Words to live by
Subtitle: Japanese classics for our time
By: Nakano Kōji ; translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter
Contributors: Carpenter, Juliet Winters, translator; Nakano, Kōji, 1925-2004
Edition: First English edition.
Series: Japan library; Japan library (Shuppan Bunka Sangyō Shinkō Zaidan)
Publisher: Japan Publishing Industry Foundation for Culture
Published: 2018
Place of publication: Tokyo
Language: eng
Number of pages: 235
ISBN-13: 9784866580241
Copyright date: 2017
Subjects: Criticism and interpretation; Japanese literature; History and criticism; Japanisch; Literatur
Work titles: Ima o ikiru chie
Description: "Nakano Kōji opens the door to the treasury of Japanese classics by introducing six writers who are his personal favorites. The writers under his lens span seven centuries, ranging from the twelfth century to the nineteenth. Three are poets; three wrote timeless prose. The hermit-monk Ryōkan, a poet who loved nothing more than bouncing balls with neighborhood children or just sitting sprawled in his hut listening to the sound of rain, teaches the value of living with a spirit of play. Kenkō offers trenchant comments on the aesthetics of life, grounded in an appreciation of the immediacy of death. Kamo no Chōmei, a journalist par excellence, found happiness late in life by flouting convention and "rejoicing in the absence of grief." Dōgen, the founder of Sōtō Zen in Japan, takes us on a mind-bending trip to the Dharma--ultimate truth--that involves revolutionary ways of conceiving of time, life, and death. Saigyō, the beloved itinerant monk-poet, continually explores his own wayward heart and its vast, incorrigible love of beauty. Buson the haiku poet uses his painter's eye to capture cosmic vistas as well as moments of poignancy in poems of seventeen syllables"--Dust jacket.
Notes: Revised and abridged translation of: "Ima o ikiru chie" originally published by Iwanami Shoten in 2002.

Includes "A guide to titles cited in the text" (pages 228-229)

Includes bibliographical references (pages 230-233).

In English, translated from the Japanese.

Colophon also in Japanese.
Table of contents: title: Ryōkan [1758-1831]; title: Yoshida Kenkō [c. 1283 - c.1353]; title: Kamo no Chōmei [c. 1155-1216]; title: Dōgen [1200-1253]; title: Saigyō [1118-1190]; title: Yosa Buson [1716-1784].