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Zhuangzi Speaks: The Music of Nature

(Paperback)


Publishing Details

Full Title:

Zhuangzi Speaks: The Music of Nature

Contributors:

By (Author) C. C. Tsai
Translated by Brian Bruya

ISBN:

9780691008820

Publisher:

Princeton University Press

Imprint:

Princeton University Press

Publication Date:

10th October 1992

Country:

United States

Classifications

Readership:

General

Fiction/Non-fiction:

Non Fiction

Main Subject:
Other Subjects:

Strip cartoons

Dewey:

299.51482

Physical Properties

Physical Format:

Paperback

Number of Pages:

160

Dimensions:

Width 216mm, Height 235mm

Weight:

340g

Description

During a period of political and social upheaval in China, the unconventional insights of the great Daoist Zhuangzi (369-286 B.C.) pointed to a way of living naturally. Inspired by his fascination with the wisdom of this sage, the immensely popular Taiwanese cartoonist Tsai Chih Chung created a bestselling Chinese comic book. Tsai had his cartoon characters enact the key parables of Zhuangzi (pronounced jwawngdz), and he rendered Zhuangzi's most enlightening sayings into modern Chinese. Through Tsai's enthusiasm and skill, the earliest and core parts of the Zhuangzi were thus made accessible to millions of Chinese-speaking people with no other real chance of appreciating this major Daoist text. Translated into English by Brian Bruya, the comic book is now available to a Western audience. The classical Chinese text of the selections of the Zhuangzi is reproduced in the margins throughout. Evoked by the translation and the playful cartoons is the spontaneity that Zhuangzi favors as an attitude toward life: abandon presuppositions, intellectual debates, and ambitions, he suggests, and listen to the "music of nature."With the writings attributed to Laozi, the Zhuangzi contributed to an alternative philosophical ideal that matched Confucianism in its impact on Chinese culture. Over the centuries this classical Daoism influenced many aspects of Chinese life, including painting, literature, and the martial arts. It had a particularly strong effect on Chan Buddhism (Japanese Zen). For this book, Donald Munro has written an afterword that places Daoism and the Zhuangzi in historical and cultural context.

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