Turning the Wheel: Essays on Buddhism and Writing [Hardcover]

Charles Johnson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 6, 2003

"Were it not for the Buddhadharma, says Charles Johnson in his preface to "Turning the Wheel," "I'm convinced that, as a black American and an artist, I would not have been able to successfully negotiate my last half century of life in this country. Or at least not with a high level of creative productivity." In this collection of provocative and intimate essays, Johnson writes of the profound connection between Buddhism and creativity, and of the role of Eastern philosophy in the quest for a free and thoughtful life. In 1926, W. E. B. Du Bois asked African-Americans what they would most want were the color line miraculously forgotten. "In Turning the Wheel," Johnson sets out to explore this question by examining his experiences both as a writer and as a practitioner of Buddhism. He looks at basic Buddhist principles and practices, demonstrating how Buddhism is both the most revolutionary and most civilized of possible human choices. He discusses fundamental Buddhist practices such as the Eightfold Path, Taming the Mind, and Sangha and illuminates their place in the American Civil Rights movement. Johnson moves from spiritual guides to spiritual nourishment: writing. In essays touching on the role of the black intellectual, "Uncle Tom's Cabin," and Ralph Ellison, Johnson uses tools of Buddhist thinking to clarify difficult ideas. Powerful and revelatory, these essays confirm that writing and reading, along with Buddhism, are the basic components that make up a thoughtful life.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Dr. Charles Johnson, a 1998 MacArthur fellow, is the S. Wilson and Grace M. Pollock Endowed Professor of English at the University of Washington in Seattle. His fiction includes Dr. King's Refrigerator, Dreamer, and Middle Passage, for which he won the National Book Award. In 2002 he received the Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He lives in Seattle.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Scribner; First Edition edition (May 6, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743243242
• ISBN-13: 978-0743243247
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,004,122 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Reader's Feast, May 29, 2003

By 

"elljwb" (The Lion City) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Turning the Wheel: Essays on Buddhism and Writing (Hardcover)

This book, a collection of essays on Buddhadharma, race, and writing in America, is vintage Johnson: the essays are wise, funny, and genuinely erudite. As a spiritual writer, as a critic of predominent intellectual trends in American culture, and as a careful and intelligent arbiter in the on-going reconstruction of American identity, Johnson offers clear and memorable essays on an astonishing variety of topics. My two favorites are "A Phenomenology of ON MORAL FICTION" and "An American Milk Bottle." This book is a reader's feast.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Solid, October 16, 2008

By 

Cosmoetica "cosmoeticadotcom" (New York, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Turning the Wheel: Essays on Buddhism and Writing (Paperback)

Charles Johnson is a fictionist best known for his award winning novels like Oxherding Tale, Middle Passage, and Dreamer. He is one of the rare published writers and intellectuals willing to publicly state his displeasure with the current low state of American writing. Yet, despite his novels and short story collections, Johnson is also an essayist and Buddhist. In 2003 he published a small volume of essays titled Turning The Wheel: Essays On Buddhism And Writing. Unsurprisingly, in this deliterate age, the book was launched without fanfare and destined to obscurity, perhaps awaiting rediscovery in future decades by Johnson scholars and historians, once today's ignorant era is passé.

The book is divided into two parts, with a preface. The first part is called On Buddhism, and consists of seven essays on the subject. The second half of the book is called On Writing, and contains nine essays. As someone who is far more interested in the arts than religion, my preference is for the latter essays, but the book, as a whole is well written, and straddles the line between Lowest Common Denominator appeal and textbook jargonese. In theory, this should allow the book to appeal to both ends of the intellectual spectrum, but in practice, the ignorant simply will not read such a work, and the supposed intelligentsia will ignore it, for it does not attempt to cordon off higher thought from the barbarians....Overall, Johnson shows that, as an essayist, while he might not be in a class with greats like a Loren Eiseley or James Baldwin, he certainly has insights and an ability to convey them that surpasses- and rather easily, most books you will read on religion or writing. Yes, more Baldwinian passion, or more Eiseleyan poesy, would have made the read a great pleasure rather than merely intellectually provocative, but that's picking nits. How Johnson's art and religion informs not only the essays' both titular sections, but those in the other sections, is the unconscious sort of implementation that only a superior artist does. He does not screed, nor wave banners, nor state the manifest- especially in bald clichés. He is also someone who truly thinks- even if his conclusions are not in sync with the reader's own. There is no mistaking a work like this with the New Age charlatanry of writers like Tony Robbins, Bill Moyers, Joseph Campbell, Deepak Chopra, Marianne Williamson, nor Wayne Dyer. Yet, Johnson is not hermetically sealed away, as many intellectuals are, as the book even mentions a writer as pop cultural as Rod Serling (but, no- not Rod McKuen).

Overall, Turning The Wheel: Essays On Buddhism And Writing is not a work to read if one merely wants to kill time. Yet, by stating that, I am not declaring the book FOR INTELLECTUALS ONLY. If one wants to really ponder some things about life and art, it will give one some new things to chew on, make some connections, and do both in ways one would not notice. This is something that other such books in this vein will not do. To some- if not most, that will seem a call to pass on this work. To those who actually do read it, you can thank me later.