China

New Book Announcement: “Voices from the Chinese Century: Public Intellectual Debate from Contemporary China”, edited by Timothy Cheek, David Ownby, and Joshua A Fogel
Voices from the Chinese Century: Public Intellectual Debate from Contemporary China, edited by Timothy Cheek, David Ownby, and Joshua A Fogel (Columbia University Press, November 2019)
Voices from the Chinese Century: Public Intellectual Debate from Contemporary China, edited by Timothy Cheek, David Ownby, and Joshua A Fogel (Columbia University Press, November 2019)

China’s increasing prominence on the global stage has caused consternation and controversy among Western thinkers, especially since the financial crisis of 2008. But what do Chinese intellectuals themselves have to say about their country’s newfound influence and power? Voices from the Chinese Century brings together a selection of essays from representative leading thinkers that open a window into public debate in China today on fundamental questions of China and the world—past, present, and future.

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New Book Announcement: “Chinese Grammatology: Script Revolution and Literary Modernity, 1916–1958” by Yurou Zhong
Chinese Grammatology: Script Revolution and Literary Modernity, 1916–1958, Yurou Zhong (Columbia University Press, November 2019)
Chinese Grammatology: Script Revolution and Literary Modernity, 1916–1958, Yurou Zhong (Columbia University Press, November 2019)

Chinese Grammatology traces the origins, transmutations, and containment of this script revolution to provide a groundbreaking account of its formative effects on Chinese literature and culture, and lasting implications for the encounter between the alphabetic and nonalphabet worlds.

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New Book Announcement: “The Japanese Discovery of Chinese Fiction: The Water Margin and the Making of a National Canon” by William C Hedberg
The Japanese Discovery of Chinese Fiction: The Water Margin and the Making of a National Canon, William C Hedberg (Columbia University Press, October 2019)
The Japanese Discovery of Chinese Fiction: The Water Margin and the Making of a National Canon, William C Hedberg (Columbia University Press, October 2019)

The classic Chinese novel The Water Margin (Shuihu zhuan) tells the story of a band of outlaws in 12th-century China and their insurrection against the corrupt imperial court. Imported into Japan in the early 17th century, it became a ubiquitous source of inspiration for translations, adaptations, parodies, and illustrated woodblock prints. There is no work of Chinese fiction more important to both the development of early modern Japanese literature and the Japanese imagination of China than The Water Margin.

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New Book Announcement: “Three Asian Divas: Women, Art and Culture In Shiraz, Delhi and Yangzhou” by David Chaffetz
Three Asian Divas: Women, Art and Culture In Shiraz, Delhi and Yangzhou, David Chaffetz (Abbreviated Press, November 2019)
Three Asian Divas: Women, Art and Culture In Shiraz, Delhi and Yangzhou, David Chaffetz (Abbreviated Press, November 2019)

The diva is a nearly universal phenomenon. Wherever poetry, music and mime have been practised with virtuosity, great women performers always take centre stage. Traditional Asian divas are however less well known and understood among English language readers than the great divas of Mozart and Puccini. Whether from Shiraz at the court of the Injuids, from Delhi during the twilight of the Moghuls, or from Yangzhou under the last Ming emperors, these Asian divas constitute the first identifiably modern women.

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“Secondhand: Travels in the New Global Garage Sale” by Adam Minter

Globalization usually means manufacturing. But globalization reaches into other realms, even waste disposal as Adam Minter wrote in his debut book, Junkyard Planet. In his new book, Secondhand, he investigates what happens to material goods we donate after we’re done using them and travels throughout North America, Asia, and Africa to explore how different countries reuse discarded items.

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“Fu Ping: A Novel” by Wang Anyi

With the exception of Eileen Chang to whom she is often compared, few writers have become as synonymous with Shanghai as Wang Anyi. Although born in Nanjing, Wang was brought to Shanghai at the age of one by her mother, noted writer and Shanghai native Ru Zhijuan, and her quest to know the city over the years in spite of its protean elusiveness (as well as Wang’s intermittent absences) has become something of an elegiac obsession for the celebrated author.

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