The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Chinese Literature [Paperback]

Victor H. Mair (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0231074298 | ISBN-13: 978-0231074292 | Publication Date: April 15, 1996

Including works of varied genres from fiction and poetry to folk stories and elegies, travelogues and jokes to criticism and theory, this wide-ranging collection brings together more than two thousand years of great works in one portable volume.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Innovative, talented, lively, and splendidly readable.

(Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society )

The list of translators reads like a Who's Who of Western Sinology. This is a book one can open at any page and immediately be drawn in by its great and appealing content. It is at once a reference book, with examples drawn from the huge corpus of Chinese literature, and a book which guarantees superb reading pleasure.

(New Asia Review )

A lifetime spent reading Chinese literature has produced this enormous, enthralling, canon-exploding book.... Often, the funniest and liveliest entries are translated by the editor himself, who has an uncanny ability to capture puns and rhymes even in English translation.... [W]onderful.

(Revue Bibliographique de Sinologie )

Language Notes

Text: English (translation)
Original Language: Chinese --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 1376 pages
• Publisher: Columbia University Press (April 15, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0231074298
• ISBN-13: 978-0231074292
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6 x 2.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #157,928 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #29 in Books > Literature & Fiction > World Literature > Asian
  • #67 in Books > History > Asia > Central Asia
  • #80 in Books > Literature & Fiction > History & Criticism > Asian

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A comprehensive anthology of mainly academic translations., May 21, 2001

By 

tepi "tepi" - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Chinese Literature (Paperback)

'The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Chinese Literature,' Edited by Victor Mair, is a very large book of over 1300 pages which offers the reader "a broad selection of expertly translated texts from the widest possible variety of sources." The selection, which seems on the whole to have been very well done, has been arranged in five main divisions: Foundations and Interpretations; Verse; Prose; Fiction; and Oral and Performing Arts. Besides the familiar, readers will find here much interesting material they may not have seen before - for example: extracts from Shang Divination Records, Bronze Inscriptions, wonderful Buddhist stories, and so on.

As for the translations, Mair tells us that almost all of them were done by "professional sinologists teaching in American universities." These lightly annotated academic translations range in quality from the excellent work of scholars of the caliber of Burton Watson and Leon Hurvitz, through to the rather pedestrian efforts of the less inspired, in fairly equal balance. The selections are preceded by an interesting and informative 10-page Preface by the Editor, and a double-page Map of the Provinces of China.

The book is rounded out with a table of the Principal Chinese Dynasties and Periods, and a Wade-Giles to Pinyin conversion table. Since this information is readily available elsewhere, neither of these tables are really necessary, though Mair is to be commended on his decision to employ a modified Wade-Giles system of transcription throughout the anthology, in preference to the "extremely repulsive" (Needham) Pinyin so beloved by most modern sinologists.

Since Mair felt that they would be "useless and out of place," no Chinese characters (sinographs) have been given for any of the Chinese names, book titles, etc. A far more serious omission is the complete absence from this book of an Index. We are given neither an Index of Names, nor an Index of Titles - not even a General Index in which they could been bundled together. We have not even been given a List of Contributors (there are over one hundred) except on the back of the dust-jacket where we learn that among the non-academic translators are luminaries such as Pound, Snyder, and Rexroth. This makes the book extremely difficult to use.

Locating specific items involves repeated and tiresome searches through the 14-page 258-item Table of Contents. For example, Mair tells us in his Preface that because of its great popularity he has included some selections from Lin Yutang's translation of 'Six Chapters of a Floating Life.' But it will take you some time to find out where they are. And if, as I am, you happen to be interested in a specific translator such as Lin Yutang, since the translators' names are not shown in the Table of Contents, you will have to leaf through all 1300 pages to find their contributions. It will also take you a lot of searching to determine, for example, whether or not Lu Chi's 'Wen fu' (Essay on Literature) has been included in the book. So far as I can see, it hasn't - but I could be wrong. And if it hasn't been included, I wonder why?

The book is stitched and well-printed in a readable font on excellent paper. Anyone who is looking for a comprehensive anthology of traditional Chinese Literature understood in its broadest sense, and in scholarly and exact (though not always inspired) translations with informative notes, will find much that is of very real interest and value in this book. I've enjoyed reading many of the selections, and have benefited from their brief and interesting notes.

And Professor Mair is certainly to be more than commended on his decision to employ the older and elegant - though imperfect - Wade-Giles system of transcription, rather than the trendy and ugly - and just as imperfect - modern Pinyin system. But I do wish the book had included at least a General Index!

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Tredding deep Into Oceans of Traditional Chinese Literature, November 2, 2000

By 

Michael Sean Gallagher (Masan, South Korea) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Chinese Literature (Paperback)

The Columbia Anthology provides a fascinating glimpse into the work of traditional Chinese masters and novices alike for those of us who are armchair Sinophiles. The book is broken into genres which satisfies the academic and offers enough raw material to be somewhat overwhelming, hence the difficulty that arises in most anthologies. However, it is impressive in both scope and simple, poignant beauty with revealing insights into the Chinese world of court gentry and peasants toiling in the fields. Somewhat akin to the Norton Series of Western literature, the Columbia Anthology is not a venture to be transversed lightly. But in toil comes the sweeter stuff of dreams and traditional Chinese literature is the world of heavy eyelids drifting into mystical worlds both human and otherwordly. This book is highly recommended but not if you have an appointment to keep shortly after straining your arm dragging this beheamoth from the front porch. Tread lightly into this wonderful world but, dear reader, please tred.