Renowned in ancient China’s artistic tradition, the Wheel-Rim River poems and paintings come to life in exquisite translations and 40 full-color reproductions.The famed T’ang-Dynasty poet Wang Wei once said that his poems were paintings and his paintings poems. This book presents a legendary instance of that conjunction. One autumn in eighth century China, Wang’s friend P’ei Ti came to visit, and the two of them wandered the mountain landscape around Wang’...

The dramatic story of the oil boom that transformed the history of a state, drawn from archives and first-person accounts.As the twentieth century began, oil in Texas was easy to find, but the quantities were too small to attract industrial capital and production. Then, on January 10, 1901, the Spindletop gusher blew in. Over the next fifty years, oil transformed Texas, creating a booming economy that built cities, attracted out-of-state workers and companies, fund...

An expansive selection of poems from the last giant of classical Chinese poetry’s golden age, Yang Wan-li (1127–1206 c.e.), masterfully translated by David Hinton.A typical Yang Wan-li poem attends to immediate experience with profound clarity, and this attention usually leads to a moment of sudden awakening: a startling image or turn of thought, a surprising imaginative gesture, a twist of humor. As a government official, Yang undertook many long and arduous journ...

Join renowned author David Hinton on two walks into the wild beauty and archaeological ruins of the desert Southwest, where he maps the edges of consciousness and our place in the Cosmos.Walks in the desert and journeys through Ch’an (Zen) enlightenment. Meditations on the nature of perception and on the nature of ruins. Topographies of mind and of space-time. Poetry and prose. This talismanic book is all of these and more.In this poetic odyssey of nature w...

In this radical new translation of a classic Ch’an (Zen) koan collection, David Hinton illuminates the Taoist dimensions of “carefree-ease,” the effortless joy of the enlightened mind in harmony with earth and cosmos.First collected by the Ch’an master Wisdom-Expanse (Hung-Chih) in the twelfth century, this collection of one hundred kung-ans, or koans, is an essential text for students of Ch’an and Zen. These miniature masterpieces of Chinese philosophy an...

A once-in-a-generation translation of the definitive Ch’an (Zen) koan collection from preeminent translator David Hinton.The Blue-Cliff Record, a collection of Ch’an (Zen) koans stemming from the eleventh century, is a remarkable masterwork of classical Chinese literature, a philosophical text of profound power, and an active practice guide in use by Ch’an and Zen Buddhists all over the world. Rendered with his trademark lyricism and philosophical rigor, t...

A selection of poems by the ancient Chinese poet and statesman Wang Ah-Shih, translated by David Hinton.Wang An-shih (1021-1086 C.E.) was a remarkable figure—not only one of the great Sung Dynasty poets, but also the most influential and controversial statesman of his time. Although Wang had little interest in the grandeur of high office and political power, he took the responsibility of serving the people seriously. He rose to become prime minister, and in this po...

This sweeping collection of new translations paints a brilliant picture of the development of Ch’an (Zen) Buddhism, China’s most radical philosophical and meditative tradition.In this landmark anthology of some two dozen translations, celebrated translator David Hinton shows how Ch'an (Japanese: Zen)—too long considered a perplexing school of Chinese Buddhism—was in truth a Buddhist-inflected form of Taoism, China's native system of spiritual philosophy. The texts ...

Exploring the confluence of ancient Chinese spirituality and modern Western environmental thought, Wild Mind, Wild Earth reveals the unrecognized kinship of mind and nature that must be reanimated if we are to end our destruction of the planet.Earth is embroiled in its sixth major extinction event—this time caused not by asteroids or volcanos, but by us. At bottom, preventing this sixth extinction is a spiritual/philosophical problem, for it is the assumpt...

A deep and radically original exploration of Taoist and Ch'an (Zen) Buddhist wisdom through the lens of the life and work of Tu Fu, widely considered China's greatest classical poet.What is consciousness but the Cosmos awakened to itself? This question is fundamental to the Taoist and Ch'an (Zen) Buddhist worldview that shapes classical Chinese poetry. A uniquely conceived biography, Awakened Cosmos illuminates that worldview through the l...

The first collection of original poetry by the renowned nature writer and highly lauded translator of the Chinese classics.Traveling today Ifound a riversomewhere insideme, wonderedhow far itwanders thereand how muchsky itmirrors. All daylong, wind and desertlight, Ifollowed that river’sdistances . . .Weaving mind and landscape together in meditations on sky and wind, rid...

A new translation of one of the great koan collections--by the premier translator of the Chinese classics--that reveals it to be a literary and philosophical masterwork beyond its association with Chan/Zen.A monk asked: “A dog too has Buddha-nature, no?” And with the master’s enigmatic one-word response begins the great No-Gate Gateway (Wu-Men Kuan), ancient China’s classic foray into the inexpressible nature of mind and reality. For near...