Asia Books

I would not recommend this work if you haven't had vast exposure to the Ramayana and the Mahabharata (from any translators). If you have a good acquaintance with the major players of these epics, then this book will help clarify many things, as it provides back story that isn't covered in either epic, that explains many otherwise odd aspects of some of the characters' actions and beliefs. No collection of Indian epics is complete without it. Wonderfully written, and a joy to read overall.

R.K Narayan is perhaps one of the best known Indo Anglican writers. He is known capture the Indianness of his subject despite of writing in english. In this wonderful little book he tries to narrate some excerpts from Indian mythology. These are chosen from portions of great epics to folk lore tales. Most of these tales are usually naratted by a priest or some story teller in a villlage side temple. Having listened to some of those story telling concerts I would say Narayan's book gives you the same exhiliration and joy you would experience as you listen to a live story teller in a village.

Fantastic book from truly one of the greatest english writing authors of the 20th Century. Once you read Narayan, any other author is only second best.

This is a very nice book in which R.K. Narayan retells various stories and legends from India. The stories range from those of Devi to the demon king Ravana and pretty much everything in between. What makes this particularly nice is Narayan's mastery of the English language. He manages to make these stories understandable and approachable for a western audience, and in doing so has created a wonderful book. Even if you are not familar with the many epics of ancient India, I strongly recommend that you approach this book. It makes it very easy for westerners to understand and appreciate the cultural works of South Asia. Check it out.

I just finished reading this book -- it is extraordinary and well worth buying. In many respects this is the ultimate 'self help' guide. It is the kind of book you read when facing adversity in life, or give to a friend when they are looking down. Sichan Siv has faced the worst life has to offer and has made it to the top. Anyone who thinks they can't rebound or pick themselves up from tough times should read Siv's story.

The other remarkable message is the opportunities that America gives to everyone, no matter what your background. Siv came to the U.S. as a refugee and soon found himself working in the White House. What other country on the planet offers opportunities like that? Another inspirational message to people of any background, color, education, etc. about what can be accomplished if you keep on trying.

Golden Bones is a true story which will inspire and captivate you from beginning to end.

Ambassador Sichan Siv shares his journey from his younger days in Cambodia to the White House to the United Nations. His story reminds us that America is a great country and that with hope and hard work-- dreams do come true.

This book intertwines history, Cambodian and American culture with a tale of courage and hope. A must read for all and a story we, as a land of immigrants, can appreciate. His story is the American Dream.

I must congratulate the author for creating such a powerful story that will inspire us all for generations to come. It takes an incredible amount of courage to relive those moments in order to tell of them. On behalf of all of us who are fortunate to be able to read of his journey, we thank him for his soulful outpouring and for sharing a piece of history that we might otherwise never have known about.

From cultural highlights about Cambodia (arranged marriages, faith, and even pet bears), to the carnage of the Khmer Rouge, to public speaking tips (Z180 delivery), to even getting ripped off in NYC, Sichan has created a memorable book that reminds us that the key to overcoming anything life throws at us is to keep that optimistic spirit alive, and to treat others around you with endless kindness and respect.

Golden Bones reads like fiction, until you realize it is a true story. It is history, international politics, intrigue, the White House, United Nations and a love story all rolled into one. I started it on a Friday evening and could not put it down until I finished it on Sunday. What a most fascinating and moving story. The courage and leadership showed by Sichan Siv at such a young age was remarkable, and should be an inspiration to everyone. Fleeing hell and thirteen years later becoming a Presidential aide sounds more like a novel than reality.

In addition, I enjoyed learning more about the history and culture of Cambodia.

While reading Golden Bones, I was often in tears, and frequently, crying. Ambassador Siv's escape during the 1975-1976 period occurred when I was working in the White House. I saw how difficult his life was, and thought how soft it was for me at that same time. I can't even imagine what it was like to learn that your family had been brutally murdered. The description of his mother and family was wonderful and heart warming. His escape from the Khmer Rouge and the Killing Fields was remarkable and riveting.

Sichan Siv's return to Cambodia in 1992 representing the President of the United States must have been one of the most enjoyable and emotional moments of his life. Also, what a thrill to have the Dalai Lama ask for your autograph?

