Burton Books

THE OLD MAN WHO DOES AS HE PLEASES : Selections from the Poetry and Prose of Lu Yu. 126 pp. New York and London : Columbia University Press, 1973. ISBN 0-231-03766-X (hbk.)

Burton Watson has always struck me as an eminently civilized scholar and as a fine translator. Unlike certain others, he wears his scholarship lightly, and doesn't overburden the text with extraneous matter. His many translations from Chinese and Japanese Literature are of uniformly high quality, and are well worth having as they are books one often returns to.

Lu Yu (1125-1210) was an amazingly prolific poet, and left behind almost 10,000 poems as well as a variety of prose writings. His poetry is characterized by occasional spasms of intense patriotism, but mainly by a carefree enjoyment of life. Hence his literary name 'Fang-weng' or 'The old man who does as he pleases.' He adopted this name as a gesture of defiance after being dismissed from his official post for "drunkenness and irresponsibilty." This image of a lively and lovable old rascal is borne out by the poetry.

The present book offers a selection of sixty-three of Lu Yu's poems which provide us with glimpses of the poet's daily life. Here is a brief example, with my obliques added to indicate line breaks :

"My medicine's crude, yet the old farmer / swears it really works. / my poems are shallow, yet the mountain monk / has immoderate praise for their skill. / Cakes in pockets, with packets of tea / they come to pay me a visit. / What harm if in the midst of loneliness / we have one little laugh ? (p.59).

Besides the poems, Watson has also included translations of excerpts from Lu Yu's famous 'Diary of a trip to Shu' which was written in 1170 and describes the sights along the Grand Canal, the hair-raising experience of sailing through the Yangtze gorges, and the temples, shrines, and scenic spots he visited when travelling to take up the position of vice-governor of the province of K'uei-chou. This is a truly marvelous travel journal, and presents us with a vivid picture of life in central China in the twelfth century. Here is a brief passage selected at random which described an event Lu Yu witnessed in the Ch'ien-tao 6th year (1170 A.D.) 12th month :

"25th day : I watched the troops staging a mock battle on the water. There were seven hundred large warships, each ... fitted out with walls and turrets. Their flags and pennants shone brightly, their gongs and drums clattered and clanged as they raced back and forth, crashing through the huge waves as swiftly as though they had wings. Thirty or forty thousand people came to watch - it was in fact one of the most spectacular sights in the world" (p.100)

In addition to a typically interesting and informative Introduction, and his usual light annotations to all selections, Watson has also provided a useful map of 'Places Important in the Life of Lu Yu,' along with some bibliographical information. The book is small 8vo in size (6 by 8.5 inches), beautifully printed on excellent paper, stitched, and bound in full cloth.

Lu Yu was a unique and interesting figure, and anyone who cares for Chinese poetry in English is certain enjoy this book.

As a poet, Lu Yu goes a bit against the grain. Hardly the refined Taoist recluse type, there's something defiantly ordinary and down-to-earth about this man whose greatest unrealized ambition in life was to see his country stop piddling around and go to war already. Probably this guy was a real jerk--but an irresistibly likable one. A good bulk of his poems dwell on patriotic dreams of retaking North China from the Barbarian Chin, and, since this stance went against the official policy of the Southern Sung Dynasty, the rest of his poems dwell in loving detail on his everyday country life when out of a job as a government official. Almost as if to say, yeah, you fired me on trumped-up charges, but I'm doing fine here, thank you all the same. Even his literary name, the loose translation of which figures as the title of this book, evinces some of his defiance, delightfully incorporating the charges of drunken dereliction of duty used against him.

Of course, bombastically hawkish poems with preachy political themes, while convincingly sincere, tend not to weather the passage of centuries all that well even under the best of circumstances, and Lu Yu's seem especially bound to jar against contemporary poetic expectations and sensibilities. The opposite may be said of his irreverent homebody poems of simple everyday family life--these appeal directly to us across the intervening barriers of time, space, culture, and history; they feel more like real poetry to us. In which case the translator, Burton Watson, has struck a judicious balance between these two themes, including enough of the former that we get a proper and accurate sense of what Lu Yu's characteristic concerns were while somewhat favoring the latter ones we (and he, the translator, as he tells us outright) are more likely to enjoy as literature. And as always, with Watson the resulting translations are as close to a brilliant fusion of scholarly accuracy and literary quality as is perhaps humanly possible.

