Details

ISBN-10: 0231034504
ISBN-13: 9780231034500
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Publish Date: 10/22/1970
Dimensions: 8.26" L, 4.71" W, 0.35" H

Cold Mountain: One Hundred Poems by the t’Ang Poet Han-Shan

Translated byBurton Watson

Paperback

Price: $29.00

Overview

This collection is one of the earliest and most important works of Chinese Buddhist poetry and is especially influential in the later literature of the Zen Sect of Buddhism, which looked back to these poems as a classic of Zen literature. The poems cover a wide range of subjects: the conventional lament on the shortness of life, bitter complaints about poverty, avarice, and pride, accounts of the difficulty of official life under a bureaucratic system, attacks on the corrupt Buddhist clergy and the foolish attempts by Taoists to achieve immotal life, and incomparable descriptions of the natural world in a mountain retreat. These poems represent the largest number so far made available in English and are important both as vivid descriptions of the wild mountain scenery in Han-shan’s home, Cold Mountain, and as metaphors of the poet’s search for spiritual enlightenment and peace.

Read More
Reviews
"Burton Watson... possesses all the qualities which distinguish a master translator. As a craftsman and as a poet, he has inspired and challenged two generations." – "Asian Affairs"
More Reviews

Details

ISBN-10: 0231034504
ISBN-13: 9780231034500
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Publish Date: 10/22/1970
Dimensions: 8.26" L, 4.71" W, 0.35" H
Skip to content