programmed to grow thin branches, and be rather short because in their natural state of a crowded forest, long branches don't give the tree an advantage, the neighbor tree shades them out. So the branches are thin. And weak. We get ice storms about every 5 years that cover the trees with ice. Many weak pine limbs break. Many others are so weighted down they crack and bend down, but not break off. Many pines fall. (Hell on the power lines!)
The solitary pines during these ice storms usually fair pretty well. Since they get more sun, their branches are usually stronger than the forest trees, thus they tend to bend rather than break.
Young pines (under 10 years old) can be so weighted down they can curve to the point where their apex touches the ground! Much of that curve can remain even after the ice has melted. I remember a row of pines on a Church's property from the ice storm of 1962. Bent the trees over double. Over the next 30 years they grew up straight. Crazy S curves! They've all been cut down now.
Anyway, my mind's eye of a literati is an old pine, with plated bark, hanging branches, some movement to the trunk.
Junipers are not native to my area, but pines are. Which, I suppose, why I prefer pine bonsai.
Back in the day, I had a nice Virginia Pine literati. They make good literati because they bark up, but don't put on heavy trunks. I wish I still had it, but that way before I knew about good soil. It was very weak, and wobbly (very little roots) and it's moving when the wind blew probably prevented it from developing new feeder roots.
I have a literati prospect, but it will be 10 years before it barks up:
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This tree has a lot of literati features, but I consider it too lush and the trunk is a bit too heavy to be a literati:
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