In addition to this modest sampling of Lu Yu's voluminous output of poems, Watson also includes a selective translation of Lu Yu's prose "Diary of a Trip to Shu" (about one third of the original). This seems a bit chopped up, okay for a generalist like me but probably a bit annoying for committed Sinologists. But one gets a vivid impression of the sights and sounds, the experiences and hardships of river travel as Lu Yu records the ups and downs of his trip. Here too we get a glimpse of a different, deeper Lu Yu with hints of an interest in Taoism. Usually poetry is the venue by which scholar officials such as Lu explored such concerns, but there's almost no hint of it in Lu's poetry at all. And then here of all places in a prosaic travel journal on the way to a government post it pops up unexpectedly. Lu Yu, just as he pleases, going against the grain to the very end.

The illustrations in this book are absolutely stunning. They are photographed of modeled clay, and look as crisp and whimsical as the works of Nick Parks (of Wallace and Grommit fame). The sequencing and rhyming of colors and objects is clever, and is still fun the 10th or 20th+ time you read it to your little one. My daughter loves looking for the gray mouse in every picture, and I am still finding new things to discover in the pictures myself. I can't recommend this book highly enough. Ideal for children from 1-3.

The rhythmic text and the brightly-coloured illustrations captivated my child as early as 4 months of age. The repetition of colour from one page to the next and the little mouse collecting a souvenir in each illustration only add that much more to an engaging read-aloud experience.

"To mourn a mischief that is past and gone is the next way to draw new mischief on" is one of the few famous quotes from the book Othello. The quote means "When you lament something bad that's already happened, you're setting yourself up for more bad news" which in my opinion is an omen to what will happen by the end of the story.
Othello is a story about a Moor, or a North African, named Othello and Desdemona who fall in love even if everyone disagrees. Othello is a general of Venice and a powerful figure. He wasn't respected much from the people because of his color and the age difference between him and Desdemona. Desdemona is the daughter of the Venetian senator, Brabantio and is very capable of defending her marriage with Othello. Desdemona and Othello are secretly married before the book even begins and their marriage slowly crumbles as the story goes on thanks to the crafty work of Iago. Iago is one of Othello's friends, or is what everyone thinks. Iago ends up lying to Othello about what Desdemona does behind his back and gets Othello rethinking his marriage.
William Shakespeare is a very well known writer even though his writings were written four centuries ago. Othello is one of the thirty-eight plays written by him. Since they were all written in the Elizabethan age, it is much harder for us to understand what is being said. All of his plays have been translated into the world's major languages. His plays are against the rich lives of his time. Such as the kings and queens. Before and since his death, in April 1616, Shakespeare has been one of the best writers in history.
I liked Othello very much. Even though there are very few description words, since it is written as a script, the imagery was very good. I did like that the ending wasn't really given away like some plays or stories can be. It kept me reading since I didn't know what would happen next. Some of the text was hard to read but there were a few translations at the bottom to help me out. I did read a fully translated version online just to make sure I understood what was really happening. Overall, I loved the book even though it had a sad ending to is since it was a tragedy. I do recommend this book if you are looking for a Shakespeare play that is a good love story.

Before the fall semester came rolling in, I went on a Shakespeare binge to get myself back into reading. On finding the right books, I had certain preferences: 1. I didn't want a modern translation of the work and 2. I didn't want the annotations on the bottom take up 3/4 of the page. Personally, I find it hard to enjoy a work where there are only 4 lines of
it on one page. Not to mention, I don't want the editor's full interpretation and criticism on what "thou" means or something trivial. I just wanted to read the work for what it is.

This is where "The Annotated Shakespeare" comes in. Not only with Othello, they do other Shakespeare works as well like Julius Caesar, MacBeth, and others. What grabbed my attention is that they fill in the criteria in which I set in finding the ideal Shakespeare book with limited, but effective annotations.

Othello is one of my favorite plays (I don't think there's a need to go over the plot) and how it's represented in this book works great for me. The annotations provide thoughtful insight on what certain terms meant as well as providing some historical and educational references. What I like about it is that the editor doesn't get pretentious by getting out of hand with his translation and interpretation of a line. There are very few pages where the annotations take half the page at least, but that's understandable because sometimes, Shakespeare can put in something and it WILL go over your head.

I recommend this for anyone who wants to read and enjoy Shakespeare with limited distractions on a page.

