Chinese Books

The majority of reviews, by far, are overly happy with this, and I am no exception. I bought the first 2 volumes and CANNOT SAY ENOUGH. ITS SUPER ! I read 2 seperate reviews of the book (one in each volume) and I couldn't believe how uptight people are. These cartoons are WONDERFUL and skillfully drawn. One reviewer said he (and his daughter) were offended because of the chinese stereotype characters. THERE IS NOTHING OFFENSIVE IN HERE. And to be honest, these are traditional characters, and dressing they way they did in the old days. If you go to china today, much of the tradition still exists. They even still pull rickshaws. This reviewer was chinese & should come to grips with the traditional appearance of the chinese. I think its wonderful. As for the other reviewer who Loved the book, but felt embarrassed in front of his kid, because women were seen in "traditional" roles preparing food, etc.... damn, get a life. This is still the way in china, and even to a lesser degree in the USA. Why the hell is everyone LOOKING FOR THINGS TO BE OFFENDED AT? DO yourself a favor and buy this book. you won't regret it. Its fantastic & I learned alot. This is a FAMILY book you can share with anyone.

The first time I took a glance at this book I immediately decided I was going to read and finally learn Chinese. When I opened it, I was overtaken by the simplicity and structure of the book. A minute into the introduction I knew how to read Chinese!! I was very surprised, I never thought it would be this simple. By the 20th page I was smiling and thinking, "Wow!! This is fun. I have to buy this book." Unfortunately I have to return it within 2 weeks to my campus library at Cal State Northridge but I know that during those 14 days I will learn and return it knowing that I could speak Chinese. This book deserves 5 stars and I highly recommend it to anybody who wants to learn this language that day by day is becoming more necessary. I am positive that you will learn and have plenty of fun.

This is a helpful book. My five year old and I have just about gone through it twice, and it has held her attention, though I should say that she is insanely into languages of all kinds. But the the book is well designed, showing the etymology from ancient forms to traditional forms to simplified forms. Each character gets a page, and the etymology and cartoons constitute the top half of the page. The cartoons are fun and -- usually -- help you remember. My only criticism is the cartoons: often, embarrassingly non-PC, making me wince a bit as my daughter absorbs the roles men and women are _supposed_ to have. Also, I think the cartoons, though always drawn well, are often a little too far out there to really help you remember the meaning of the character. The middle to bottom of the page shows the character in phrases, and the bottom shows the character in a sentence. The phrases and the sentence are well-chosen, vernacular, and contemporary. Overall, the book is excellent, and I'm trying to track down the next volume, because nothing I could find at the local bookstores comes close to being something a five-year-old would want to read!

This book does not fall short of it's title. The Introduction gives some helpful background as to the ancient genesis of Chinese script, going back to the legendary period and Cang Ji, on up through the Modern Period. It clearly illustrates how various types of compound words are created - and potentially deciphered, and covers pictographs, ideographs, and determinative-phonetic characters. The Preface gives a general overview of Chinese as a means of visual communication. The body of the book gives a description of each of 176 of some of the most common characters. Each character description includes a cartoon to help the reader recall the etymology of each character, which can help novices simply to remember the character. As well, a number of examples of how the character is used in compound phrases are offered. This is the first of a three-part series, and the only one of the series to have the Intro and Preface described above. A great introduction to Chinese characters for someone unfamiliar with them, and a fun read for someone who is.

This is great for its intended use. Has all the info one needs to complete the class associated with it.

I received my book from R Cohen in good conditions, with the best price and very soon (actually before than I expected). I strongly recommend him.

Amazingly boring subject for me. Only got it because I had to. It is written well.

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A fine book on cigars. I completely enjoyed this book and refer to it often.

I just picked this book up recently (2007) and though the book is getting on in age, it really holds up today. The first half of the book discussed history of tobacco, cigars, and smoke shops. The authors can really tell a good story and their historylessons were highly entertaining.

This is a useful and well-written cigar guide. It is getting a bit dated, but it is still very good for all cigar lovers.

The Good Cigar is to your brain what your tobacconist's walk-in humidor is to your nose. It's a cornucopia of history, anecdotes, and general cigar lore that makes you want to relax and stay a while.

