My husband and I have many books on Chinese Medicine, but always return to this one. It is the best in providing the names for Chinese medicines by ailment -- something most helpful when searching in Chinatown for the medicine. What is especially useful is the names of the Chinese formulas in pill form. Gan mao ling has been a life saver in fighting off colds and flu, and that is only one of the herbs we have found! The Chinese clerks/herbalists have been impressed with our knowledge, asking where we have been able to get the information and names of the right medicine.

My Father, Dr. Michael Tierra is trully inspiring to me. I have watched him over the course of my life wholeheartedly embrace herbalism. I can remember going with him to many different herbal healers all over the country, and listen to him try to get as much information from them as he could, even though sometimes it was hard to understand their english, and they seemed hesitant to teach their ancient knowlege to white people. This sort of thing never seemed to stop him . I've seen him quickly pull off the side of the road and pick a bunch of fresh herbs that seemed to call out to him, and go home and make them into many different healing rememdies for his friends, patients, and family. I've studied with him in his clinic for many years and watched him make individual formulas for his patients, and it reminded me of watching a great musician play his instrument. I am in awe of his genuine love and connection with all of the herbs - Chinese, Ayurvedic, Western, etc. For all of us who have had the honor to be with and study from someone who is trully connected with the herbs, intuitively, mentally, scientifically, clinically, etc. it is a real privilege to have a compilation of his experience in a book so all can reap the rewards.

This book presents photos of archeological
findings of weapons from ancient china from
bows and arrows that have been carbon dated
to 28,000(!) years old down to Ming dynasty
cannons. There are 388(!) b&W photos and
line drawings (298 pages) and 57 color photos
(16 pages). The accompanying text describes
the artifacts and weapons development of the
times. Each chapters also come with a good list
of primary references.

This book is loaded with drawings and photographs of Shang, Zhou and Qin dynasty weapons. Arrow points and spear points throughout these periods are well represented including styles I have not seen elsewhere. Numerous examples of crossbow mechanisms are illustrated. Technical information includes alloys and archaeological proveniences.

I wish I had seen the exhibition of which this beautiful book is the catalogue. It must have been breathtaking. This is more than a catalogue, it is a reference book, beginning with an overview and four informative introductory essays. The Catalogue itself is divided into twelve specific areas/types of Tibetan Sacred Art. These cover not only the different representations of the Shakyamuni Buddha, Arhats, Boddhisattvas and others, but also the four Tibetan Buddhist Orders. The Illustations are very clear and many detailed illusrtrations and graphs help to explain the Thangaks and Mandalas. The text is very informative, and the book is also printed and bound well.... A truly wonderful gift.

This is one book you can judge by it's cover. It is fabulous. The photos of Tibetan paintings and statuary are simply beautiful. In some cases, such as a Tibetan thangka painting of Shakyamuni buddha's life, the whole painting is shown first, then close-up shots of other parts of the painting are shown for a more detailed view. Scenes from the painting are then explained. Anyone who has tried to decipher the meaning in a thangka, knows that without the help of experts, it is nearly impossible to capture the true story. Marylin Rhie and Robert Thurman help unlock the mysteries in a book with stunning photography, history and artful explanations. If you are interested in Tibetan iconography, a collector, buddhist or an art student--BUY IT, you'll love it!

Like all the China Tate books, it has an amazing humor! I find myself quoting several of the lines, 'cause I can't get over how funny they are! Look for the scene when B.T. tries to ride a horse. It's hilarious! The trials and tribulations that go on through this book are tense, but not so much so you have to stop reading. The plot is fun, the story is great and the moral is one to stick in your mind.

I love the China Tate series. They are so fun it makes you feel like you are a character in the book. It's just spilling out with adventure and it is very detailed. I especially love "Wishing Upon a Star." China so much wants to be a star like her friend. I don't want to tell you too much so I don't spoil it for you so why don't you pick it up and start reading!

This collection was a huge surprise. Unlike the steryo type of what women in China was like, subservient to husbands they are forced to marry, with little thoughts and feelings for themselves.

These women poets starting from 1644-1911, shout out thier love of thier partners, discuss drinking, sex, lust, romance, infactutation and even loving other women.

The metaphors are soft and light at the first reading, yet if you look deeper you realise some of the subjects are far from the softness the poetry is conveyed in.

A good histrical text on Chinese Women and a good read. As the previous reviewer said, buy two and give one to a friend.

An exciting selection of poems by known and previously unknown women poets. Ling Chung's scholarship and sensitivity gave the late great Kenneth Rexroth the insight and inspiration to outdo himself here. Buy two copies and give one to a friend.

This book, by the late Rear Admiral Kemp Tolley, is a very interesting and at times humorous account of the life of U.S. Navy gunboat sailors on China's Yangtze River from the time of the American Civil War through the mid-20th Century. During that period, China went through a tremendous amount of upheaval that included revolution, civil wars, major wars with Japan, and smaller wars with western countries. In the midst of China's upheaval, small American gunboats and those of other foreign nations tried to protect the lives and commercial interests of their citizens living in China.

Kemp Tolley, who passed away in 2000 at age 92, was himself a young Naval Officer in the 1930s when he was assigned to the Yangtze River Patrol. From that vantage point his tales of U.S. Navy life on the Yangtze--both on duty and off duty--in the 1930s make for some interesting anecdotes, whether they deal with U.S. sailors battling the river and Chinese bandits, romancing White Russian and Chinese women, or brawling with British and Italian gunboat crews in the bars of Yangtze River towns.

