Description: Examines the traditional and modern Western interpretations of the Tao-te-ching, and its author, Lao-tzu.
Brief description: Livia Kohn is Assistant Professor of Religion at Boston University. She has written Taoist Mystical Philosophy: The Scripture of Western Ascension, also published by SUNY Press, Seven Steps to the Tao, Sima Chengzhen's Zuowanglun, and Taoist Meditation and Longevity Techniques.
Review Quotes:
"There are so many things about this book that please me. It presents the most up-to-date scholarship on Lao-tzu and the Tao-te-ching. The essays approach the text and its legendary author from a broad spectrum of disciplines. Furthermore, the authors are uniformly both critical (in a positive sense, as all good scholars should be) and sympathetic (as befitting students of other cultures). I particularly appreciate the open-minded manner in which Buddhist art, legend, and scripture are dealt with here in spite of the fact that the subject could not be more Taoist. Finally, I am pleased by the international nature of the scholarship represented in this book-here we have the best work of Anglo-American, French, German, Chinese, and Japanese specialists brought together." - Victor H. Mair, University of Pennsylvania