Jeffers and Gordon start their history with the original tobacco lovers, the indigenous people of the Americas. Then they discuss the introduction and development of tobacco in Europe and the New World. Jeffers and Gordon acquaint us with many of the people who have influenced our image of cigars (Mark Twain, Groucho Marx, Ernest Hemingway, etc.) and give quotation buffs a nice supply of material. From the "Wooden Indian" to cigar boxes and bands, they explore the history and artistry of cigar paraphernalia.

The authors include a cigar index complete with their personal ratings of each cigar. The book shows its age here, as some of the cigars are no longer sold. This doesn't necessarily detract from the book. You just might run into somebody who's had a box aging for several years and is willing to trade a few sticks. In a situation like this, an older index of cigars would be helpful.

Jeffers and Gordon also cover humidors, cutters, and lighters. They even include a resource guide. These sections might lead the cigar neophyte to believe that cigar smoking is a costly pursuit, but this doesn't have to be the case. Less expensive and perfectly functional accessories are readily available; but as Winston Churchill warned, "Shoddiness can be found easily, in quantity" (I got that from this book). Choose carefully. There are several Internet message boards devoted to cigars that would be more helpful than this book in finding accessories that fit your taste and budget.

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?

I bought this so my daughters could better understand the Chinese zodiac and all the animals. it has a great story that is very understandable to them (ages 2 and 4) and the pictures are great too. highly recommended.

Cute story about the Chinese Zodiac and why the cat is not in the calendar. Fun illustations. My daughter who is 5, enjoys this book.

I purchased this boook for use in a Third grade unit on China. I ended up using it with my Kindergarten and First grade social studies classes as well. It's a little wordy in parts for the very young children but can be easily abridged without losing the context of the story.

The Great Race: The Story of the Chinese Zodiac is a picturebook retelling of an ancient Chinese legend of how their annual calendar came to be. The Jade Emperor decreed a grand race between the animals to determine the order of the years. Thirteen animals raced, but the rat, eager to be first, tricked the unfortunate cat into missing the finish line completely - as a result, the rat and the cat remain worst enemies to this very day! Playful color illustrations by Anne Wilson add an enthusiastic touch to this adventurous narrative, rounded out with fun facts about the Chinese calendar and Chinese astrology.

The first thing you'll notice about this book is the artwork. Like "Always Come Home to Me" the colors and lines seem to float over the pages; it's that vivid. They brightened my daughter's eyes as we turn page after page never stopping until we've reached the end.

The story itself is an honest one. Hannah is a cute little girl from Taiwan who with her two parents tries to assimilate to the US -- not unlike the many immigrants before her. I won't spoil the story but I will say I am thoroughly pleased this story is told and I feel my daughter will be better for it.

I can't recommend this wonderful book enough. Get it and you'll treasure this book for years to come.

Very insightful story of the author and her family as they entered into the American society. It was about their struggles to get their green card so they didn't have to hide, but could walk around in the open without fear.A very heart warming story for children and adults.

In this evocative children's tale of a Chinese family's arrival in California, Belle Yang traces her own roots. The Yangs came to this country from Taiwan when she was a young girl. As the author and creator of the the luscious color illustrations, the author has done a marvelous job of combining image and language. The story, set in San Francisco, conveys the pervasive uncertainty that colors the immigrant experience yet ultimately gives readers a story of triumph, as Hannah and her parents make their way in purusit of the American Dream. This is a children's story that is perfect for the whole family. Its message has never been more timely, nor more universal.

Not only is this book brightly illustrated depicting the action, but the story is captivating, suspenseful. Those children who have immigrated to the US will relive their history and all other children will be given a vivid insight to how it is to be a foreigner in this land. I highly recommend this book to school librarians and to parents who want their children to empathize with immigrant children. Furthermore, it's a story that helps us all appreciate how fortunate we are to live in this country even with its imperfections. The setting in San Francisco is an additional plus.

Good book, detailed and easy to follow. I bought to perhaps help deal with my uti's without antibiotics and so far nothing has helped. I'm still trying though. Still a lot of great information and wroth a read.

This book had alot of good information but it would have been nice if they could have included a glossry of terms of a dictionary for some of the words. I couldn't even find half of the words in a regular dictionary.

