The Four Chinese Classics


Book Description

Discover four seminal masterworks of Chinese thought—Lao Tzu’s Tao Te Ching, the Analects of Confucius, the Chuang Tzu, and the Mencius—presented in one volume for the first time in nearly two centuries. Award-winning translator David Hinton offers fresh insights on the most influential texts on Taoism, Zen Buddhism, Chinese philosophy, and more. Hinton’s award–winning experience translating a wide range of ancient Chinese poets makes these books sing in English as never before. But these new versions are not only inviting and immensely readable—they also apply much-needed consistency to key philosophical terms in these texts, lending structural links and philosophical rigor heretofore unavailable in English. Breathing new life into these classics, Hinton’s new translations will stand as the definitive texts for our era. Perhaps the most broadly influential spiritual text in human history, Lao Tzu’s Tao Te Ching is the source of Taoist philosophy, which eventually developed into Ch’an (Zen) Buddhism. Equally influential in the social sphere, Confucius’ Analects is the source of social wisdom in China. The Chuang Tzu is the wild and wacky prose complement to the Tao Te Ching. And with its philosophical storytelling, the Mencius adds depth and complexity to Confucius’ vision.




Journey to the West (2018 Edition - PDF)


Book Description

The bestselling Journey to the West comic book by artist Chang Boon Kiat is now back in a brand new fully coloured edition. Journey to the West is one of the greatest classics in Chinese literature. It tells the epic tale of the monk Xuanzang who journeys to the West in search of the Buddhist sutras with his disciples, Sun Wukong, Sandy and Pigsy. Along the way, Xuanzang's life was threatened by the diabolical White Bone Spirit, the menacing Red Child and his fearsome parents and, a host of evil spirits who sought to devour Xuanzang's flesh to attain immortality. Bear witness to the formidable Sun Wukong's (Monkey God) prowess as he takes them on, using his Fiery Eyes, Golden Cudgel, Somersault Cloud, and quick wits! Be prepared for a galloping read that will leave you breathless!




The Five "Confucian" Classics


Book Description

The Five Classics associated with Confucius formed the core curriculum in the education of Chinese literati throughout most of the imperial period. In this book Michael Nylan offers a sweeping assessment of these ancient texts and shows how their influence spread across East Asia. Nylan begins by tracing the formation of the Five Classics canon in the pre-Han and Han periods, 206 B.C.–A.D. 220, revising standard views on the topic. She assesses the impact on this canon of the invention of a rival corpus, the Four Books, in the twelfth century. She then analyzes each of the Five Classics, discussing when they were written, how they were transmitted and edited in later periods, and what political, historical, and ethical themes were associated with them through the ages. Finally she deliberates on the intertwined fates of Confucius and the Five Classics over the course of the twentieth century and shows how the contents of the Five Classics are relevant to much newer concerns.




The Four Books


Book Description

In this engaging volume, Daniel Gardner explains the way in which the Four Books--Great Learning, Analects, Mencius, and Maintaining Perfect Balance--have been read and understood by the Chinese since the twelfth century. Selected passages in translation are accompanied by Gardner's comments, which incorporate selections from the commentary and interpretation of the renowned Neo-Confucian thinker, Zhu Xi (1130-1200). This study provides an ideal introduction to the basic texts in the Confucian tradition from the twelfth through the twentieth centuries. It guides the reader through Zhu Xi's influential interpretation of the Four Books, showing how Zhu, through the genre of commentary, gave new coherence and meaning to these foundational texts. Since the Four Books with Zhu Xi's commentary served as the basic textbook for Chinese schooling and the civil service examinations for more than seven hundred years, this book illustrates as well the nature of the standard Chinese educational curriculum.




Delphi Collected Works of Confucius - Four Books and Five Classics of Confucianism (Illustrated)


