China Books

Just about every recipe I've tried in here has turned out delicious! Highly recommended!

This book is the best chinese cookery book on the market. It is not only beautifully illustrated, but the recipes are really authentic

This book will be passed down through the years in my family . It is a one of a kind gem . Good work Mr. Mark

The tradition of Chinese imperial cities is one of the longest and best-documented traditions of preindustrial urbanism. Steinhardt identifies the principles that structured traditional Chinese city planning, construction, and use. The book is well written with many good plans and illustrations. A major contribution to urban history.

A classic book -- the paperback version is less intimidating (much lighter in weight and also cheaper in price) than the hardback, so this is a must-have for those interested in Chinese historical studies.

Chinese Imperial City Planning is an excellent historical account of the spatial development of China's ancient cities. Extremely well researched, Steinhardt does a nice job of chronicling the impacts each empire had on urban form in China.

As a scholar interested in Japanese and other East Asian cities, the author's chapter discussing China's historical legacy to urban form in Ancient Japan, was especially interesting. This chapter clearly illustrates how necessary the study of Chinese cities is to the understanding of other Asian cities. It also demonstrates the care Steinhardt took in her research.

I recommend this book to anyone interested in the historical origins of urban planning and spatial form in China and Japan.

The Chinese Negotiator is the culmination of high quality experience as a China/Japan Negotiation trainer, coach, consultant and professor since 1978.I am Bob March, the senior author of "The Chinese Negotiator" (TCN). TCN represents both my China-specific professional experience (1990 to the present), as well as my professional training and coaching experience from 1978 in Japan (as an international business negotiation professor at Aoyama Gakuin University, and as the international business seminar leader at Japan Management Association, training both Japanese and Western managers, 1985 - 1992) as well as China negotiation counsel to Western companies, 1990 to present; online teaching, MBA Program, University of New England. 2000 - 2003, Professional Negotiation Training - China and Japan; MBA Program, Nanjing University, 2006 - 2008). I calculate I have trained six hundred Chinese, Japanese, and Western managers to be more professional international negotiators, and have been involved in many of the twenty odd negotiation cases included in TCN. As many Chinese managers in my training courses have said, once they become involved, "there is no other way to learn professional negotiation". You will never be a professional negotiator if you have not had a mentor who gives you clear, honest feedback, and effective coaching guidance. TCN reflects this long experience as a trainer, coach and consultant. You will get most out of TCN if you follow my instructions about how to prepare for negotiation with the Chinese (also works for the Japanese and other East Asian teams)and allow yourself or your corporate team to let themslves be trained, by following the instructions, especially chapters 10,11,12,13. The "best students", smart managers who are able to apply the steps of preparation and strategy in successive negotations, make the best negotiators. If you are not "trainable", cannot follow instructions, you must get someone else to lead your team. Not everyone makes a satisfactory team leader, and all success starts with who is your team leader. A team of hotshot specialists who can also follow instructions is what the team leader needs.
See also my "The Japanese Negotiator", in paperback. I presently live and work in Hangzhou City, China.

With a small library of negotiation books, there are certain features that for me make a book both an enjoyable and a worthwhile read. Dr Bob March's book The Chinese Negotiator was both enjoyable and highly worthwhile, and is now on the prescribed reading list for Asian consultants of The Negotiation Experts'.

So what makes a negotiation book a worthwhile purchase?
1. Stories, lots of real life interesting business negotiation stories. The more the better. Better yet if the stories are followed with some analysis and advice to maximise learnings. Stories are the hooks upon which we can hang our lessons, so that remembering becomes easy, and reading enjoyable.
2. Processes and frameworks to follow - there are regrettably too many disjointed lists of advice from most other books.
3. Researched understanding of the subject matter, and mature advice that can be trusted.
4. A step above the 'me too' books out there - e.g. loved the Team Negotiation Preparation coverage.
5. Strategems that can be used in your very next deal to either save you from losses, or create value.

Enjoyable bedtime reading for sure.

Very helpful, especially the listing of the 36 Stratagems; I would recommend this book to anyone wanting to do business in China.

This is an articulate and visually stunning book on Chinese Opera. Better pictorial research on the costumes, make-up and architype body poses is not available in English speaking countries. This is a must have research book for those in film and theatre.

If you're looking for a gorgeous book on the fascinating world of chinese opera, this is it. Has quite a good text featuring stories of the more popular operas. Furthermore, discusses regional variations, history and development and modern developments in the art.

This is an extraordinary book filled with pictures and information about every facet of Chinese Opera. It not only describes the operas and the regions from whence they originated, but also provides details such as the musical instruments used, and descriptions of the various the role types. Everything is illustrated, with color pictures on almost every page. The book certainly exceeded my expectations.

Just a quick note to add to the other reviews. This can be read in one sitting. It's a good coffee table book, nice printing and good art, but if you want a serious book of Chinese wisdom, pick another. This would be a very nice gift to someone with a surface interest in the subject.

