By seeing his life or at least by seeing the portrait of his life as painted in the stories of those who knew him, a Master s life becomes a sketch of a path to Mastery. From stories shared by his son, this book paints a portrait of the famous Wing Chun Grand Master, Ip Man, providing a set of fifteen principles as a guide to mastery. While there are broad lessons to be learned from this portrait, the details must be savored. Many of the great figures of history are shrouded in the mists of aggrandizement, but here the details, the fine strokes of the portrait, have remained to show the humble seeker something about the life of a Master. Each chapter provides a principle or set of principles to contemplate. You will be richly rewarded if you seek to discern the principles and the man who strove to embody them. These stories and the principles drawn from them are commended to you for your benefit and learning and enjoyment. Let them guide you in your journey, but do not look for them to tell you every step. In this portrait are great treasures for the taking but not simply for the asking.

    The book is informed by a wide knowledge of the Asian context and an approach devoid of Euro-centric bias. The book also examines the many non-Chinese elements in China's history, such as the impact of Buddhism, foreign trade, etc.

    This book tells the story from three perspectives: of the Japanese soldiers who performed it, of the Chinese civilians who endured it, and of a group of Europeans and Americans who refused to abandon the city and were able to create a safety zone that saved many.

    We 'moderns' can use the sixty-four hexagrams found in the I Ching as a predictive tool to enhance our lives and reconcile our spiritual and physical selves. When one consults the 'I CHing', the hexagram gives the general background of the situation, while the lines indicate the correct way in which to handle the specific circumstance. This masterful translation by Hua-Ching Ni is popular throughout the world.

    Artist and author Kwong Kuen Shan has combined the quiet power of eastern philosophy with the serene and playful beauty of her cat paintings, creating a book sure to comfort and move readers with its infectious appreciation for the wisdom of both. Her exquisite watercolor-and-ink paintings portray a variety of cats in settings ranging from the garden to the pond to the windowsill, each scene bringing to life the specific Taoist or Confucian text that accompanies it.With special, masterfully stroked Chinese characters and authentic seals whose meanings are explained and interpreted on the facing page, "The Cat and the Tao" is an inspired combination of art and thought. Readers can experience the enchanting world of Kwong Kuen Shan's paintings while encountering meditations on the benefits of simplicity, the rewards of friendship, the tenets of living our lives with humanity -- and, of course, the invaluable lessons to be learned in both mischievousness and stillness, qualities which no creature exemplifies better than the beloved cat.

    Shanghai has historically been China's jewel, its richest, most modern and westernized city. The bustling metropolis was home to sophisticated intellectuals, entrepreneurs, and a thriving middle class when Mao's proletarian revolution emerged victorious from the long civil war. Terrified of the horrors the Communists would wreak upon their lives, citizens of Shanghai who could afford to fled in every direction. Seventy years later, members of the last generation to fully recall this massive exodus have revealed their stories to Chinese American journalist Helen Zia, who interviewed hundreds of exiles about their journey through one of the most tumultuous events of the twentieth century. From these moving accounts, Zia weaves together the stories of four young Shanghai residents who wrestled with the decision to abandon everything for an uncertain life as refugees in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the United States.Benny, who as a teenager became the unwilling heir to his father's dark wartime legacy, must decide either to escape to Hong Kong or navigate the intricacies of a newly Communist China. The resolute Annuo, forced to flee her home with her father, a defeated Nationalist official, becomes an unwelcome exile in Taiwan. The financially strapped Ho fights deportation from the U.S. in order to continue his studies while his family struggles at home. And Bing, given away by her poor parents, faces the prospect of a new life among strangers in America. The lives of these men and women are marvelously portrayed, revealing the dignity and triumph of personal survival.

    The author concerns himself not only with art, but also with Chinese philosophy, religion, and the realm of ideas.

    The inspired and detailed presentation of Professor Andrew R. Wilson of the U.S. Naval War College is vivid cultural history at its most compelling and insightful.