After going through hell, Ambassador Siv had so many good things happen to him upon arriving in the United States, but, obviously, meeting Martha Lee Pattillo, his future wife, had to be at the top of the list. His description of their courtship and relationship has the making of a movie, a true love story.

One of my regular tennis partners while in the White House was George H. W. Bush, before he became "41," so I also share Sichan Siv's great admiration for him. (Bush, Sr. was our liaison to China and then Director of the C.I.A. in those days).

I learned a great deal from Golden Bones, including courage, motivation and leadership, not to mention ABC, (American By Choice), and overall, one must work hard to achieve their objectives. Also, I'll always remember, "No matter what happens, never give up."

Golden Bones is an inspiring and uplifting story for people of all ages and walks of life.

John G. Carlson

Golden Bones is one of the most amazing, inspiring stories that I have ever come across. It is really at least two inspirational stories. The first is Sichan Siv's tale of survival during the murderous reign of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia--a reign that killed over a fifth of Siv's countrymen and almost his entire family. His dramatic, against-all-odds escape from Cambodia by bicycling across the entire country, somehow escaping detection and outwitting the Khmer Rouge, is an epic in and of itself. The second story--how Siv rose from a penniless refugee in the U.S. to a high-ranking White House official and later a U.S. Ambassador--is an incredible tale in its own right. His rise from working as a New York cab driver plying the streets outside the U.N. to a high-ranking Ambassador representing the U.S. inside the U.N. is one of those "only in America" stories that should make us all proud. The book keeps you on the edge of your seat as it navigates through all of the dramatic twists and turns of Sichan Siv's remarkable life. This book is required reading!

This book is sometimes referred to as Tagore's response to Kipling's Kim, but it's much more; in fact, there's only a single British official in the novel, and he only appears for several pages. This novel takes place in Kolkata in the mid 1880s (?), and focuses on the generation coming of age a few decades after the Sepoy Rebellion, especially on the Brahman revivalist Gora and his close friend Binoy, who is drawn to a less restrictive code. They form close personal, and gradually romantic connections, with the strong-willed girls in a family involved in the equally restrictive Hindu Samaj movement. Though the characters struggle to reconcile themselves with Bengali etiquette, they also embody the modernizing impulses of the nascent nationalist movement that is informed by English education and social values.

The above may sound dry, but the novel is quite gripping, and it provides a nuanced and loving recreation of a generation struggling to come to terms with India's extreme cultural & religious diversity and the outside influences that place additional strain on it. And, from our post-Partition perspective, we see perhaps the last, best chance to create one, comprehensive Bharatvarsha.

Although it has a very helpful introduction and notes, I've given the work 4 stars because of the occasional misspellings and syntactic trainwrecks that occur every 30 or 40 pages (there aren't many, but when they occur, it's quite messy).

To truly appreciate this book one needs to have some fair idea of the social, religious and political situation of India during the late nineteenth-early twentieth century. This book revolutionised the thinking and beliefs of the then contemporary modern thinkers and intellectuals, laying the foundation of the idea of a secular Indian society. The underlying theme is the essence of being a human, and very few in the history of mankind could find words that brings this out so beautifully (more so in the original Bengali, much of it is lost in the English translation). The reader undergoes the journey of self discovery along with the main protagonist, Gora. The beauty of Tagore's writing is that the unpredicatability and the vulnerability of the characters make them so natural and real, bringing out the inherent self-contradictions of human beings until they discover their true self and then all the cunfusions and the contradictions in one's own faith vanish. One finds one's place in this cosmos, realises the implication of being a human, experiences the beauty of life. And this makes the appeal of the book timeless.