Book Description

The philosophy of Confucius emphasises personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice and sincerity, which were developed into a system known as Confucianism. Confucius is traditionally credited with having authored or edited many of the Chinese classic texts including all of the Five Classics. This comprehensive eBook presents the Four Books and Five Classics of Confucianism, with numerous illustrations, rare texts appearing in digital print for the first time, informative introductions and the usual Delphi bonus material. (Version 1) * Beautifully illustrated with images relating to Confucius and the Chinese Classics * Concise introductions to the texts * Features James Legge's seminal translations * All Four Books and Five Classics of Confucianism * Includes multiple translations of the ANALECTS, including a special dual text * Excellent formatting of the texts * Includes the legendary I CHING divination text * Features three biographies - discover Confucius’ ancient world * Scholarly ordering of texts into literary genres Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting titles CONTENTS: The Four Books GREAT LEARNING DOCTRINE OF THE MEAN ANALECTS MENCIUS The Five Classics CLASSIC OF POETRY BOOK OF DOCUMENTS BOOK OF RITES I CHING SPRING AND AUTUMN ANNALS The Biographies THE LIFE AND TEACHINGS OF CONFUCIUS by James Legge THE LIFE, LABOURS AND DOCTRINES OF CONFUCIUS by Edward Harper Parker BRIEF BIOGRAPHY: CONFUCIUS Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting titles or to purchase this eBook as a Parts Edition of individual eBooks




The Confucian Four Books for Women


Book Description

This volume presents the first English translation of the Confucian classics, Four Books for Women, with extensive commentary by the compiler, Wang Xiang, and introductions and annotations by translator Ann A. Pang-White. Written by women for women's education, the Confucian Four Books for Women spanned the 1st to the 16th centuries, and encompass Ban Zhao's Lessons for Women, Song Ruoxin's and Song Ruozhao's Analects for Women, Empress Renxiaowen's Teachings for the Inner Court, and Madame Liu's (Chaste Widow Wang's) Short Records of Models for Women. A female counterpart to the famous Sishu (Four Books) compiled by Zhu Xi, Wang Xiang's Nü sishu provides an invaluable look at the long-standing history and evolution of Chinese women's writing, education, identity, and philosophical discourse, along with their struggles and triumphs, across the millennia and numerous Chinese dynasties. Pang-White's new translation brings the authors of the Four Books for Women to life as real, living people, and illustrates why they wrote and how their work empowered women.




Classical Chinese Literature: From antiquity to the Tang dynasty


Book Description

Contains English translations of Chinese writings drawn from throughout a period of four hundred years, including poems, drama, fiction, songs, biographies, and early works of philosophy and history; arranged chronologically and by genre, with introductory quotes and comments.




Four Books and Five Classics


Book Description

Four Books: In this book, we include Great leaning, The Doctrine of Mean, The analects, and Mencius, which was traditionally called Four Books.




Classical Chinese Poetry


Book Description

“A magisterial book” of nearly five hundred poems from some of history’s greatest Chinese poets, translated and edited by a renowned poet and scholar (New Republic). The Chinese poetic tradition is the largest and longest continuous tradition in world literature. This rich and far-reaching anthology of nearly five hundred poems provides a comprehensive account of its first three millennia (1500 BCE to 1200 CE), the period during which virtually all its landmark developments took place. Unlike earlier anthologies of Chinese poetry, Hinton’s book focuses on a relatively small number of poets, providing selections that are large enough to re-create each as a fully realized and unique voice. New introductions to each poet’s work provide a readable history, told for the first time as a series of poetic innovations forged by a series of master poets. “David Hinton has . . . lured into English a new manner of hearing the great poets of that long glory of China’s classical age. His achievement is another echo of the original, and a gift to our language.” —W. S. Merwin




Wild Mind, Wild Earth


Book Description

Exploring the confluence of ancient Chinese spirituality and modern Western environmental thought, Wild Mind, Wild Earth reveals the unrecognized kinship of mind and nature that must be reanimated if we are to end our destruction of the planet. Earth is embroiled in its sixth major extinction event—this time caused not by asteroids or volcanos, but by us. At bottom, preventing this sixth extinction is a spiritual/philosophical problem, for it is the assumptions defining us and our relation to earth that are driving the devastation. Those assumptions insist on a fundamental separation of human and earth that devalues earth and enables our exploitative relation to it. In Wild Mind, Wild Earth, David Hinton explores modes of seeing and being that could save the planet by reestablishing a deep kinship between human and earth: the insights of primal cultures and the Ch’an (Zen) Buddhism of ancient China. He also shows how these insights have become well-established in the West over the last two hundred years, through the work of poets and philosophers and scientists. This offers marvelous hope and beauty—but like so many of us, Hinton recognizes the sixth extinction is now an inexorable and perhaps unstoppable tragedy. And he reveals how those primal/Zen insights enable us to inhabit even the unfurling catastrophe as a profound kind of liberation. Wild Mind, Wild Earth is a remarkable and revitalizing journey.