    This search is the search for the origins and meaning of life itself.We are here, we have life – but we don’t know what life really is. We can feel our energy, but don’t know where this energy comes from and to what goal this energy is going. We are that energy, we have glimpses of its true source and our connection to it, and those glimpses keep us going even when it seems we will never find what we are seeking – but still we do not know what that energy is.An ancient Zen story symbolizes the search for the source of this life. Zen master Kakuan’s story of The Ten Bulls of Zen is a teaching that uses ten images, each representing a particular step on the journey of experiencing and understanding it means to be a conscious and aware human being.Osho takes us through this story and its lessons for the traveler on a journey into the inner world – that’s what meditation is all about according to him. But reaching the pure, uncluttered freedom of meditation is not the end. The circle is only complete when the seeker comes back into the marketplace of the world, but as a transformed person.This is a book that belongs in the hands of everyone who is on the search, beginning the search, or just thinking about the search.The book is illustrated with ten original images of Gomizen’s Ten Bulls of Zen from the Fuzoku Tenri Library, Tenri University, Japan.

    No cloistered don, this tall, married Englishman was a freethinking intellectual. A nudist, he was devoted to quirky folk dancing. In 1937, while working as a biochemist at Cambridge, he fell in love with a visiting Chinese student, with whom he began a lifelong affair. His mistress persuaded him to travel to her home country, where he embarked on a series of expeditions to the frontiers of the ancient empire. He searched for evidence to bolster a conviction that the Chinese were responsible for hundreds of humankind's most familiar innovations—including printing, the compass, explosives, suspension bridges, even toilet paper—often centuries before others. His journeys took him across war-torn China, consolidating his admiration for the Chinese. After the war, he determined to announce what he'd discovered & began writing Science & Civilization in China, describing the country's long history of invention & technology. By the time he died, he'd produced, almost single-handedly, 17 volumes, making him the greatest one-man encyclopedist ever. Epic & intimate, The Man Who Loved China tells the sweeping story of China thru Needham's life. Here's a tale of what makes men, nations & humankind great—related by one of the world's best storytellers.

    The 5,000-year-old Chinese book of wisdom, presented in a unique work-book format designed to help truth-seekers find new meaning and enlightenment in its ancient lore.

    With anecdote and memorable quotation, this long-needed work restores Zen to its living, human form.The truth of Zen has always resided in individual experience rather than in theoretical writings. To give the modern reader access to understanding of this truth, THE ZEN EXPERIENCE illumines Zen as it was created and shaped by the personalities, perceptions, and actions of its masters over the centuries.Beginning with the twin roots of Zen in Indian Buddhism and Chinese Taoism, we follow it through its initial flowering in China under the First Patriarch Bodhidharma; its division into schools of “gradual” and “sudden” enlightenment under Shen-hsui and Shen-hui; the ushering in of its golden age by Hui-neng; the development of “shock” enlightenment by Ma-tsu; its poetic greatness in the person of Han-shan; the perfection of the use of the koan by Ta-hui; the migration of Zen to Japan and its extraordinary growth there under a succession of towering Japanese spiritual leaders.Rich in historical background, vivid in revealing anecdote and memorable quotation, this long-needed work succeeds admirably in taking Zen from the library shelves and restoring its living, human form.TAGS: Zen History, Buddhism, Zen Buddhism, Zen History, Bodhidharma, Lin-Chi, Rinzai, Soto, Eisai, Dogen, Hakuin

    It remains a masterwork without parallel. The distinguished historian Merle Goldman brings the book up to date, covering reforms in the post-Mao period through the early years of the twenty-first century, including the leadership of Hu Jintao. She also provides an epilogue discussing the changes in contemporary China that will shape the nation in the years to come.

    An indispensable historical document.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review) From the award-winning poet, dissident, and “one of the most original and remarkable Chinese writers of our time” (Philip Gourevitch) comes a raw, evocative, and unforgettable look at the Tiananmen Square massacre through the eyes of those who were there. For over seven years, Liao Yiwu—a master of contemporary Chinese literature, imprisoned and persecuted as a counter-revolutionary until he fled the country in 2011—secretly interviewed survivors of the devastating 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Tortured, imprisoned, and forced into silence and the margins of Chinese society for thirty years, their harrowing stories are now finally revealed in this gripping and masterful work of investigative journalism.

    A. Milne's Piglet. Piglet? Yes, Piglet. For better than impulsive Tigger... or gloomy Eeyore... or intellectual Owl... or even loveable Pooh... Piglet herein demonstrates a very important principle of Taoism: the Te - a Chinese word meaning Virtue - of the Small.In this wonderful sequel to The Tao of Pooh, Benjamin Hoff explores the Te (Virtue) of the Small - a principle embodied perfectly in Piglet, a Very Small Animal who proved to be so Useful after all.