This was one of the first book i had read. i was a teenager then. and although gora being a very bullheaded guy had become my hero. he was a believer. he was a proud Hindu or at least he thought he was a hindu. he was a leader and believed that if he did anything not permitted in hindu society then everyone else wud do it too. he made it his responsibility awaken religious beliefs in society. and in the process he met a family consisting of all women of another cast. he tried to stay away from them but couldn't and fell in love with one of them. but being a responsible hindu he stopped himselves from taking any steps to come closer to her.
the best part was the end of the novel when he comes to know that his all beleifs were baseless. he was not what he had believes himselves to be and that just changed his outlook in life. and it suddenly opened up his heart to each and every human being. he had become a believer of humanism instead of any religion.
women characters were all too good and Lalita was my favorite. all the arguments in the novels teached me a lot about indian society and religion. i had read this book several times since then. This Is a true classic novel.... WE are proud of u Rabindra Nath Tagore.

Gora is inteligent, energetic and a strong believer. He believes in believing and acting for those beliefs. He is strong he is aggressive. He thinks that the strong belief can bring in all the good. Strong belief in God, Culture, country, ... will automatically make them self confident and will lead to progress. Which will eliminate the problems for the society. He subscribes to the beliefs, that he thinks are birth right to him. He is strong Hindu, He is strong Indian, Strong __, ... At the end he comes to know that his all the beliefs are baseless. He is devastated! The meaning of his existence was closely bound to his beliefs, but there is nothing to believe. What can he survive on? He gains new insights and so do we.

All the women characters are simply great!! Which is very characteristic of Tagore and Sharad Chandra.

This book changed me!

My son read this book as part of a book club. He enjoyed it thouroughly. It gave us an opportunity to talk about a different culture. Some of the text describing the behaviors and actions of the characters were a great place to ask text comprehension questions. I enjoyed reading it along side with my son.

I read this book and then had my 8 year old daughter read it and give me a report on it. She not only loved the story, she picked up on Pong Lo's plan right away and couldn't wait to get to the end to see what came of it. It's a very good story with more than one great lesson.

Multiplicaton pays the bills .He wants to marry the princess,but he is a peasant. See how Pong Lo wins the right to marry her by using his math skills. Wonderful story about an old culture and about how smart people are regardless of their social stature.Ahhhhh....yes ! DON'T FORGET THE RICE.

This is a great story for teaching how something as small as a grain of rice can earn a farmer a marriage to the princess, and a kingdom. Multiplication is used in the book, and can spring into a math lesson for teachers and parents alike. It is most likely to interest 4th and 5th grade children.

Prof. Mungello wrote this comprehensive book on the intercourse of China and West in culture and religion in a highly readable text.
Between 1500-1800, China was a powerful country. Catholics dreamed of converting China into a Christian country. However, it was Chinese influence to Europe to bring about Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions. He showed that missionaries sent back Tao Te Ching, I Ching and Confucius teaching to the European educated to help bring about the Enlightenment Movement.
What would happen when China is Christianized and the West goes Taoist Way?
By 1800, China was still in its glorious satisfaction while European Powers underwent industrialization. Britain unable to balance the trade deficit pushed opium and war on China. The 1997 Hong Kong Hand-over concluded the last British Imperial chapter in history. China was at its nadir at 1900 Boxer Movement with eight foreign countries invaded Peking.
Napoleon said, "When China wakes, it will shock the world". History affirms the Tao in East and West, strong and weak, grandeur and decline, war and peace. Prof. Mungello presents the readers the historical background to understand the modern China. A number of Westerners see Deng's reform with market economy lead to China rising as a world threat. Reading this book will help open up their horizon.

Will US wage war on China in the billions of dollar trade deficit as their British cousins did in 19th Century?

I think Mungello has done a wonderful job in reconstructing the meeting between China and the Western world.

Dr. Mungello has done a great job in presenting how the (Far) West met with Chinese culture over the period of 1500-1800. This book was written in easy and non-technical language. As a Chinese that has learnt Chinese history all through my school years, I am intrigued to read simialar materials presented from a Western perspective in simple English.

Dr. Mungello noted that the Chinese in Song Dynasty mistook the picture of Virgin Mary as Guanyin (Chinese Goddess of the sea). A three-story high statue given by Portuguese to Macau, China shortly before 1999 was meant to be Guanyin but it certainly looks like Virgin Mary. What went around has come around:) Thanks for writing such a good book and I enjoyed it very much.

