Daxue and Zhongyong (A Bilingual Edition)

Dec 2012 · The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press

About this eBook

For the past eight hundred years, the study of Confucian doctrine has been largely dominated by the crucial works known as the "Four Books": the Analects, the Mencius, the Daxue, and the Zhongyong. In their original forms, the Daxue and Zhongyong were two of the more than forty chapters of the larger Li ji (Book of Rites), only gaining prominence thanks to the Song Neo-Confucian scholar Zhu Xi. In this groundbreaking text, Ian Johnston and Wang Ping have translated both of these versions of the Daxue and Zhongyong, one version as chapters of the Li ji that contain the influential commentary and notes of Zheng Xuan and Kong Yingda, and the second after they were reorganized into standalone works and reinterpreted by Zhu Xi. Johnston and Wang also include extensive explanatory and supplemental materials to help contextualize and familiarize readers with these supremely influential works.

About the author

Associate Professor of Neurosurgery at the University of Sydney before he retired in 1999. During his medical career he pursued concurrently studies in languages and philosophy, and has devoted himself to the studies on a full-time basis since retirement. He started learning Chinese in 1970, and obtained his MLitt in Philosophy from University of New England in 1995 (dissertation topic: the Pre-Qin School of Names). He is also proficient in Greek and Latin.

Senior lecturer in the School of Languages and Linguistics at the University of New South Wales. Her research and publications are primarily dedicated to classical Chinese poetry and aesthetics.