The Culture Of The Book In Tibet

The history of the book in Tibet involves more than literary trends and traderoutes. Functioning as material intellectual and symbolic object the bookhas been a... » 

The history of the book in Tibet involves more than literary trends and traderoutes. Functioning as material intellectual and symbolic object the bookhas been an instrumental tool in the construction of Tibetan power andauthority and its history opens a crucial window onto the culturalintellectual and economic life of an immensely influential Buddhistsociety.Spanning the fourteenth to the eighteenth centuries Kurtis R.Schaeffer envisions the scholars and hermits madmen and ministers kings andqueens who produced Tibets massive canons. He describes how Tibetan scholarsedited and printed works of religion literature art and science and whatthis indicates about the interrelation of material and cultural practices. TheTibetan book is at once the embodiment of the Buddhas voice a principal meansof education a source of tradition and authority an economic product afinely crafted aesthetic object a medium of Buddhist written culture and asymbol of the religion itself. Books stood at the center of debates on the roleof libraries in religious institutions the relative merits of oral and writtenteachings and the economy of religion in Tibet.A meticulous study that drawson more than 150 understudied Tibetan sources The Culture of the Book in Tibetis the first volume to trace this singular history. Through a single objectSchaeffer accesses a greater understanding of the cultural and social historyof the Tibetan plateau. «