University Profs take note: Although I had to read this book because I was in the author's class at Baylor, it really is a good introductory book. Dr. Mungello is one of the world's top Sinologists and did his graduate work at the U. of California at Berkeley and I am privelaged to be one of his students.

Half of the book is focused at the West meeting China, and the other half is China meeting the West. It answers the questions: What did the West reject and accept from China? What did China accept and reject from the West?

This remarkable, very readable book is written as a conversation between two women born in Beijing at the same time as the People's Republic of China. As the women explore the similarities and differences in their experiences--from housing arrangements, to elementary school, to their roles in the early months of the Cultural Revolution, to the years spent working in rural China--the reader learns about the wide range of what it means to have grown up in the PRC. The result is a reflective, thought-full, and nuanced look at this tumultuous period in China's recent history.

Weili's book is remarkable. I was struck by her honesty, studiousness of recording details, and courage of facing the past events, no matter how ugly they were, and searching for the truths and true feelings. One of the most memorable moments of the book was the story about Weili's mother, walking 20 miles, close to the distance of a Marathon, to give birth in the cold winter by herself in 1945. As a female soldier in the People's Liberation Army, Weili's mother had to go outside of the WWII Japanese controlled territory to avoid capture. She was crippled for many years after this experience. Weili's mother's personal story was an example of the war time suffering the Chinese people went through. Weili described this story to give background on her family and the Great Culture Revolution. Ironically, many people who suffered a great deal to establish the new government in 1949 were tormented, imprisoned, or killed during the Great Culture Revolution.

Why should one read Weili's oral history book on the Great Culture Revolution in China? Here are the reasons I would suggest:

1) To understand what happened in history.

Weili and Ma Xiao Dong's personal encounters were a part of the Chinese history, and a part of the human history. The author described the years of her youth spent in China when the daily reality seemed so unbelievable and crazy. A totalitarian region was created to isolate the 1 billion Chinese people from the rest of the world. It could be called the biggest scale social experiment. In the name of revolution, beating someone to death, looting, and public humiliation were common practice in those days. Once targeted as a counter-revolutionist for whatever reasons, one lost individual rights and faced physical attacks by the mobs.


Yet, those 10 traumatic years were not a total loss. The authors wanted to show you that living an innocent and simple life was somewhat possible at times for young people. The young people were initially enthusiastic to fight for the revolution and get reeducated by going to the country side. They were with people their age, away from home to serve as laborers on the farms for 5, 10, or even sometimes 20 years. They sang, performed, and made friends. Later, the reality of famine, poverty, and personal encounters in the country side left them confused and disillusioned. They matured beyond their years due to the sent-down experience.


2) To learn from this period of Chinese history. How did the Culture Revolution happen?

It happened mostly because Mao's communism "religion" dominated all. Weili's stories took us to a different time when everyone was labeled and categorized into 9 different "red" and "black" types. The man-made caste system marginalized the intellectuals and business people. So beware of religious fanatics or other ideology fanatics who would not tolerate others with different viewpoints, and do not let one voice dominate a country or a group. Masses can be brainwashed into a lot of ugly things such as killing neighbors who are identified as enemies. Racial violence and ethnic cleansings are examples of those belief systems in other parts of the world.

Second, life itself was not valued in the teaching of the time. Young kids were taught that life should be easily given up for a greater cause such as the revolution. There were plenty of books and films on the heroes who sacrificed lives for the new government. In addition, killing or beating an "enemy" was encouraged. Not respecting life was also one of the reasons that the Culture Revolution caused so much damage.

The third reason that the Culture Revolution occurred was due to the desire to negate history or anything old while jamming down a new belief system. The poetic side of Mao wanted to cleanse the past and create a new society. As Mao grew increasingly impatient with the speed of the progress, he resorted to extreme measures of "cleansing," - the Great Culture Revolution. The Red Guards (young people who pledged allegiance to the revolution) and the masses fought, killed, or tormented anything or anybody who were deemed counter-revolutionary. The violence was justified and praised. The Red Guards thought that they were doing the right thing for a cause. Later Red Guards fought each other because one group thought it was more revolutionary than another.