This is a vastly revised 2nd edition. Anyone perusing the numbers of herbs books available on the market should notice at least two shortcomings: 1. They are not written by practicing clinical herbalists and so they often just pass on 2nd and 3rd hand information 2. They are not wholistic in the sense that they do not integrate diet, lifestyle and the many other factors necessary for a successful therapeutic result. Then there is the current wave of herb books written by inexperienced medical authorities with little or not practical experience in the clinical herbal medicine. Most of these are practically useless.

None of this is true of the latest of edition of this Lesley Tierra's Healing with The Herbs of Life. This book offers the rare opportunity to participate in the herbal healing strategies of one of the world's foremost practicing herbalists with over 20 years clinical experience. Integrating Western and Chinese energetics, it is an excellent source for self healing useful for both the lay person and the professional practitioner.

When the qualities and energetics of diet and lifestyle are appropriately adjusted, herbs offer the most time-honored and effective way for treating the underlying causes of disease rather than merely the outer symptoms. With chapters on "Causes of disease," The Energy of Illness," "The process of Healing," Treatment of Specific conditions" along with other chapters on the "Energy of Food," "Living with the Seasons." The reader is fully empowered in the process of herbal medicine.

This is not simply another herb book with a catalogue of herbs and common indications but allows for a much needed personalized approach to herbal healing.

Another thing the reader will appreciate is that the book is well organized and well written making it all the more enjoyable and useful.

You will not regret owning a copy of this book.

The reader might check out the author's other unique book for kid's, appropriately called The Kid's Herbal.

Lesley Tierra's book is a refreshing look at the old system of energetic herbology. While many herbals focus on healing the ailments, this book introduces the concept of healing the energy imbalance. As such, it is not a reference book for a quick fix. It teaches a different philosophy for using herbs.

Western medicine once used such a concept as the equilibrium between humors. In "Healing with the Herbs of Life", the author uses the Chinese energetic system. She explains why an energetic approach to healing with herbs is more efficient than the ones dealing with symptoms.

This is a very useful book for curious amateur or professional herbalists and energy healing students:

Part 1 deals with herbal fundamentals such as herb chemistry, energy and a materia medica (dictionary of herbs) of 148 herbs from all over the world.

Part 2 discusses the energetic causes of illness, its energy, the process of healing according to the chinese five elements system and a compendium of specific conditions to treat with herbs, always in an energetic perspective and with general guidelines that may apply (keeping in mind that every ill person is different).

Part 3 deals with the energy of food, living with the seasons, herbal preparations.

There is also a complete appendice of resources, bibliography and glossary. An index to identify the names of herbs in their common names, latin names, chinese name and sanskrit name is included at the end.

Completely worth its price since it is so well done and complete.

More than poetry, this book teaches Chinese history, language and culture. Each poem appears in 4 forms, English with syntax adjusted, Raw English word-for-word translation, pinyin (pronunciation guide), and Chinese charaters. The commentary on each poem ranges from an explanation of the symbolism to anecdotes about the poets themselves.

Very pleasing collection of classical Chinese Poetry! The Chinese is provided with the translation so it is also an excellent opportunity to learn more about the Characters as well. This was a joy to read and it connects the reader to the notion that poetry has always been with us and is as inherent to humans as breathing!

THE HEART OF CHINESE POETRY. By Greg Whincup. 178 pp. (Anchor Books). New York : Doubleday, 1987. ISBN 0-385-23967-X (pbk.)

Greg Whincup has here had the useful idea of making Chinese poetry come alive for the Western reader by bringing readers face-to-face with the original texts. Although it has been done before, for example by David Hawkes in his 'A Little Primer of Tu Fu' (Renditions Press, 1988), Whincup seems certainly to have done as well, and considering the incredible importance of the Chinese language, and the wealth of its literature, there really ought to be many more books like this.

Whereas Hawkes' book focused exclusively on the work of Tu Fu, Whincup has chosen instead to give us fifty-seven of China's greatest poems from a wide range of writers - Li Bai, Du Fu, Du Mu, Su Shr, etc. If these names look strange it's because Whincup, rather than employing the Wade-Giles system of transcription which everyone is familiar with, has chosen instead to use the far less well-known Yale system of romanization. For those who don't know it, which probably includes almost everyone, he has provided a brief guide on pages 173-74. The book also contains an extensive 5-page English-language Bibliography

The poems have been topically arranged under the following headings : The Heart of Chinese Poetry; The History of Chinese Poetry; Three Poets of the Golden Age; Poems of War; Poems by and about Women; Landscape/Enlightenment.

