Allegories of Desire: Esoteric Literary Commentaries of Medieval Japan

by Susan Blakeley Klein

One of the more intriguing developments within medieval Japanese literature is the incorporation into the teaching of waka poetry of the practices of initiation ceremonies and secret transmissions found in esoteric Buddhism. The main figure in this development was the obscure thirteenth-century poet Fujiwara Tameaki, grandson of the famous poet Fujiwara Teika and a priest in a tantric Buddhist sect. Tameaki's commentaries and teachings transformed...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0674009568
• ISBN13: 9780674009561
• Release Date: May 2003
• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Length: 378 Pages
• Weight: 1.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.4" x 9.2"