This is by no means a scholarly book with pages or single-spaced, tiny printed proverbs. It's a fun little book with cute illustrations that makes it child and adult friendly.

This is a great collection of proverbs. The accompanying art is both clever and charming.

The proverbs are so well translated that no additional explanations regarding the proverbs are provided or needed -- they would only serve to clutter up the page. Most importantly the translations preserve the original "flavor" of each proverb.

Each proverb is written in both English and in traditional Chinese characters.

I own a few books of Chinese Proverbs. This is by far the prettiest and most charming.

Sangren's Marxian approach to social analysis is crucial to understanding the phenomenon of culture. This theory is more insightful than other theories because it views culture as an endlessly reproducing machine-like whole that produces individual selves, communities, and society in its process. In turn, people themselves are human agents with power who unconsciously reproduce the machine at all these levels by simply living out their lives. Alienation is an element in this process, and although Sangren focuses mainly on how alienation works regarding Chinese religion, religious gods are only one form of all the alienating idioms people express depending on their situations and interests. When analyzing social reality, alienation becomes a constant while its idioms and the peoples and cultures reflecting them often conflict with each other and change through history, and many times the changes themselves serve only to reproduce the original system as history repeats itself. In addition, Sangren offers a critique of Foucault's concept of power, emphasizing that power is not a "subject" itself with its own agency and intentions and should not be treated like one. Finally, it remains an open question as to whether or not the author should be applying Freudian psychoanalytic concepts to Chinese minds in his last chapter, especially since the Chinese people don't agree with it. Overall, the book makes one wonder if the human mind will ever mutate out of the circular logics that form the basis of the reasoning that social orders are built upon.

Are you interested in Anthropological theory but tired of one's that that ignore the power of people as human agents to reproduce their own cultures? Sangren's focus on alienation shows how people themselves play an integral part in this process. Did you ever think that your belief in a god might actually be contributing to the survival of your own culture? Or, if you're being exploited, did you ever wonder how your own actions could be contributing to your own exploitation and reproducing your own circumstances? Although answers to these questions are not provided directly, they can be derived from Sangren's extremely thought-provoking model that is not only relevant to Chinese society, but with some tweaking, can be applied anywhere! Employing concepts like alienation, misrepresentation, and mystification, this model comes from a Marxian dialectical approach that proves to be so much more enlightening than postmodern theories about culture.
Critics might argue that the theory doesn't account for change, but how can any approach account for change before understanding, totally, the nature of the culture that changes in the first place? Social realities in any culture might not be pretty, but anthropologists have to first face the facts before they can understand change. For example, reality may include seemingly inescapable relationships of exploitation(like in his analysis of Chinese women's circumstances), but if analysts ignore how people, as productive agents, might be reproducing their own exploitation even through resistant behaviors, they will never be able to account for how true creative change happens.
Although Sangren's model doesn't yet account for change, his special attention to how people are also true agents of power can certainly inspire change!

Chinese Sociologics: An Anthropological Account Of The Role Of Alienation In Social Reproduction presents an original, thought-provoking, articulate analysis of Chinese culture and society along with a compelling, scholarly critique of contemporary social theory. Steven Sangren (Professor of Anthropology at Cornell University) insightful explores the various dimensions of both social and individual life in China, including the effect of gender and desire. After an informative introduction, individual chapters address Why "Culture": Why "Production?"; History and the Rhetoric of Legitimacy: The Mazu Cult of Taiwan; Dialectics of Alienation: Individuals and the Collectivities in Chinese Religion; Power and Transcendence in the Mazu Pilgrimages of Taiwan; "Power" Against Ideology: A Critique of Foucaultian Usage; Women's Production: Gender and Exploitation in Patrilinear Mode; Fathers and Sons in a Patrilinear mode of Desire: Preliminary Analysis of the Story of Nezha from Fengshen Yanyi; Afterword: "Excess"; Change and the Limits of Analysis. Enhanced with a Character List, References, and an Index, Chinese Sociologics is a meticulous and very highly recommended work for students of contemporary Chinese culture, multicultural sociology, and social rituals.

Although many historical accounts of the cold war largely address the standoff in terms of the interrelationship between its most easily recognizable major players--the U.S., the People's Republic of China (PRC), and the U.S.S.R.--Steve Tsang's The Cold War's Odd Couple provides a fascinating alternate perspective. Tsang's book examines the manner in which the Kuomintang-controlled Republic of China (ROC), from its exiled position on the island of Taiwan, played a fundamentally important role in influencing the international balance of power during the cold war's critical early years. This book examines the complex web of interrelationships that developed between the ROC, the PRC, the UK, and the U.S. during the early cold war period, and also explains the significant impact that the Korean War, and the two Taiwan Strait crises of the 1950s, had upon these relationships. The book demonstrates that, even though the UK severed all of its formal diplomatic relations with the ROC in early 1950 in favor of official recognition of the PRC government, the ROC and the UK were nonetheless able to cultivate a mutually beneficial, informal relationship that had a significant impact upon cold war politics and that, by 1958, had evolved into an unintended partnership between the two governments. Because Tsang's book examines the South Asian cold war theater from a multinational perspective, it lends itself to a diverse array of readers. Students, researchers, and historians working in a number of fields, including cold war, Korean War, Taiwanese, Chinese, U.S., UK, and Hong Kong history, as well as post-colonial disciplines, will find that The Cold War's Odd Couple provides an enlightening new look at the cold war, its relationship to South Asian politics, and the twentieth-century origins of the contemporary, tenuous Taiwan-China relationship.

