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42 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Still Useful, November 18, 2002
This book made headlines in America when it came out in the 1930's. For perhaps the first time a Chinese wrote a book in English about China and the Chinese, and the sympathetic reaction of many Americans to China's plight in the struggle against Japan made this book a bestseller. I still think it is a good book. It sets out in language that is still easy to read the Chinese mind, their history, philosophy, characteristics, etc. A good deal of the descriptions are the author's own opinions, inevitably, but it is a testament to the author's brilliant mind and perceptive eyes that much of the book is still valid today. Indeed, now that war, revolution, and communism are things of the past, the Chinese are reverting more and more to their old ways, both good and bad, and their old ways are what this book is about.Pearl Buck, the first American woman to win the Nobel Literature Prize, was the one who persuaded Lin to write this book. Her faith in him is fully justified. Few indeed were native sons of China who were immersed in both Chinese and Western cultures. And Lin was one. Given my interest in both Lin Yutang and JRR Tolkien, I cannot resist a comparison. There is no evidence that Lin and Tolkien knew each other, although both were philologists (linguists interested in the historical origins of words) living in the same period. Their specialties were quite different, however. Tolkien was an expert in Old English, and was comfortable in many northern European languages, both old and modern. (He could even read Finnish!) Lin's expertise was in Chinese literature from the classical period, and what made him unique at the time was his almost native fluency in English (as well as in German, plus a couple of modern European languages). They were born three years apart (Tolkien in 1892, Lin in 1895) and they died exactly three years apart, at the same age (81). Tolkien was a distinguished Oxford professor. Lin held few positions in universities. But Tolkien's education did not go beyond the bachelor's degree. Lin had an MA (from Harvard) and a PhD (from Leipzig, in Germany). Tolkien's scholarly output was very small, but of a high quality. Lin had no scholarly output in the technical, academic sense. His scholarship and intelligence were reflected in the highly-regarded Chinese-English bilingual dictionaries he produced, his prodigious translations of Chinese literature, and in the brilliant essays he penned in Chinese. As I'm fluent in Chinese (my own native language), I find his essays very enjoyable, very humorous - more so than his English books. Tolkien is immortalized by his novels, which have a worldwide appeal. Lin also wrote novels - of an utterly forgettable quality as far as I'm concerned. He's remembered for his non-fictional writings such as this book. Shortly before he died Lin was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature. (I would give it to him if it were up to me.) Both lived through the Second World War in relative safety, Tolkien in England, Lin in America. Tolkien had proved his bravery in WWI, while Lin's life in pre-1937 China was also perilous due to the Japanese marauders. Both were outsiders in different ways. Tolkien was a Roman Catholic living in Protestant England who had been born in South Africa, and whose last name didn't sound quite English (it's German). Lin was a Chinaman in America, at a time when being a Chinaman was almost like being a Martian. Tolkien was a practising papist all his life. Lin was at first a Christian, but he later renounced his religion and became what he called a "pagan" most of his life - and then apparently converted back to Christianity in old age. Most of his writings are a-religious, if not anti-religious, having been written in his middle years. Tolkien had little to say about his own religion - and his novels are almost "pagan" - but he seemed to have believed in the "truth" of mythology. (Fools, if you ask me.) Tolkien was a good friend of C. S. Lewis, the Irish writer. Lin was a good friend of Pearl Buck, the American Nobel laureate. Lewis wrote a glowing review of the Lord of the Rings, while Buck wrote a foreword to this book and did much more to help Lin publish his other books. But neither friendship stood the test of time, apparently. Coincidentally, both men were social and political conservatives. One preferred Old Britain, and the other Old China, to their modern versions, and technology and "progress" as we know it meant nothing to them. Interestingly, they both loathed communism. They were also devoted pipe smokers. One can well imagine these two gentlemen having a good time sharing their views on these things in a smoky, book-lined study late into the night, speaking their oddly old-fashioned English (perhaps mixing some German into it as well). But as brilliant philologists, they would only talk past each other without a single word being understood! Oh, if only they knew each other! Tolkien's fame is assured, mainly by his epic fairy tales. Lin will only be remembered by those few people in the West who take an interest in China's cultural heritage. But even now there are still not many Chinese who can write, in good English, about China and the Chinese people from such a literate perspective (in the best true sense of "literate"). His insights are sometimes historical, at other times anthropological and sociological, but always and everywhere personal. He eschews abstract, finely spun theories; he sticks to China's facts, history, insights gleaned from classical literature, and his own keen anecdotal eyes. This book is thus eminently practical. It is not entirely timeless, but neither is it out of date. Given the rising importance of China in world affairs, Lin's books are as urgently needed today as they were more than 60 years ago when they made it to the top of New York Times bestsellers list while China struggled to survive.
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by Lin Yutang
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