Eastern Literature

[Killawatt]

Is there no literary work here from any prominent Eastern authors or thinkers, aside from the seemingly obigatory Sun Tsu?

[AwayAloneAlast]

Try the "Tao Te-Ching" of Lao Tzu, the meditations of Buddha, the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita (and its longer frame, The Mahabharata) and the Ramayana. These are all very powerful works; not as influential in the West as they perhaps should be, but excellent nonetheless.

[stlukesguild]

I think the problem with Eastern literature is mostly a lack of quality translations. Thanks to Fitzgerald's translations Omar Khayyam is probably far better known in the English-speaking world than his reputation deserves. Or rather, perhaps I should say that there are others that surely deserve to be far-better known... but lack any brilliant translator. In spite of the scale of my personal library I have but a few volumes of Chinese, Arabic, Indian poetry. As the world becomes more multi-cultural and as the Western ties with the Middle-East and Asia increase I assume we will have more speakers of those languages... and more quality translations of those literatures.

[SirRaustusBear]

A great Chinese novel is The Story of the Stone by Cao Xueqin. It's considered the greatest Chinese novel of all time, but it's about 2500 pages, so reading it is kind of an investment.

As far as modern lit, I love Gao Xingjian, especially Soul Mountain.

[stlukesguild]

A great Chinese novel is The Story of the Stone by Cao Xueqin. It's considered the greatest Chinese novel of all time, but it's about 2500 pages, so reading it is kind of an investment.

AKA The Dream of the Red Chamber. I have an abridged version which I have yet to read.

[AwayAloneAlast]

I think the problem with Eastern literature is mostly a lack of quality translations. Thanks to Fitzgerald's translations Omar Khayyam is probably far better known in the English-speaking world than his reputation deserves. Or rather, perhaps I should say that there are others that surely deserve to be far-better known... but lack any brilliant translator. In spite of the scale of my personal library I have but a few volumes of Chinese, Arabic, Indian poetry. As the world becomes more multi-cultural and as the Western ties with the Middle-East and Asia increase I assume we will have more speakers of those languages... and more quality translations of those literatures.

That's probably a big part of it. The "Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam" are really the "Rubaiyat of Edward FitzGerald", and its interesting that you bring that case up. It's a brilliant poem, but I gotta agree that (at least from what I've heard) it's hardly based on Khayyam's original anyways.

[Killawatt]

Thanks for your suggestions.

I was thinking in terms of this site though and is there any way of uploading work here as it seems to be mainly classical authors? Not that it's a problem mind!

More comments appreciated...

[Logos]

The Literature Network only hosts authors with works that are in the public domain but there is a long list of those [authors and works] still to be added :)

http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17769

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