About the Author

The way of life defined in the Tao Te Ching was developed by ancient sages who lived in China some two thousand years ago. Lao Tzu, known as the Old One, was one such sage who practiced "the way," although there were almost certainly other religious thinkers who contributed further ideas and wisdom to it.

R. B. Blakney, past president of Olivet College, former missionary and teacher in China, and author of many volumes on Eastern religions, made this splendid translation of a great gem of Chinese religion and provided an illuminating interpretative commentary.

Richard John Lynn is Professor Emeritus of Chinese Thought and Literature, Department of East Asian Studies, University of Toronto, Canada. His books include Chinese Literature- A Draft Bibliography in Western European Languages, Guide to Chinese Poetry and Drama, and The Classic of Changes- A New Translation of the I Ching as Interpreted by Wang Bi. He is the editor of James J. Y. Liu's Language-Paradox-Poetics- A Chinese Perspective.

Reviews

"It would be hard to find a fresh approach to a text that ranks only behind the Bible as the most widely translated book in the world, but Star achieves that goal. As fascinating to the casual scholar as it is for the serious student."

"Jonathan Star's "Tao Te Ching achieves the essential: It clarifies the meaning of the text without in the slightest reducing its mystery. This superb work enables readers to search for their own understanding of the "Tao Te Ching, under the guiding hand of Star's admirable scholarship."

It is not often that books of merit in the field of spiritual writing also appeal to the eye and the hand. This version of the well-known Tao Te Ching is indubitably a coffee-table book, but it is as gratifying to the intellect as to the sense of aesthetics. In the principal section of the book, each verse chapter, in Chinese and in Dale's translation, is accompanied by a beautifully subtle black-and-white photograph. At the rear of the book, Dale, a longtime scholar of acupuncture and other fields, repeats each verse chapter and adds his own commentary. There is something unintentionally comic about Dale's Western, reasoned, and multisyllabic commentaries on Lao Tzu's studied simplicity, apparent even in translation; still, most readers will find Dale's insights helpful. For libraries with significant holdings in Taoism. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

"It would be hard to find a fresh approach to a text that ranks only behind the Bible as the most widely translated book in the world, but Star achieves that goal. As fascinating to the casual scholar as it is for the serious student."
"Jonathan Star's "Tao Te Ching achieves the essential: It clarifies the meaning of the text without in the slightest reducing its mystery. This superb work enables readers to search for their own understanding of the "Tao Te Ching, under the guiding hand of Star's admirable scholarship."