Translating Buddhism from Tibetan (Hardcover)

by Joe Wilson (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"What an impressive production! It is a superb piece of work." -- Richard Hayes, Dept. of Religious Studies, McGill University

Product Description
The grammar, syntax, and technical vocabulary of classical Tibetan used in Buddhist works.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 816 pages
• Publisher: Snow Lion Publications (May 25, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0937938343
• ISBN-13: 978-0937938348
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 7.2 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #475,271 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

38 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Maybe the best all-around textbook for literary Tibetan, June 21, 1999

By	John Pettit (Woodstock, New York) - See all my reviews

Joe Wilson's book is an outstanding achievement. Any serious student of literary Tibetan should own a copy, along with Goldstein's Modern Literary Tibetan, Beyer's Classical Tibetan Language, and Erik Schmidt's Rangjung Yeshe Dictionary.

Wilson has achieved an effective (though in some respects unusual, and debatable) synthesis of grammatical approaches based on Latinate, English-language and traditional Tibetan grammars. Though expert readers will find much of this information redundant, students in the first three or four years of formal study stand to gain much from this book.

Translating Buddhism from Tibetan will be particularly useful for students who wish to read Buddhist scriptures or study Tibetan scholastic commentaries. Most of the examples in the book are drawn from one of these two genres. Students interested contemporary and secular Tibetan literature should consult Goldstein's book mentioned above; those interested in a more deeply researched, scholarly discussion of Tibetan syntax and morphology, or in archaic forms of Tibetan language, should have a look at Beyer.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Less enthused, May 21, 2000

By	IM Taylor (Canberra, Australia) - See all my reviews

I am less enthused about this massive tome than the other reviewers. I have a feeling that the book has failed to make the transition from a very lively university course to a textbook. The approach using all the different 'dimensions' is rather idiosyncratic. There problem is that there are few other choices when it comes to Tibetan textbooks. There is a heavy reliance for examples on the literature of logic. In my opinion more examples from practice-related material would have been useful. Too much reliance is placed on traditional Tibetan grammar for my liking. And that romanisation is unnecessarily complex. Still, it is a very significant work, and inspite of its short-comings, is still the best in this small field.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Decent, but ..., August 8, 2005

By	Italo Vecchi (Ferrara, Italy) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This is the first book I bought at the start of my journey into Tibetan. The overall strategy of this book is to build an hybrid Tenglish (Tibetan-English) language, which should gradualise and faciltate the student's approach to Tibetan texts. I regard this idea as essentially flawed and therefore I basically agree with the less enthused reviewers.
Still, this is a honourable work and it may be useful for a first, cautious approach to classical Tibetan. If you want to plunge into the real thing right away, I suggest you buy Stephen Hodge's "Introduction to Classical Tibetan" (if you can find it).