Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings

Brook Ziporyn is Associate Professor of Religion and Philosophy, Northwestern University.

The Zhuangzi, with its 'goblet words,' lends itself by design to endless interpretation, of which no single instance has any real claim to the 'correct' meaning of the text. To date, Zhuangzi translations have presented their readers with only a single view of the text--that of the translator himself. With Ziporyn's book, the English world finally has the means to read the Zhuangzi the way it should be read: through the eyes of many. Ziporyn has carefully selected the most illuminating passages to be found within several of the most brilliant Zhuangzi commentaries written over the past two millennia, and he has rendered these often abstruse interpretations, along with the key Zhuangzi chapters which form their subject, accurately and lucidly into flowing English prose. This extraordinary work sets the new standard for Zhuangzi translations, and will prove an indispensable resource for anyone who wishes to take a comprehensive view of this most timeless and boundless of Chinese philosophical classics. --Scott Cook, Grinnell College