3) To appreciate women's perspectives on growing up during the culture revolution. The new government was supposed to have liberated women. They were equal to men in a lot of ways. Considering that women still had feet bound 50-60 years earlier, this was a remarkable accomplishment. Weili's mother was a combat pilot during the revolution. Weili's mother said that women must stand tall, which seemed to be something Hilary Clinton would have said.

However, the authors described what they experienced and learned as women, Chinese women specifically, in a male-dominated society. Weili's mother held leadership positions outside of the house, yet at home she cooked, cleaned, respected her husband's authority, and was a model wife. Women were expected to play these two different roles in a modern society. Moreover, the media and culture at the time encouraged young women to dress like soldiers with uniforms and heavy belts. Femininity was denied and considered "bourgeois." The young women at times did not want to be mothers because culturally motherhood devalued a woman and raising kids appeared to be hard, tedious, and not as meaningful as other work. If life is not valued, of course the tasks of raising kids are not respected.

The dialog format throughout the book was powerful and very easy to read. The author had a very crisp and clear writing style on some of the most difficult subjects. All in all, a terrific reading experience for me.

I believe a book is best useful when it makes me question myself or change my attitude. Ye and Ma's book is definitely one of such books. They help me see the Cultural Revolution in a new light.
Born after the Cultural Revolution, I do not have the opportunity to live this turbulent time myself. Identified as poor-peasants (pin-nong, though not peasant at all) and being non-intellectuals, both my father's and mother's families were not targeted or severely affected in the Cultural Revolution. Or if they were, they did a good job shielding me from that memory. My high school history book only gave a cursory glance at the Cultural Revolution, about which my history teacher did not take the liberty to say more. The notion that "this is a taboo" had been planted in my immature mind without myself knowing exactly where it came from. Therefore, I never thought about inquiring about it before I went to college.
Since then I came to understand how and why it was a mistake, a huge mistake that was almost irreparable. However, what has done cannot be undone. What we can do is to mind the present and create a better future to make up for the losses. I brought into the general morale of "looking-forward" (xiangqiankan, this is more telling in its homophone in Chinese which means "looking toward money") and felt reassured about it.
However, now being a graduate student in the United States, I was exposed to more western intellectual works. Their obsession with the Cultural Revolution made me unable to continue my "ostrich strategy." As one of the generation "growing up under the red flag," I read such starkly downbeat criticism of the Cultural Revolution as capitalism's unrelenting ideological attack on the Chinese Party: Cultural Revolution, as China's stigma, is the best topic they can engage in order to castigate China. Nationalist sentiment also made me reluctant to directly confront this traumatic national memory. Particularly, I had a hard time reading the "victim literature" produced by people who suffered during that time and later went to the West--the "land of free speech"--to let out their sorrow and hatred. I knew I was unfair to them--they have been so profoundly affected by that past that time cannot separate them from its horror or undo its effects. I also knew my resentment testified to the success of Chinese government's "thought control." However, no matter where my sources of rejecting the negative portrayal of the Cultural Revolution came from and no matter to what extent I could question myself, the more stark and inhuman the Cultural Revolution is depicted, the less I would trust the accounts.
Yet, Growing up in the People's Republic finally enabled me to comfortably and bravely face up to this burden of history. On the one hand, Ye honestly related the death of her school principal, the story that has haunted her for years, and Ma daringly confesses her participation in violence, which is made more compelling as she juxtaposes it with the violence her mother was afflicted with. The immense difficulty they have in "opening up deep wounds" reveals the highest moral integrity. On the other hand, their telling of the sweet childhood adds an intimate dimension to this supposedly brutal age. Ye's apathy to join the revolution in contrast to Ma's enthusiasm in embracing the "winds and waves" convinces me that they did not grow up "drinking wolf milk," as they are represented in some literature. The complexity of this era can only be understood by lending a humanistic understanding to the seemingly unimaginable individual behavior. By transforming the unbelievable into the understandable, what this book gives me touches at a level deeper than history.

