AnyBook4Less.com	Find the Best Price on the Web Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Home  |  Store List  |  FAQ  |  Contact Us  |
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money Keyword AuthorISBN

Title: Praying for Power: Buddhism and the Formation of Gentry Society in Late-Ming China (Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series, Vol 38) by Timothy Brook, Harvard University Press ISBN: 0-674-69775-8 Publisher: Harvard Univ Pr Pub. Date: March, 1994 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $38.50

Your Country USA Canada United Kingdom Australia Austria Belgium France Germany Italy Netherlands Switzerland Currency AutoUSD CAD GBP EUR AUD CHF Delivery Only cheapest delivery All delivery options Include Used Books Are you a club member of: Barnes and Noble Books A Million Chapters.Indigo.ca

Average Customer Rating: 4 (1 review)

Rating: 4
Summary: An In-Depth Look at a Subtle, but Massive, Shift
Comment: This is not a book for those new to Chinese studies. While Brook's Confusions of Pleasure and Quelling the People are both written to be easily understandable, this book grew out of his Harvard dissertation and, though fascinating, is not readily accessible to everyone. Those familiar with Ming or ancient world history will know of the monetization of the world economy in the 1500's due to massive amounts of precious metals coming from the Spanish New World.

Much of this money flowed into China, 'freeing' wealth from land ownership and allowing merchants to become truly powerful in China for the first time. The gentry, the level of Chinese society that controlled land and society through the law, symbolic support of cultural keystones and government service, were suddenly in competition with merchants' sons for these bureaucratic posts that defined a large portion of their self-image. Brook's book looks at the mid- to late-Ming defense of status undertaken by the gentry through support of the Sangha, or Buddhist church.

Their monopoly on education, government service and wealth undermined, the gentry connected themselves to 'the people' through the support of the Sangha and to each other through cultivation of artistic tastes. While Craig Clunas is the expert on the latter phenomenon, Brook explains the former in this book. Exploring the gentry culture, dispelling ideas of conflicts between Confucianism and Buddhism and summarizing huge socioeconomic shifts in China, Brook has written an important book. Any reader who has read through the long sentences and generalizations in this review can make it through Brook's work, which is no more unclear and is far more interesting than my review. All those versed in basic history and interested in social shifts should read this work, but those trying to begin a study of China or of the Ming should not begin with this complicated work.