"Yangtze Patrol" is a great true adventure story and captures some of the same spirit as the novel, "The Sand Pebbles," which dealt with one U.S. gunboat crew during the Chinese Nationalist Revolution in the mid-1920s. However, any American reader of "Yangtze Patrol" needs to keep in mind how most Chinese viewed the Patrol. That view is well summed up in "The Sand Pebbles" where an American missionary asks Jake Holman, a gunboat sailor, how he'd feel if, instead of American gunboats on the Yangtze, there were Chinese gunboats sailing up and down the Mississippi River.

A fogotten chapter of Naval history is brought to life in this fabulous volume. Kemp Tolley, once a sailor in the Yangtze river patrol, outlines the Navy's service in China from its humblest beginnings prior to the cival war through the loss of the last gunboat in 1941. For those of us interested in Navy history, This book brings a lively and action packed legacy from our "China Sailors"

I think, that this book will be very helpful in keeping my wife and I happier in our marriage, for the long term relationship!

This book has quoted some interesting Chinese literatures to illustrate how the ancient Chinese enjoyed sex as we do today. There are many tips and tricks given to enhance your love making skill. This book is educational and is interesting to read. It also opens the eyes of many who used to think Chinese has no history on sexuality...

Father Dumoulin's magisterial two volume history of Zen Buddhism is the standard English work on the subject and come highly recommended for any student of Zen of Eastern religions who wants a scholarly overview of the subject. My only caveat would be that this is NOT a history of Zen thought in the sense of a detailed analysis of the various philosophical doctrines of the various schools of Zen. Such a work would be much, much larger than this one. It does, of course, deal with these issues, but only in a very basic way, as one would expect from a general history. In short, it is the best general history of Zen available.

It's a real shame that this book is out of print. This is one of the great, classic studies of the history of the development of Zen. Volume 1 (this one) covers the antecedents of Zen in India to its development in China. Volume 2 covers Zen in Japan. I've only read volume 1, but I learned a lot about both the history of Zen and also its philosophy. Dumoulin is one of the great scholars of the history of Zen, and although he is not always philosophically acute, you will get some genuine insights into Zen doctrine by reading this. (Of course, according to Zen, the doctrine isn't really what's important!)

THE CRANE'S BILL : Zen Poems of China and Japan. Translated by Lucien Stryk and Takashi Ikemoto with the assistance of Taigan Takayama, Zen Master. 143 pp. New York : Grove Press, 1973 and Reprinted.

Zen poetry is one of the glories of Zen, and yet few in the West seem to care or even know about it. Though undoubtedly sincere in their efforts to understand Zen, most readers seem drawn to prose treatises or explications or analyses of one sort or another, while overlooking the fact that, as Taigan Takayama expresses it : "Zen detests conceptualization" (page xi). Tenzan Yasuda has expressed the same idea this way : "What expresses cosmic truth in the most direct and concise way - that is the heart of Zen art" (page xxxvii).

The poetry of Zen ranges all the way from the tiny seventeen-syllable haiku of a stupendous poet such as Santoka, which have been beautifully translated by John Stevens (in 'Mountain Tasting : Zen Haiku by Santoka Taneda'), through to the Zen verse treatise, of which the finest example is the Third Patriarch Seng-ts'an's 'Hsin-hsin-ming.' This poem brilliantly captures the essence of Zen in its thirty-one verses, and is a text that deserves to be far better known. Although the present book is devoted to shorter poems, an easily accessible translation of the 'Hsin-hsin-ming' will be found in D. T. Suzuki's 'Manual of Zen Buddhism' ('On Believing in Mind,' pages 76-82).

'Crane's Bill' is a collaborative effort which falls into three parts. First we are given, in a Foreword, Preface, and Introduction, 42 pages of interesting and informative material in which a very persuasive case is made for the fact that we should be reading these poems. Then follow 151 poems on enlightenment, death, and general subjects, drawn from a wide range of Chinese and Japanese writers. The book is rounded out with 48 pages of notes on the poems, though it unfortunately lacks both an index and a conversion table of the Japanized Chinese names

The translations, as might have been expected from the present team, read very well. Here is Poem 1, with my slash marks to indicate line breaks:

"The mountain slopes crawl with lumberjacks, / Axing everything in sight - / Yet crimson flowers / Burn along the stream" (page 5).

Here to provide a comment on Poem 1 is Poem 14:

"Iron will's demanded of / the student of the Way - / It's always on the mind. / Forget all - good, bad. / Suddenly it's yours" (page 10).

Compare this with first verse of the Hsin-hsin-ming, the original Chinese of which may be read as follows:

"To realize the Way is not difficult / If you'd only stop choosing; / Just let go of all of your hate, and love, / And everything will be brilliantly clear."

Do we really need to know more? If you don't believe me, here is Poem 97 from the great Japanese Zen Master Dogen (1200-1253):

"Four and fifty years / I've hung the sky with stars. / Now I leap through - / What shattering!" (page 63).

'Crane's Bill' is an extremely interesting and highly successful collaborative effort which no-one who is seriously interested in Zen can afford to overlook. Because it really is all in the poems!

This is in my top ten favorites to read and re-read. I was lucky to have actually find this book laying around, now I feel it has actually found me.

An excellent, full color overview of Chinese robes from neolithic through modern times. Organized by dynasty, each chapter gives a few text pages covering basics in garment style, hairstyle and make up, and footwear for that dynasty. The full color plates are generally focused on court robes, but also include some armor, dance costumes and scholars robes. Most of the garments are rendered in a 2-dimensional layout, with either paintings or statuary from the period as primary documentation. I found the appendixes in the back to be most useful, showing the evolution of body and sleeve style through progressive dynasties. A few examples of accessories are shown. It is a good starting point for the study of the clothing of the nobility. It does not go in to much detail on the clothing of the common man until the modern era.