Customer Reviews

The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is an entertaining, well-researched BIOGRAPHY about a Jesuit missionary in China.

If, like me, you were expecting a book detailing Matteo Ricci's method of enhancing his memory, you will be only partially rewarded. That subject IS brought up, with intelligent commentary, but (to use a metaphor) Ricci's mnemonics are only the 'frame' around the main 'painting'.

The main painting is a thoroughly enjoyable, detailed picture of a Catholic missionary sent from Europe to China. Ricci's voyage of discovery as his ethnocentric training meets with China's equally ethnocentric culture makes for good reading.

Readers interested in mnemonics will be partially rewarded. Readers will be thoroughly rewarded, if they are seeking entertaining Middle-Ages history about Catholicism, missionary work, Europe, Rome, Asia, or China.

Jonathan Spence's approach here is so effortlessly engaging, so like a work of historically informed fiction, that you can easily lose sight of just how responsible and convincing it is at the same time. Framing the book with Ricci's own mnemonic imagery gives Spence a complex but perfectly coherent lens through which to write. Spence deftly allows Ricci's own images to define the scope of the narrative as well, so he isn't burdened with scholarly asides attempting to fill in the gaps with a general history.

This is a book of simple genius. I've reviewed several books on Amazon, and seldom given a five star rating. This wonderful book rates a five.

Jonathan Spence's approach here is so effortlessly engaging, so like a work of historically informed fiction, that you can easily lose sight of just how responsible and convincing it is at the same time. Framing the book with Ricci's own mnemonic imagery gives Spence a complex but perfectly coherent lens through which to write. Spence deftly allows Ricci's own images to define the scope of the narrative as well, so he isn't burdened with scholarly asides attempting to fill in the gaps with a general history.

This is a book of simple genius. I've reviewed several books on Amazon, and never given a five star rating before. This wonderful book rates a five.

I loved this book. The mixture of history, mneumonic device, theology, missionary activity, and social and political thought is entrancing. Dr. Spence has displayed the cultural and spiritual ethos, not only of the title character, but of an era, place and time. The breadth of scholarship is impressive, as are the language and imagery used to present it. I cannot speak to the accuracy of the material presented, but am so intrigued, now, by the period, that I soon will be able to. I highly recommend this book.

I wrote my BA of Humanities thesis on Matteo Ricci and found Spence's book valuable for its information but mildly frustrating. "Memory Palace" is an excellence source for facts about Ricci's life for those who are not fluent in multiple languages or do not have access to the research material that Spence does. I turned to Spence for his commentary on Ricci's various writings that I did not have access to and for various tidbits of facts. Furthermore, Spence does a good job of illustrating the world that Ricci lived and worked in. For example, I was enlightened on the relationship of the Jesuits to the Portuguese King and how the Portuguese port of Macao in China operated. It was good background information to supplement the primary text I was using.

However, the frustrating part of this book is its organization. While it's an interesting idea to organize it according to the first four Chinese characters in his mnemonic system (or "memory palace"), it makes for a near meaningless train of thought; I ended up skimming the lengthy chapter on "water." I'm still disappointed by the end because Spence offers no real conclusion or summary, just an enigmatic statement. I had previously read Spence's "Death of Woman Wang" and I realize that it is Spence's style to amass historical information with unorthodox organization (I think it's his selling point). It's creative, but not very useful. Fortunately, the book has an excellent index, so it's fairly easy to re-find significant passages.

For those that want to read an actual narrative of Ricci's mission, I highly recommend the English translation of Trigault's transcription of Ricci's mission journals; this was the primary text for my paper. I found it very interesting and suprisingly high in entertainment value, considering its origin.

Trigault, Nicolas S. J. "China in the Sixteenth Century:
The Journals of Mathew Ricci: 1583-1610."
trans. Lous J. Gallagher, S.J. (New York: Random House, Inc. 1953).

Also recommended for his examination of the religious issues involved with Ricci and the other Jesuits preaching Christianity in China is Jaques Gernet's "China and the Christian Impact." To sum up, it answers this question and more, "What happens when you try to insert the Christian God into the ancient writings of a sophisticated society?"

Gernet, Jaques, "China and the Christian Impact." (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990).

This book is worth reading for the account of Ricci's memory system alone. The way the Jesuits used the power of the sensory imagination to remember texts or chinese characters is inspirational. Spence explains the secrets of creating such a system, though this ain't no self-help book. But more interesting still was the way that Ricci used his imaginative interpretations of chinese pictograms to convey Christian images and ideas to the Chinese; and the way that he performed memory feats to impress and gain access to high chinese circles for his work.

Having used this book in an upper division undergraduate history class, I recommend it to any reader interested in China's relations with Europe and the West or Western perception and understanding of China. An excellent account of cultural encounter and mutual exploration.

Jonathan D. Spence has written a book which can fall into a number of categories. On one level, it is a biography of a Jesuit who worked as a missionary in China during the Post-Reformation period. On another, it is an examination of his remarkable memory. On yet another, it vividly describes the China of this era and the efforts to bring Christianity to this closed society. The structure of the book is unusual for the genre, but is surprisingly successful. Ultimately, the book becomes a sort of psycho-historical account of a most remarkable man in a most remarkable place in a most remarkable time. Images from this book will linger in your mind for some time to come. Recommended for those interested in religious history, missions, the Jesuits, China, or artificial memory. A more technical companion piece is Francis Yates' _The Art of Memory_.

Spence's masterfully written book, a touching story of one man's devotion to a cause greater than himself, is a must read for all historians, especially those who want to learn more about the Society of Jesus, the Jesuits, and their missions around the world. "The Memory Palace" is engaging--it reads like a mystery novel. I was unable to put it down until I was done for the book was an excellent read.

One of the major fascinations of China as a field of academic endeavor is that China is an ancient, highly developed, extremely complex society that came into existence with virtually no significant contact with Western society until the last two centuries. With a nod to Marco Polo and the Silk Route, it's probably fair to say that if Chinese culture had developed on another planet, it couldn't have been more distinct from Western culture than it is. What's more, while one could say the same thing about, say, the Maya, in fact we really know very little about the Maya, and all the strides being made in deciphering their writing will not increase the amount of raw material we have to work with. By comparison, we have a tremendous amount of information about traditional China, due to the Chinese interest in their own society and its history. As a result, all Western students of China are attracted attracted at least to some extent to the potential of holding up China as a mirror of our own world. For some, it is the major attraction in the study of China.

It is this attraction that Spence specifically seeks to satisfy in all of his books. In "Matteo Ricci" he addresses one of the earliest significant cultural contacts between China and the West - the Jesuit contacts in the sixteenth century, and specifically Ricci's achievement as a conduit of Western thought to the Chinese educated classes. In choosing the "memory palace" as the point of departure - Ricci's practice of teaching the ability to remember more material, and a system as old as Ancient Rome - the subject moves on to the learning process, and the purpose of learning, as understood in China vs. the West.

Ricci's own career as a Catholic priest who obtained the complete classical education of a Chinese mandarin and went on to be an influence at the Ming court is a story worth telling in and of itself, and provides the background to a story of great depth regarding the similarities - and differences - between China and the West. A fascinating read on a fascinating subject.