Disputers of the Tao Book

In my Chinese History class with Patricia Ebrey last fall one of the readings she gave us was from A.C. Graham on Lao Tzu and Taoism. I loved it as it was the first explanation of Taoism that I'd read. It actually made sense and I could understand what the whole point of it was. Surprisingly the rest of the class found it a really difficult reading, which also surprised the teacher as she had used the whole book before as a textbook for the class in previous years. Several months ago I found the entire book Disputers of the Dao and bought it immediately. Though it took me a couple months to start reading.

I have to admit that I am not really excited by philosophy, I feel like this is my personal failing in some way and I have the hardest time explaining why exactly. I love looking at religion, psychology and even science to understand how people work but for some reason the work of philosophers just don't have the same appeal to me. I think part of the problem is they seem so abstract and removed from every day life. And so much of what the ancient philosophers argued over seems to have been answered by modern science. So you should read my review of this book aware of my prejudice which I am not proud of.

So I did really enjoy this book. This might mean that it's either really good philosophy or really bad. But I thought it was good. Graham was a professor of Chinese language for many years at, among other places, SOAS. So before I even started I had a soft spot for him. But as a Chinese language expert he was able to look at the different meanings of the characters being used and explain their meanings, roots, and the way they've been interpreted and misinterpreted over time. This I think was very valuable to understanding the philosophy he was talking about.

He also seemed to be writing for people who have knowledge of western philosophy, he would frequently refer back to what the Greeks did, or what more modern philosophers have thought and compared them with the Chinese ideas in a very meaningful way. Rather than simply try and look at the differences between the two he looked at where they crossed over lapped and where they diverged and why.

The book is steeped in Chinese history. Graham looks at the historical background of the different philosophies and philosophers, and how this affected the writing, and how the writing was used and affected others. I think in order to get an understanding of the books it is very important to understand the circumstances in which they were written. Graham, more than any other author that I've read, does this very well.

Graham starts his discussion chronologically but rather than just sticking with the names famous to most Western readers he looks at all the different schools and how they affected each other, how interests that were being discussed changed over time, from the right way to rule a state, to more metaphysical aspects. He also looks at the cosmology of the Han which was particularly interesting, analysing the yin and yang schools and the tradition of the 5 elements/phases.

The book is a great read to figure out how it all happened grew and changed and what people were trying to say. It is full of quotations, all done as original translations for this book. It I think will also be a good reference for going back and looking at particular philosophies. I would definitely recommend it as the best book I've read so far on understanding early Chinese philosophy.