Kūkai
Major Works
Kūkai author Yoshito Hakeda translator
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Columbia University Press
Published:23rd Apr '84
Should be back in stock very soon
Kukai, more commonly known by the honorific Kobo Daishi, was one of the great characters in the development of Janpanese culture. He was active in literature, engineering, calligraphy, and architecture and is represented in this work in terms of his major effort--the introduction of esoteric Buddhism from China, which resulted in the formation of the Shingou sect still active in Japan. Eight of his works are presented here.
Kukai was a polymath who has achieved the status of demigod in popular legend: in part because of his virtuosity as a writer of Chinese, his books are too difficult to read by any but a very few scholars in Japan today. Hakeda's achievement in arriving at these lively and intelligible translations is of the highest order. Choice This book serves two functions remarkably well: being an easy to follow, lucidly written introductory work for the non-initiated, and providing for the expert for the first time in English eight of Kukai's major works. World Literature Today
ISBN: 9780231059336
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: unknown
303 pages