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State and Society in Early Medieval China
$23.28
Book
State and Society in Early Medieval China
Edited by Albert E. Dien
Extending roughly from the final collapse of the Han Dynasty in A.D. 220 to the establishment of the T'ang Dynasty in 618, the Six Dynasties period in China is commonly compared to the "Dark Ages" of European history.
The political history of the period is a dismal record of disunity, intrigue, strife, and alien encroachments, seeming to amount to little more than a confusing series of dynastic names. Given such an array of fragile ands short-lived dynasties, it is natural to attempt to summarize the period, but the inadequate state of our knowledge (the historical record is sparse, fragmentary, and very difficult to interpret) makes such an attempt at best provisional.
The twelve essays in this volume are therefore to be viewed as attempts to further our knowledge of the period and to test what few generalizations we do have. The authors address a wide range of problems, including the composition of the ruling elites, the evolution of eminent families, and the nature of the state and its administration. For example, previous scholarship has portrayed the period as one dominated by powerful aristocratic clans; a revisionist view presented here argues that the leading families were neither powerful, nor aristocratic, nor clans. In almost every case the topics of the individual papers are treated here for the first time in English
The period of the Six Dynasties suggests fragmentation and disorder, and yet it is now generally recognized that the so-called fragmentation simply meant that the level of cohesion had shifted from a national to a regional level. To a large extent, what was involved were changes in the ways in which various social and political groups related to one another. The focus of this volume, then, is to explore the interfaces within Six Dynasties social and political organizations and to trace the changes in the these complex and often puzzling relationships. The editor suggests that in these developments are to be found the roots of T'ang greatness.
The contributors are William Crowell, Albert E. Dien, Patricia Ebrey, Dennis Grafflin, Jennifer Holmgren, Whalen Lai, Carl Leban, Mao Hankuang, Richard Mather, Robert M. Somers, and Tang Changru.
Albert E. Dien is Professor of Chinese at Stanford University.
This is a reproduction edition from a scanned copy of the following original edition:
Title State and society in early medieval China
Author Albert E. Dien
Editor Albert E. Dien
Contributor Albert E. Dien
Edition illustrated
Publisher Stanford University Press, 1991
ISBN 0804717451, 9780804717458
Length 414 pages
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Brocade by Night
$29.44
Book
Kokin wakashū (Collection of Early and Modern Japanese Poetry) is one of the world’s earliest and most important poetic anthologies. It consists of over 1,000 poems, almost all of which were probably written between the last half of the eighth century and 905, the approximate date of the work’s compilation. This is the first full-scale study in English of Kokinshū (as it is usually called), the anthology that fixed the basic style of Japanese poetry, and in so doing defined the aesthetics of an entire literary tradition.
Kokinshū cannot be appreciated without some knowledge of Chinese poetry and its influence on Japanese writers, Heian aesthetic ideals, the aims of the anthology’s poets and compilers, the expectations of the intended audience, and the nature of Heian society. Brocade by Night attempts to provide the necessary perspective by discussion the Chinese poetry known to the Japanese, the characteristics of early Japanese composition in both Chinese and Japanese, and the social and literary atmosphere out of which Kokinshū arose. The author also discusses the content and form of typical Kokinshū poems, the structure of the anthology, and the question of individuality in a genre of convention. The role of Kokinshū’s principal compiler, Ki no Tsurayuki, is described, and the author examines two of Tsurayuki’s other works, Tosa nikki and Shinsen waka. A companion volume (see back pages here, which were the original dust jacket and back cover) consists of new translations of Kokinshū and Tosa Nikki and the first transaltion in any language of Shinsen waka.
Helen Craig McCullough is Professor of Oriental Languages at the University of California, Berkeley.
This is a reproduction edition from a scanned copy of the following original edition:
Brocade by night: "Kokin wakashū" and the court style in Japanese classical poetry
By Helen Craig McCullough
Published by Stanford University Press, 1985
ISBN 0804712468, 9780804712460
591 pages
Contents
PreHeian Song and Poetry 73
Otomo , tanka , Emperor Tenmu
The Dark Age of the Public Waka 154
Emperor Saga , Ise monogatari , Ono no Komachi
The Return of the Waka to Public Life 246
Emperor Uda , Kanpyo , Ki no Tomonori
Genesis and Aesthetic 293
Ki no Tomonori , Cao Pi , Zuo zhuan
The Kokinshu Style and the Individual Voice 368
Okikaze , Sosei , Henjo
Kokinshu as Literary Entity 421
Ono no Takamura , Emperor Koko , Kai Province
Tsurayuki and the Kokinshu Legacy 494
Tosa nikki , Shinkokinshu , miredo