For each poem we are given : 1. Whincup's final translation; 2. the Yale word-by-word romanization; 3. the printed full-form Chinese character (ideogram; sinograph); 4. a literal translation of each character; 5. explanatory notes. A nice touch is that the texts have been arranged vertically.

As anyone who has read the poems like this can vouch, it really is the only way for the non-specialist to get an idea of how glorious Chinese poems are when understood in their original language. My only complaint is that, although the Chinese font that has been used in the book is a beautiful cursive form and without the stiffness of the usual printed form, it's also incredibly tiny, and the beginner is going to need very good eyes and very good lighting to be able to discern the structure of the more complex characters.

Here is an example of Whincup's final translation of a famous poem, 'Deer Fence,' by Wang Wei (with my obliques added to indicate line breaks) :

"In the empty mountains / I see no one, / But hear the sound / Of someone's voice. // Slanting sunlight / Enters deep forest, / And shines again / On green moss" (p.169).

This is a respectable effort, and readers might care to compare it with Wai-lim Yip's treatment of Wang Wei in his excellent bilingual anthology, details of which follow below.

Whincup's is a wonderful book that, by enabling the reader to come to grips with the Chinese, will help anyone to arrive at a deeper and richer appreciation of Chinese poetry, and to see how far short of the originals any English translation must inevitably fall. You simply can't do in English what can be done in Chinese, and there really ought to be more books like 'The Heart of Chinese Poetry.'

For those who may be interested, here are details of the Yip:

CHINESE POETRY : An Anthology of Major Modes and Genres. Edited and translated by Wai-lim Yip. 358 pp. Durham NC and London : Duke University Press, 1997. ISBN 0-8223-1951-9 (pbk.)

One of the best books of translated Chinese poetry. The Chinese characters and word by word translation lets one get a real feel for the original. How could this have gone out of print?

I've owned this book for years. The receipes and particularly the descriptions of cooking techniques have proven invaluable. I consider myself a reasonably accomplished home cook but, until purchasing this wonderful resource I never quite "got it" as far putting really good Chinese cooking on the table. Helen explains both the how and the why allowing one to re-create the tastes, aromas and textures of Chinese home cooking. The format of the book is clear and easy to follow. The heavy emphasis on FRESH produce is wonderful. Most receipes are easily adapted to those that wish to reduce or even eliminate meat in the diet. I enjoyed the stories from her youth in her mother's kitchen, in the family restaurant, shopping in Chinatown. I love chicken and highly recommend the delicious and incredibly simple "Chinese White Chicken" (if you can boil water, you can make this great dish). Helen includes many easy and tasty dipping sauces that enhance almost any meal, yum!!!!

I've used this cookbook for years; I have soy sauce stains on a number of its pages! Ms. Chen takes the mystery out of preparing wonderful Chinese food. I have not tried a recipe that we did not like. Try it, you'll like it!

Her straight forward instructions are easy to follow. Most ingredients are easily attainable. I am able to get dinner on the table in about 30-40 minutes. My husband says her dishes reminds him of his mother's home cooking. I think that speaks for itself.

As an always - on - move graduate student raised in an Italian - American family, I must confess that I was always a bit mystified by the the techniques used in the Chinese food I loved so much, but was always unable to achieve in the kitchen. Since I don't have a lot of time at this point in my life because of my studies, Helen Chen's book gives me simple to perform instructions for her quick and absoluetly delicious and nutritious recipes. Thank you Ms. Chen! I highly recommend this book. It is wonderful.

My son and I love cooking from this book...He is an especially big fan of tofu and "In the Chinese Kitchen" provides some seriously tasty tofu recipes. We also love the potstickers and Tina's Onion Pancakes!

The shelves, in stores and online, are weighed down by cookbooks, including those for Chinese cuisine. If you're looking for all the basics of Chinese food & cooking, plus a variety of interesting (but easy) recipes, all presented in a breezy, concise manner, look no further. The author was born into a Chinese restaurant family and has come full circle, teaching cooking classes and conducting highly-regarded tours of San Francisco's Chinatown. But that's another book...

Experienced chefs as well as those just venturing into the world of asian cooking will find this book helpful. Fong-Torres is a true expert and master chef.

No other book on Chinese cuisine does such a good job of teaching the subject. This is the first book every Chinese chef, cook or wannabe should read.