5/5

May I briefly urge music lovers to search out this book about Malcolm Arnold. The author, Piers Burton-Page, reminds us that as a player Arnold was Britain's finest young trumpeter. He then developed rapidly as a composer, reaching his widest audiences with many film scores (The Bridge on the River Kwai, Hobson's Choice, and Whistle down the Wind are among the favourites) and brilliant orchestral works.

Burton-Page paints a fascinating portrait of a composer who has worked in many fields, and whose complex personality gives his music a depth and range which are only hinted at in some of his more popular works.

Why is this valuable book no longer available? In late 2001, just when many concerts around the world are celebrating Arnold's 80th birthday, it seems perverse that the book is no longer in print. There must be some enterprising publisher out there who should seize the moment. Get the authoritative Piers Burton-Page to revise the book and bring it up to date. Burton-Page charts the extraordinary ups and downs of a leading musican's life with affection and honesty. Now let's have the revised edition.

I am biased of course! But I spent 10 years on and off writing about the life and music of Sir Malcolm Arnold - now 75 - and it was a labour of love. He is severely ill with a form of brain damage that has impaired his memory: even so, it was wonderful how he was able to recall incidents from his earliest years in remarkable detail. He was able to help me enormously with the events of his later life too. All this started with a love of his music, and I hope this is reflected in my biography, too. What a shame it is already out of print. Come on some of you publishers out there, how about asking me for an update, and then reprinting

I have studied music for years, and only recently started to produce the outcomes I have desired. When I stumbled upon this book while minding my teachers two cats I knew I had found the secret ingredient missing in my practice routine. I knew I could improve my planning, but I didn't know how. This book puts it right in front of you in easy to follow techniques. Also, the ideas on expectations are great. Just keep improving, one step at the time, and success will eventually follow. The way he puts it is, again, easy to understand and follow. "Better is perfect, and PERFECT is irrelevant!" If you ever want to make the most out of your practicing buck, this book is a must!

This book is great for those musicians that need more encouragement, that also need a guideline on how to practice efficiently, and who want to learn how to prepare themselves to become successful musicians.

Neel Burton has written a valuable textbook which provides a fresh approach to the teaching of psychiatry. The biopsychosocial model or `The Medicine of the Person' (to use Dr Paul Tournier's expression) is pertinent to all branches of medicine, but especially so to psychiatry. In this book it also includes the search of meaning in illness and the spiritual dimension in the Bubber and Frankl sense.

Today's doctor requires an understanding of his own psychological, cultural, and spiritual assumptions to practice in a multicultural society and to retain a vital sense of care and commitment. Training experiences aimed at developing such values-based practice do not usually form part of medical undergraduate training, but may in future become mandatory.

Indeed, values based practice - including an appreciation of the spiritual dimension of illness - are increasingly at the centre of patient care. If we ignore this then our patients with mental disorder will consult everywhere and we may lose that creative spark which helps us to go where the patient is, and to stay there as long as necessary.

Professor John Cox
Secretary General, World Psychiatric Association, Geneva
Past President, Royal College of Psychiatrists, London

You can use this book for a bit of everything: as a core text, on a clinical rotation and as a revision text.

Three major strengths of this book:

1. Organisation: very easy to find your way around and subsequently follow the development of ideas. Spot-on explanations of key concepts, which are concise without being too brief.

2. Presentation: colour-coding, tables, chapter indentation and succinct diagrams. The whole kaboodle makes it pretty much a joy to read, no joking.

3. Case studies: reinforces information you have just read. You appreciate what you've been taking in and what you haven't.

Overall description:

Author clearly sets out objectives in introduction and sticks to them. He spices up the book making the subject even more striking and memorable, while keeping it within context. Doesn't feel like you're reading a typical medical textbook, as it's so lively and imaginative. A heady mixture of different approaches to the subject including history, art and philosophy give it a broad sweep. Make it all very life-like and not too bookish.

The clear chapter divisions encourages you to compartmentalise the material as you go along. There is no risk of being overwhelmed by facts and data. True/false questions capping each chapter see to this. You keep track of your progress. These questions also double as a summary, saving you time if you are skim-reading and looking for specific points.

You learn a lot on diagnosis thanks to clear definitions of different symptoms. Felt a lot less confused about various pathologies. Authoritative reminders of subject guidelines makes you feel good about yourself as you know you're covering what you need to.

Summary points manage to bring together loose strands of thought and keeps structure nicely coherent. Tables and flow charts can be read without accompanying text if you're in a rush.

