IN THE FOREST OF FADED WISDOM: 104 POEMS BY GENDUN CHOPEL, A BILINGUAL EDITION . Edited and Translated by Donald S. Lopez, Jr. Buddhism and Modernity. Chicago : The University of Chicago Press , 2009 . Pp. vii + 191 . $26.00 .
摘要
This slim and elegant volume is a key contribution to the study of Tibetan poetry and a fine resource for exploring Buddhism and modernity. Gendun Chopel (1903‐51)—scholar, traveler, and ex‐monk—was one of the most cosmopolitan and controversial Tibetans of his day, thrown in jail by the Lhasa government after a twelve‐year sojourn in India and Sri Lanka. Lopez continues his work on this important figure, whose Madhyamaka philosophical treatise was translated and published in the same series as The Madman's Middle Way (see RSR 33:175‐76). In the introduction, Lopez surveys Chopel's life and the development of poetry in Tibet, highlighting key themes. The remainder of the book gathers and translates his poetry with minimal annotation. While readers of Tibetan will delight in the poet's masterly verse, it is no small feat of the translator that Chopel's distinctive voice leaps off the page in spare and lucid English. The subjects of these poems vary widely and are frequently autobiographical. Themes of wandering, disillusionment, and loss mingle with heartfelt veneration of Buddhist masters, pointed critiques of Tibetan society and monastic institutions, and encounters with other religious traditions in South Asia. This book is indispensable for students of Tibetan literature and modern Tibet and offers an alternative voice on Buddhism and modernity in Asia that engages with—and goes beyond—Christian and colonial encounters.
