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Jay
Martin is an eminent literary figure in America, author of
numerous biographies and a college professor.
Questioning whether he had gotten too comfortable, in
a sort of rut, Martin set out on his own to explore the hidden
trails of Buddhism in China.
This book is his memoir of the journey from America to China,
from the golden streets of success to forest trails to forgotten
monasteries. Martin is an extraordinary literary talent and
readers will not be disappointed with a travel memoir that is by
turns meditative, adventurous (he is stranded on an island by an
opportunistic fisherman) and enlightening.
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Jay Martin,
Ph.D., is a professor of Government and Humanities at Claremont
College, Claremont, California. He is the author of numerous
biographies, including Always Merry and Bright: A Life of
Henry Miller; and The Education of John Dewey: A
Biography.
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Jay Martin has served us a layered
feast . . . a vivid picture of the imperfect blend of
tradition and modernity that constitute today’s China. . . .
This rich content is packaged in a narrative so beautifully
and clearly written as to evoke sighs of admiration and
pleasure. – Burton Levin, former U.S. Consul-General
to Hong Kong and Ambassador to Burma.
Jay Martin takes us on a spiritual
sojourn in which he comes to experience China in a way and
to a degree lost on perhaps most of our China experts . . .
A quality of unrestrained childlike wonder transforms his
prose into a reverie. Guiding us gently through the business
of the monastic day . . . Martin teaches us that real
religious feeling is, in fact, the spontaneous flowering of
sensitive living in the here and now. – Roger T. Ames,
author of Thinking Through Confucius: Thinking from the
Han, and translator and editor of Confucius’
Analects.
In spite
of the repressive efforts of Chairman Mao and his
successors, religion still lives and flourishes in China.
The author of numerous literary biographies (Always Merry
and Bright: The Life of Henry Miller) and other books,
Martin, who teaches government at Claremont McKenna College,
takes us with him to the sixth-century monastery of Guo Qing
in east central China. He spends more than a month at the
monastery, not as a casual visitor but as a monk, following
all the monastic rituals and rules although he is not
Chinese but American, not a celibate monk but a married
layman, and not even Buddhist but Catholic. Monastic life
has universal appeal, and Martin's account is full of
interesting observations about Chinese people and places
while also being attentive to Buddhist monastic
spirituality. The book suffers a bit from the author's
self-focus, but this is a minor complaint. Well written and
intelligent, it will appeal both to casual readers and to
specialists. – Library Journal, James F.
DeRoche, Alexandria, VA
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
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