I am the author of the book Growing Up in the People's Republic: Conversations between Two Daughters of China's Revolution. (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005). I am very grateful to the press for bringing it out to the reader, yet I have to say I feel dismayed by the cover design. The actual cover is not the same as the one shown on Amonzon.com. The most conspicuous feature on the current cover is a rather mean-spirited looking Chinese soldier. Judging by the modern communication equipments he's is wearing, the soldier is a military policeman. Incidentally, the military police only began to appear in China in the 1980s. What does a soldier of the police force have to do with a book about the growing-up experiences of two women in the 1950s and 1960s?

Yet I understand right away the symbolic meaning of the soldier. What he represents is a dark, repressive "police state." It is exactly this highly simplistic and unrelievedly negative image of the PRC (People's Republic of China) that I question in the book. What my book presents is a multi-faceted picture of the "Mao era." Through the conversations between me and Ma Xiaodong (my conversational partner in the book), we try to sort out, from personal, generational, and gendered perspectives, the entangled history and mixed legacy of a complex age. What distinguishes my book from most of the existing personal memoirs on the Mao era is precisely this more nuanced and more reflective approach. Such a distinction is recognized by Prof. Paul Cohen in his Forward to the book as well as the description of the book on the back jacket.

Unfortunately, the current jacket design contradicts what the book is about. It misrepresents the book and undermines its central message. It is an irony that a book intending to reveal the many "shades of grey" of a complex world is packed in "black-and-white" color. As the author, I believe I should let my readers know what I think about the matter. It is also worth noting here that I was not consulted with about this design beforehand. In this specific case, there was a lack of communication between the press and the author.

Thank you very much for reading the book. I'd appreciate it deeply if I could hear your feedback.

Thanks for a great book..

The Healthy Jewish Cookbook collects one hundred mouth-watering recipes from around the world. Full-color photographs illustrate cultural delicacies from Fava Beans in Olive Oil, to Roast Tomatoes with Garlic, to Vegetarian Cholent, Spiced Lamb Cutlets, Coconut Bread Pudding with Strawberries, and much more. The meticulous instructions touch upon the history, tradition, and health benefits of individual recipes as well as the mechanics of how to prepare them. An index allows for quick and easy references in this visual and taste-pleasing compilation.

So far this is a book that I will have for a very long time. It is well written and well illustrated.

I purchased a copy at Eichlers Judaica (Boro Park), and i was amazed at this beautiful collection of pictures, and very good recipes.

This work is most misunderstood by those who approvingly cite this, and by those who criticize this work. This misunderstanding has nothing to do with the structure of the book, but everything to do with the nature of any scientific hypothesis. The author has *not* criticized the concept 'religion' because the latter is western: do we think the concept of positron is western? And this book is not a critique of essentialism: entire natural sciences are `essentialistic.' `culture' is not monolithic; of course, species is not monolithic either, yet is amenable to study. What properties of Christianity are ones by virtue of which Christianity is a religion? Here Sweet Willman, in his criticism of the book, presumed that the properties of Christianity = the properties of religion. There are others who criticize it because it conflicts with their intuition. Of course, the author explained the necessity of experiencing religion in India.

Coming back to what the book does: the author identified a set of problems through historical research. Any theory of religion has to solve these problems. The author proposed a hypothesis of religion that solves these problems, and further explains the experience of believers; that shows why one can't study, say, Christianity as religion without being a believer. Then it is showed, one is compelled to do theology in order to study Christianity as a world view. Given this, the author shifted the study to a different level of abstraction: religion as that which generates a configuration of learning. This hypothesis sheds light on various issues: skepticism of Antiquity; origin of natural sciences in the West; vacuous debates of all sorts of relativism; cultural differences; theories of actions; etc. In other words, this theory does generate more problems, and can solve the same problems-in the long run.

The author nowhere did mention that `Hinduism', `Buddhism' etc. are not `something' else but not religions; whatever conceptual gestalts these entities `Hinduism' etc. refer to are non-existent in the way unicorn is.

It is not often that one reads a book that changes one's outlook drastically. This is one such book. I am really impressed. Sooner or later, the ideas propounded in this book will prove to be a major challenge to many disciplines like anthropology, religious studies, and such like.