I bought this book because of its intriguing title. I was not disappointed. I did not realize Britain was the only country that maintained a consulate in Taiwan and kept a naval liaison officer there after it recognized China in 1950. Nor did I know Britain was the first country to attempt a `positive engagement' policy towards China in the 1950s, and failed miserably. Equally interesting is the revelation of the importance of the Suez Crisis in affecting Britain's position and policies in East Asia. The special relationship between Britain and the US was changed by the Suez fiasco and this was reflected in how Britain handled its relations with the US and Taiwan over the two Taiwan Strait Crises of the 1950s. There are so many interesting and important new findings in this highly readable book that I recommend it strongly.

This is an excellent book on the Cold War that is written in nice prose and argued cogently. I had not realized Britain and Taiwan played such important roles in the Cold War in Asia. Even less did I know Taiwan (which is what the Republic of China is) was not just a pawn but a key player itself, not least in the two Taiwan Strait Crises of the 1950s. As a bonus this book provides the best and most convincing explanation for Maoist China to start these crises. There is much in this book that is new and insightful. A highly recommended book not only for the specialists but for general readers as it is an easy read.

I inherited my grandmother's Noritake china set when she died, and wanted to know the year of production and what it was worth. The pictures of the maker's marks and patterns were very useful. I discovered our pattern was made in 1931, and was worth about $2,500! Not that I would ever part with such a sentimental gift...It's just nice to know the history of something. Thanks to the author for her research!

I found this book to be very useful. It's very well organized and well written. An only suggestion for the next edition is to have glossier/brighter/clearer photographs.

I found this book to be logical and informative. The foundation of this book is based upon the chronilogical use of each mark. The patterns are then listed alphabetically within the time period that "mark" was used. Because of this book - all my freinds and colleages think of me as a "Early Noritake Expert" - I dont have the heart to tell them that I am not! I highly recommend this book to any and all collectors and/or dealers of Noritake!

I was so pleased to receive this book. Mr. Conti elevates biographical data to a new plane. His descriptions are insightful and useful in the evaluation of Sascha art. This is one of the best books I've acquired on Amazon.

Thsi is one of the most informative books I own, and I have aver 100 books on Antiques and Collectibles. Wonderful pictures, price guide, and the most interesting biography of Sacha's life beginning in early childhood.

Very well written with wonderful pictures. A most interesting biography of Saschas life. Anyone interested in pottery, sculpture, and many other forms of art will love this book. Feel free to contact me regarding this excellent book. I have a very large library of books on antiques and collectibles, this is my favorite.

I agree that this book rings hauntingly true, from my own travels on the mainland, Hong Kong, and living in Taiwan. I've read just about all of the most popular autobiographies of Chinese who lived through the Cultural Revolution (the last decade has seen a flood of these, many very good reads), but never have I wanted so BADLY to meet the author as with this book. She rings so true and human, if it's not all true, she is a powerful story teller... She is feisty, funny, and a true survivor... I love the book and her for sharing it with me...

I came across this book at the library one day while looking for a memoir on the Cultural Revolution. Most of the books that I have read about the Moaist years in China have been about people who didn't realize the effect the Party and Mao had on them. But author Chen Chen was raised by liberal parents and was educated in the Western style. This probably allowed her to relize that some of the movements and programs were a little odd and forced the Party's power on to the brainwashed citizens and the now lost generation. I was totally engrossed in this novel because the story was told by someone who understood what was happening and who was brainwashed.

I have traveled to China on business for 20 years. What struck me was not just the story of the China(s) that I know, but the much deeper and more complex China that I do not know. The author's descriptions ring true to everything I have seen and to the small glimpses I have had of what goes on that is not according to the official story. For instance, I have seen first hand what the author talks about in the generation whose education and professional lives were sacrificed to the cultural revolution. In the late 70's and early 80's, technical meetings would consist of a few older experts and a multitude of young trainees. There were none in the middle age groups who would normally be just entering the peak of their professional lives. A generation on, this is no longer so evident but the effects are still there. Thanks to Toto, by the way, for giving me the opportunity to enjoy this book. I was aware of the difference between the monolithic official line and the incredibly pluralistic personal views of individual Chinese. This book brought home to me just how much more there is to China and the people of China than I known. The events related here would make a fabulous fantasy tale. The strangest thing is that they were instead the normal, every day lives for most of a billion people for many, many years. I heartily recommend this book to any who want an intense and closeup view of China in the last 50 years.