Body and Face in Chinese Visual Culture


Book Description

Traditionally the "Chinese body" was approached as a totality and explained by sweeping comparisons of the differences that distinguished Chinese examples from their Western counterparts. Recently, scholars have argued that we must look at particular examples of Chinese images of the body and explore their intrinsic conceptual complexity and historical specificity. The twelve contributors to this volume adopt a middle position. They agree that Chinese images are conditioned by indigenous traditions and dynamics of social interaction, but they seek to explain a general Chinese body and face by charting multiple, specific bodies and faces. All of the chapters are historical case studies and investigate particular images, such as Han dynasty tomb figurines; Buddhist texts and illustrations; pictures of deprivation, illness, deformity, and ghosts; clothing; formal portraiture; and modern photographs and films. From the diversity of art forms and historical periods studied, there emerges a more complex picture of ways that the visual culture of the body and face in China has served to depict the living, memorialize the dead, and present the unrepresentable in art.




The Mysteries of Free Masonry


Book Description

The Mysteries of Free Masonry is a book about this infamous secret society, written by the New York businessman William Morgan, who was a mason himself, but turned against them. Morgan claimed to have been made a Master Mason while he was living in Canada, and he appears to have briefly attended a lodge in Rochester. After he was denied participation by members in Batavia, New York, he decided to publically expose secrets of Freemasonry. The book reveals and explains all the degrees conferred in the Royal Arch Chapter and Grand Encampment of Knights Templars—Knights of the Red Cross—of the Christian Mark—and of the Holy Sepulchre.







The Mysteries of Free Masons and Freemasonry


Book Description

The Mysteries of Free Masonry is a book about this infamous secret society, written by the New York businessman William Morgan, who was a mason himself, but turned against them. Morgan claimed to have been made a Master Mason while he was living in Canada, and he appears to have briefly attended a lodge in Rochester. After he was denied participation by members in Batavia, New York, he decided to publically expose secrets of Freemasonry. The book reveals and explains all the degrees conferred in the Royal Arch Chapter and Grand Encampment of Knights Templars—Knights of the Red Cross—of the Christian Mark—and of the Holy Sepulchre.