It is not often that one reads a book that changes one's outlook drastically. This is one such book. I am really impressed. Sooner or later, the ideas propounded in this book will prove to be a major challenge to many disciplines like anthropology, religious studies, and such like.

Although the theory on religion that is submitted in this book is generally found to be highly controversial, Balagangadhara's arguments are so strong that one cannot simply dismiss this theory as intellectual 'spielerei'. His account identifies crucial constraints on Western thinking about other cultures and the social world in general, and convincingly explains why even 'giants and geniusses' have not been able to surmount these constraints. I heartily recommend this fantastic book. In the legendary words of one reader: "it might even change your world view."

Ho trovato questo libro molto ben fatto.
Le riproduzioni sono bellissime e ognuna e' dettagliatamente ed analiticamente spiegata.
Lo consiglio vivamente

Loved the selection and quality of the prints. Great as a gift to someone who is interested in the subject

There are too few book editions of the print series of Hiroshige. There are a few books featuring his "100 Views of Edo" such as the excellent one by Uspensky which I own; a smallish paperback version of the first edition of "53 Stations of the Tokaido" by Muneshige Narazaki; and a book featuring his early bird and flower prints. This book by Marije Jansen is a fine and welcome addition to the few books we have.
The book illustrates Hiroshige's "Rokujuyoshu Meisho Zue", "The Famous Views of Sixty-odd Provinces", meaning "more than sixty provinces". The prints featured are from the first edition set owned by Professor Gerhard Pulverer, and were once owned by Frank Lloyd Wright. The introduction features the ubiquitous biography of Hiroshige, followed by an overview of his well known landscape series, an overview of the Provinces series illustrated, a discussion of the format used, later editions of the series, and an explanation regarding the Pulverer prints.
After the introduction, there is a map of Japan showing the locations of every print in the series. The map, and the accompanying key on the opposite page, show that the prints were arranged geographically.
The main body of the book has explanatory text and images on the left hand pages, with a full page print from the series on the right. There are 70 prints. These include the table of contents print, 68 prints of the Provinces, and a print of the capital Edo (#17).
The author gives a brief explanation of each print and what it depicts. A great deal of research has been done on the historical, artistic, and literary background of each scene.
In the upper left of the text page there is factual information on the date, the censors, the block-cutter, and the publisher. The location of the various seals is explained for every print. At the bottom of every text page is a smaller version of the print keyed to a description of how later editions degraded in quality. These include things like poorer colors, missing colors, loss of wood grain, etc. There are usually 10-12 items described per print. This is invaluable for collectors and artists studying wood block printing.
Unlike his prints of the Edo and Fuji environs, and his Tokaido series, Hiroshige did not visit all the locations shown. He was one of the first Japanese landscape artists who actually did make prints from sketches of places he actually visited. It was customary for artists to use the sketches or verbal descriptions of others to make prints, and many of the prints in this series were taken from the guidebook "Sansui Kikan" by Fuchigami Kyokko (26 of the prints), as well as other sources. The prints are wonderful however.
The images are large and beautiful, and this book will give you many hours of enjoyment. You'll want to look through the prints again and again. I know I do.

the book is totally wonderful! completely met my expectations. i couldn"t be happier with it or the service.

I bought this book for its China centered content, and I was not let down, but what I liked best about this work is that Professor Cohen weaves in a fourth component; a discourse on what historians actually do. Just as he divides the Boxer Movement into the above noted three parts he does so as well with the historical craft itself, in the process explaining his development as a historian and seriously examining in what ways history itself can have value greater than myth and commonly held beliefs. Cohen approaches history in a modest, human, and clear thinking way which makes this highly academic work also highly enjoyable to read. I enthusiastically recommend this wonderful book to anybody that is interested in Chinese society, Chinese history, or the art of making history.

I enjoyed this book immensely. The book is split into three parts, each covering the same events from different perspective.

The first part is covered just like most any other historical book. Mostly facts and dates, and reasons as to why certain things turned out the way they did.

The second part of the book, by far the most interesting to me, was the history of the events as seen through the eyes of those who lived through it: the missionaries, the rebels, and the townsfolk. Mostly derived from writings of people that were living in China at the time, it shows their feelings and thier thoughts.