An excellent all-round book.

"The Hunting Hypothesis" is an extremely readable and interesting book concerning the discoveries made in Africa about ancestors of ours who lived primarily by hunting. These ancestors were around for quite a long time and evolved AS HUNTERS. Both physically and neurologically and/or mentally/instictively we are now, largely, what they became as those of the hunters who tended to survive in each generation.

I wasn't kidding when I said it is one of the best books I have ever read. Those who have read Ardrey's "African Genesis, Territorial Imperative and Social Contract" will probably already know what a great writer he was.

This book (along with Ardrey's other three in what I think of as a sequence) is one of the most important books I have ever read. It (they) are mostly built around the discoveries made in Africa in the early and mid twentieth century of the remains of those of our ancestors who spent millions of years becoming us. Or, from our point of view, how we came to be the way we are.

Unfortunately I only discovered them within the last six or seven years. At various times, when they were published, two or three of them were best sellers... but I guess I was busy with something a lot less important.

His writing is the very best I have run into in this field and has made reading, and rereading, them a literary pleasure in addition to explaining a lot about why I do what I do, and why history is the way it is.

Read this book. If you do I hope you are as pleased as I have been.

The Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series is just wonderful; it's like a "Cliff Note" of the opera, and extremely informative and educational. I particularly like the size; these guides are not cumbersome and fit right into my shirt pocket. The ladies will find sufficient room in their pocketbooks.

The story narrative with the music examples is excellent. I prefer it to a libretto; indeed, it's a much easier way to follow the essence of the story. The essay is magnificent; very well written, not pedantic, and extremely insightful and comprehensible. I congratulate Burton Fisher for a job very well done and Amazon for making these handy, information-laden booklets available. The Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series is a wonderful contribution to opera education and opera appreciation.

My tip: acquire the entire collection because you will be in easy reach of superbly presented opera guides consisting of story analysis, principal characters in the opera, story narrative with music highlights, background, analysis, and commentary.

Heinz Dinter, Ph.D.

There seems to be a complicated mix-up with this product at Amazon. The first time I ordered it I was sent something completely different, and the two reviews below (March 2007 and September 2000) clearly aren't about this item. So to avoid confusion: what is on offer here is a FULL (ORCHESTRAL AND VOCAL) SCORE of Puccini's final opera.

Ricordi has started a series of affordable full scores, Dover-style, but just a tad more classy. While Dover offers reprints of early editions, what you get here is a fully up-to-date version of the score reflecting the latest revisions and edits. The music is printed on firm, white paper and easy to read. It is prefaced by a portrait of the composer, a list of instruments, and a synopsis of the action in English, French and Italian. The Alfano completion of the final duet and finale is included. It is a pity that a little editorial lapse resulted in the omission of a page (238) - in my copy, this is added as an erratum on a separate sheet, but I trust this will be corrected in later reprints. What will be more of a problem for many users is that apart from the synopsis, everything is Italian only, language-wise. If, like me, you don't know what `ottone' are, I'll help you out in advance: they are the onstage brass ensemble. You may encounter some more of such conundrums while perusing the score, but on the plus side, you'll improve your Italian. In the end this is a most worthwhile purchase for any admirer of this magnificent opera; only by seeing the notes you'll become fully aware of its dazzling intricacies.

As a teacher of both 9th grade Basic English and Reading, I use this book all year. The kids love the stories, learn about literary elements and apply that, and don't even mind answering the questions at the end! It may be a little more suited for middle school; definitely not upper-level freshman material. A great book for anyone at their wits' end for a good reading practice activity.

I love this book i am a freshman at mercy high, in ct and every girl in my clas loves this book (it's an all girl school.) Even if you don't need it for school it's all so a good book just o read (lots of cool short stories)

I am so very pleased with the "Reason for Spelling" level A book! I tried countless others as a homeschooling mother of 3, and have found this book to be just what my child needs for starting out. It begins with phonics, then shifts into spelling. The fun exercises hold his interest, but also teach him something of true value each lesson. Each child is different, but in my opinion, most any child will succeed using this series. I plan on buying another workbook for my youngest when her turn comes.

We have been using this curriculum for 3 months with our 6 year old and he loves it! Since he is already reading, we combine the phonics section with the spelling lessons. He loves the illustrations, the poems and he enjoys the exercises. We're seeing terrific results and we don't have to pull teeth to get him to do it!