The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons is the first comprehensive work of literary criticism in Chinese, and one that has been considered essential reading for writers and critics since it was written some 1,500 years ago. A vast compendium of all that was known about Chinese literature at the time, it is simultaneously a taxonomy and history of genres and styles, and a manual for good writing. Its chapters, organized according to the I Ching, cover such topics as "Emotion and Literary Expression","Humor and Enigma","Spiritual Thought or Imagination", "The Nourishing of Vitality","Organization", and "Literary Flaws". "Mind" is the ideas, impressions, and emotions that take form—the "rving of the dragon"—in a literary work. Full of examples and delightful anecdotes drawn from Liu Hsieh's encyclopedic knowledge of Chinese literature, readers will discover distinctive concepts and standards of the art of writing that are both familiar and strange. The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons is not only a summa of classical Chinese literary aesthetics but also a wellspring of advice from the distant past on how to write.

The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons is the first comprehensive work of literary criticism in Chinese, and one that has been considered essential reading for writers and scholars since it was written some 1,500 years ago. A vast compendium of all that was known about Chinese literature at the time, it is simultaneously a taxonomy and history of genres and styles and a manual for good writing. Its chapters, organized according to the I Ching, cover such topics as “Choice of Style,” “Emotion and Literary Expression,” “Humor and Enigma,” “Spiritual Thought or Imagination,” “The Nourishing of Vitality,” and “Literary Flaws.” “Mind” is the ideas, impressions, and emotions that take form—the “carving of the dragon”—in a literary work. Full of examples and delightful anecdotes drawn from Liu Hsieh’s encyclopedic knowledge of Chinese literature, readers will discover distinctive concepts and standards of the art of writing that are both alien and familiar. The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons is not only a summa of classical Chinese literary aesthetics but also a wellspring of advice from the distant past on how to write.

An encounter of knowledges, cultures, literary experiences and scientific approaches, from East and West, took the shape of this multifarious and bilingual collection of papers, entitled Wenxin Duihua 文心對話: A Dialogue on The Literary Mind / The Core of Writing. This work is meant to represent a first stage in an ongoing process of confrontation, in the domain of the Chinese literary and aesthetic tradition indelibly marked by the milestone of Wenxin Diaolong 文心雕龍. The six Chinese and European authors of this work shared their research and perspectives, enriched the literary and aesthetic landscape with deep reflections and original connections, and enhanced a polyphonic dialogue stemming from Liu Xie's heritage and reaching universal themes, like the essence of writing and the strong relationship between signs and images. Their contributions, crystallized in Wenxin Duihua 文心對話: A Dialogue on The Literary Mind / The Core of Writing, reveal the enormous potential of a multicultural approach, as well as the immeasurable profoundness of the wen 文.

China has undergone a unique path of development in the post-Maoist era. Especially, the last decade witnessed China's rapid rise to economic wealth and superpower status vis-à-vis the severe developmental predicaments of the West (financial crises, socio-political turbulences, etc.). This book analyzes how the leading Chinese thinkers understand China's prosperity and rapid development today, and whether there is any hidden mechanism that has been playing a crucial role of forming contemporary Chinese thinkers' shared passionate endeavor of resuscitating classical Chinese ideas, and thus shows how the fervor for discovering “essential characteristics” of Chinese thought reveals a hidden psychological mechanism.

Contains English translations of Chinese writings drawn from throughout a period of four hundred years, including poems, drama, fiction, songs, biographies, and early works of philosophy and history; arranged chronologically and by genre, with introductory quotes and comments.

The essays collected in Fate and Prognostication in the Chinese Literary Imagination deal with the issues hidden in the Chinese conception of fate as represented in literary texts and films, with a focus placed on human efforts to solve the riddles of fate prediction.

Professor Shih's philosophically oriented study...brilliantly transcends the many limitations of prior inquiries. In three tightly knit sections, Mr. Shih explores the principal elements of Taiping ideology, probes its underlying historical and cultural roots, and evaluates the numerous interpretations adduced since the upheavel itself...More original research and groundbreaking scholarship are reflected in each chapter of this book than in most complete volumes of comparable scope.

First published in 1919 by Ezra Pound, Ernest Fenollosa’s essay on the Chinese written language has become one of the most often quoted statements in the history of American poetics. As edited by Pound, it presents a powerful conception of language that continues to shape our poetic and stylistic preferences: the idea that poems consist primarily of images; the idea that the sentence form with active verb mirrors relations of natural force. But previous editions of the essay represent Pound’s understanding—it is fair to say, his appropriation—of the text. Fenollosa’s manuscripts, in the Beinecke Library of Yale University, allow us to see this essay in a different light, as a document of early, sustained cultural interchange between North America and East Asia. Pound’s editing of the essay obscured two important features, here restored to view: Fenollosa’s encounter with Tendai Buddhism and Buddhist ontology, and his concern with the dimension of sound in Chinese poetry. This book is the definitive critical edition of Fenollosa’s important work. After a substantial Introduction, the text as edited by Pound is presented, together with his notes and plates. At the heart of the edition is the first full publication of the essay as Fenollosa wrote it, accompanied by the many diagrams, characters, and notes Fenollosa (and Pound) scrawled on the verso pages. Pound’s deletions, insertions, and alterations to Fenollosa’s sometimes ornate prose are meticulously captured, enabling readers to follow the quasi-dialogue between Fenollosa and his posthumous editor. Earlier drafts and related talks reveal the developmentof Fenollosa’s ideas about culture, poetry, and translation. Copious multilingual annotation is an important feature of the edition. This masterfully edited book will be an essential resource for scholars and poets and a starting point for a renewed discussion of the multiple sources of American modernist poetry.