The third part involves the use of the boxers in the agendas of political and social parties in subsequent years. It is very possibly one of the best history books that I have read.

Not only does it cover this particular historical event, it also is a study of historians and their craft. It looks into how historians decide what is to be recorded and what is not and shows you how this affects the way people in the future perceive the event.

Cohen's book analyzes a particularly notorious (for Chinese and Western commentators) historical event--the Boxer Rebellion in North China (1899-1900) from an extremely fresh perspective. It is hardly poststructuralist to assert that people live history one day at a time, rather than according to some grand plan, and that is how Cohen treats the Boxer Rebellion. Most Western scholars merely see the Boxers as a manifestation of an irrational, bloodthirsty xenophobiba, while Chinese scholars seem to fall into two categories: (1) those like the early twentieth century modernizers who saw the Boxers as an embarrassment to the cause of national unity and freedom, and (2) those like Communist Chinese historians who see the Boxers as a precursor of their own victorious struggle in 1949. Cohen masterfully demythologizes the Boxers and puts them into the context of (gasp!) their own lives. Working from a combination of secondary and primary sources, Cohen reconstructs the domestic situation in China during the late nineteenth century and argues that domestic issues (particularly famine and floods) more than anything else prompted the Boxer uprising. This thesis, of course, turns on its head the idea that the Boxers were an instrument of the evil Dowager Empress Cixi in order to prevent Westerners from disturbing China's ancient and corrupt culture. Cohen is especially interesting in examining the mechanics and experience of mythmaking, applied in this case to the Boxers but which could be applied to just about any event or experience that has emotional or subjective importance for a group of people. This book is extremely useful for anyone, history students or otherwise, who are interested in Chinese history, or perhaps more fundamentally, how we reconstruct the past in order for it to make sense.

"History in Three Keys" is an excellent history of the Boxer Rebellion in northern China in the late nineteenth century. Even more than that, however, it is a look at the historian's craft, how history is experienced and related, and how history is used in the present. The book is divided into three parts, which discuss the Boxer Rebellion as Event, Experience and Myth. The first consists of standard historical writing, a brief survey of the Boxer movement. It relates important names, dates, ideas and events in a narrative history constructed by the author.

The second section, The Boxers as Experience, is more interesting. Cohen attempts to analyze the experiences of the Boxers, to form a picture of the past. He looks at various themes, discussing how they shaped the Boxer movement and the attitudes and beliefs of those involved. Making extensive use of primary documents, he tries to determine their thoughts and feelings regarding foreigners, magic, gender and death. Of course, Cohen realizes that he cannot fully recount or recreate the experience of the Boxer rebellion, and spends many pages discussing ways historians and writers can approach history to try to understand and explain it.

These themes become more fully developed in the book's final section, The Boxers as Myth. Here Cohen explores the various ways the Boxers have been used as myths in twentieth century China, serving "the political, ideological, rhetorical and/or emotional needs" of the moment. While foreigners and the New Culture movement mythologized the Boxers as symbols of Chinese superstition and backwardness, anti-Imperialists cheered their anti-foreignism and nationalism, and cultural revolutionaries idolized their rebelliousness and the mythical role of women in the rebellion.

Cohen explores the difference between historians, who attempt to understand and explain the past, and mythologizers, who try to use history to advance an agenda in the present. He discusses the process of myth-making, in which contexts and inconvenient facts are ignored and a one-dimensional 'history' in created through distortion and oversimplification. Still, Cohen has some respect for mythologizing the past, and notes that experience itself is "processed" in terms of culture and myth. "Mythic constructions are ubiquitous in the world of experience and form an inseparable part of it."

I was assigned part of this book in a history course on nineteenth century globalization, but ended up reading the whole thing - and I'm glad I did. In addition to giving an excellent history of the Boxer Rebellion, "History in Three Keys" contains valuable insights into more recent Chinese history and development. Even more valuable are the discussions about the nature of history, myth, historical writing and the historian's craft. It is well written, clear and engaging, with extensive notes, index and bibliography. I enjoyed it immensely and recommend it to all interested in Chinese history or historical writing in general.