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Title: Tao Te Ching by Lao Tze, James Legge ISBN: 0-486-29792-6 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 23 January, 1998 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $1.50 |
Average Customer Rating: 2.25 (4 reviews)
Rating: 1
Summary: Read it only for its historical significance.
Comment: The majority of this Taoist scripture is composed of metaphysical gibberish about the emergence and emanations of the Tao. Lao-Tze (or whoever wrote the Tao Te Ching, since it's often thought he was more myth than man) spends an awful long time telling us that he can't really tell us anything about the Tao. Then there are the claims that by doing nothing you can do everything, although the translator claims this does not literally mean complete inaction. Though there are a few chapters of merit - for instance, chapters 39 and 42 instructing against war, and chapters 73 and 74 suggesting that rulers should be lenient in punishing criminals and that capital punishment is ineffective - these are few and far between, and ultimately get swallowed up in mystical fluff.
Specific to this translation, I find the rhyming of sentences in some chapters by Legge to be a bit suspicious. Whether or not they rhymed in Chinese, forcing them to rhyme in English will inevitably cause the translator to alter the meaning of the passage.
Rating: 3
Summary: A good work, whose magic can't totally be taken away
Comment: I enjoyed most of this translation, but I noticed some sections that I found to be incorrect. The strongly disagree with the translation from ,I believe, the Fourth Chapter- "I do not know whose son it is. It might appear to have been before God." I feel this to be incorrect because the Chinese tradition does not have an idea of a capital G god who is the ruler of the universe. I suppose from a pantheistic standpoint this translation could be more accurate, but to most first time readers this will sound as if it is talking about the Judeo-Christian god. I hope those who get this translation because of its low price will read on the internet or download audio files to supplement this reading to get a better understanding of the original work.
Rating: 4
Summary: A thorough Victorian effort
Comment: This edition reproduces in facimile form the James Legge translation of the Tao Te Ching, as published in the series "The Sacred Books of the East". This series was published by Oxford in the 1870's and 1880's. The present edition contains more in the form of annotations than it does translated text, as was not unusual in Victorian times. This translation certainly deserves a great deal of credit. Apparantly it does contain minor errors, though I can say that I have found nothing by way of a concrete inconsistency in the ideas as expressed in this translatin in comparison with the same chapters in other translations. Many people enjoy, and find meaning in this translation. If I could only have one translation of the Tao Te Ching, this would be the one. I have removed one star, because the author occasionally expresses (in the notes) a disbelief of the material he is translating, which I find irrelevant but not obstructive to understanding and enjoying the work itself.
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Title: Confucius: The Analects by Confucius, D. C. Lau ISBN: 0140443487 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 03 September, 1998 List Price(USD): $10.95 |
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Title: Wisdom of the Buddha : The Unabridged Dhammapada by F. Max Muller ISBN: 0486411206 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 24 March, 2000 List Price(USD): $1.50 |
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Title: Bhagavadgita by Sir Edwin Arnold ISBN: 0486277828 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 12 October, 1993 List Price(USD): $2.00 |
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Title: I Ching : Book of Changes by JAMES LEGGE ISBN: 0517149907 Publisher: Gramercy Pub. Date: 12 February, 1996 List Price(USD): $9.99 |
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Title: Symposium and Phaedrus by Plato ISBN: 0486277984 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 31 January, 1994 List Price(USD): $2.00 |
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