Myths and Legends of China

by E.T.C. Werner

Book Overview

Werner arrived in Peking in the 1880s attached to the British Legation as a student interpreter. Werner remained in the British consular service in China until 1914 serving in postings including time... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0486280926
• ISBN13: 9780486280929
• Release Date: June 1994
• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Length: 496 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.4" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

pre-modern orientalist perspective; excellent depth, breadth

To appreciate this book you must take it with a grain of salt (or several). The author is a an old school orientalist, writing in the days when the Chinese Empire still had an emperor and was thoroughly infilitrated by colonial powers (fyi, thats before WWII). To a modern reader Werner seems condescending, but you can tell he has a genuine love for Chinese culture and people even when he is moralizing about the failures of their society at the time. In any event, the depth and breadth of the compilation of myths and tales is excellent, as is the historical context that the author provides. The only flaw is that the order and index is not quite as clear as you might like - several tales are told together in a single chapter, and references to characters in other tales are not always clear due to the numerous names used for some mythological figures. If you can get a version with the original color prints, its a real plus.