Journal of East Asian Libraries Journal of East Asian Libraries

Volume 1993 Number 98 Article 11

2-1-1993

Publications Publications

Pingfeng Chi

Richard T. Wang

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BYU ScholarsArchive Citation BYU ScholarsArchive Citation Chi, Pingfeng and Wang, Richard T. (1993) "Publications," Journal of East Asian Libraries: Vol. 1993 : No. 98 , Article 11. Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jeal/vol1993/iss98/11

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PUBLICATIONS

I. China

Ch'en Tu-hsiu yix Chung-kuo kung-ch'an chu-iyun-tung (Ch'en Tu-hsiu and the Chinese Communist Movement). By Thomas C. Kuo | p

. Taipei: Lien ching ch'u-pan she shih-yeh kung-ssu, 1992. 489 pages. NT$350.00 (paper). Appendices.

This is the Chinese version of Thomas C. Kuo's superb book, Ch'en Tu-hsiu (1878-1942) and the Chinese Communist Movement. The book in English, published in 1975, has been recognized as the first comprehensive and well-informed work in the field. The publication of the Chinese version with newly available data will undoubtedly further clarify the author's brilliant interpretation of the role played by Ch'en Tu-hsiu in the Chinese Communist Movement.

Drawing on a vast amount of source materials, Professor Kuo has carefully and skillfully analyzed the life, ideas, personality, and activities of Ch'en Tu-hsiu and used him as a case study to indicate how a Chinese intellectual who explored possible paths for saving his country drifted into the turbulent current of the Communist revolution.

Although Professor Kuo maintains that Ch'en's case demonstrated a tragedy of the Chinese intellectuals in the early Republic, he affirms Ch'en's leadership and contribution both in the New Culture Movement and the Communist Movement in modern China. These two drives, led by Ch'en, as he argues, were only for a single patriotic goal - to seek ways to make possible the rebirth of China from a backward country to a modern state. Based on this assumption, Professor Kuo concludes that Ch'en's devotion to the advocacy of democracy, science, and socialism; anti-Chinese tradition; anti-Confucianism and feudal ethics; and even the break with the Chinese Communist Party that he established and once led were for nothing but this single goal.

Fifteen years have past since the book first came out in 1975; still not many scholarly works on Ch'en Tu-hsiu have been produced. In recent years, works by Ch'en and articles and biographies on him have been published in China. There are, however, still very few solid research works. The publication of the Chinese version of Professor Kuo's book will hopefully help stimulate research on Ch'en Tu-hsiu and his complex relations with the Chinese Communist Movement, of which he began as a founder and to which he later became opposed.

(Pingfeng Chi)

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Chung-kuo ch'engyu ta tz'u tien ty& ^1&J^%%$&. Compiled by Wang Tao, et al. Shang-hai: Shang-hai tz'u shu ch'u pan she, 1987. 1,846 pages.

Chung-kuo ch'engyu fen lei ta tz'u tien ^ |§j i&fr%$£jfy$r. Chiefly edited by Han Sheng-chi. Pei-ching: Hsin shih chieh ch'u pan she, 1989. 1,467 pages.

Han yu ch'engyu k'ao shih tz'u tien Compiled by Liu Chieh-hsiu. Pei-ching: Shang wu yin shu kuan, 1991. 1,664 pages.

"No foreign student can claim mastery of the Chinese language without being able to use Chinese ch'engyu YfyM— idioms and phrases properly and correctly." This is one of the most common remarks Chinese-language instructors in this country like to make to students in their first Chinese lesson. Indeed, the common use of ch'eng yu in Chinese daily life has created some serious difficulties for those learning Chinese as a foreign language. However, they should find some comfort in knowing that even native Chinese themselves cannot claim total freedom from this difficulty; in fact, misuse of ch 'eng yix appears frequently in Chinese-language newspapers and journals, which may explain in part why so many dictionaries of ch'engyu have been published.

The three titles selected for this review are among the major works published during the past five years and have found their way to nearly all the East Asian collections in this country. While all three are very comprehensive in scope with more than 15,000 entries, offering information on the origin and earliest sources of each ch'eng yiX and its historical usage, they differ in a number of ways, each possessing certain strengths and shortcomings.

When first published in 1987, the Chung-kuo ch'eng yu ta tz'u tien, (referred to hereafter as Ta tz'u tien) was praised for its effort to trace the origin of some ch'eng yu to much earlier sources. However, comparison of this work with the two other titles and Chung wen ta tz'u tien ^ x ^ft$t$k leads to the discovery that in over a hundred cases, the effort appears to have tailed. For example, the earliest source for pu nien chiu wu is Lun yiXi^^, not San kuo chih S^fy ^ and the source for ch'ang ko tang k'u is the ancient poem, Pei ko hsing&^M^, not the novel Hung lou meng &zjf3k.% • Similar mistakes are found in many other entries. The other two works, Chung-kuo ch'engyu fen lei ta tz'u tien (hereafter Fen lei tz'u tien) and Han yu ch'engyu k'ao shih tz'u tien (hereafter K'ao shih tz'u tien) are much better in this regard.

As the title suggests, K'ao shih tz'u tien focuses more than the other two works on the history of the usage of each ch'engyu. But the historical tracing does not always follow a chronological order, and the treatment of each entry shows inconsistency and confusion. For example, under shui shen huo je ^K^XM\ it gives a well-organized

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description of the origin and various usages with slight differences, such as huo je shui shenjz&kJCffi , shui shen huo lieh £jfrf̂ , and shui huo shen je jKsfctffi,

. Yet, the description for chung yuan chu lu ^ /fefe/fej is very confusing and disorganized. The major shortcoming of this work is its failure to list some of the historical variations which have assumed their own identity as a separate entry with a See cross reference to the original. For example, one cannot find shui huo shen je unless one knows its origin. Nor is it included in the index with a cross reference. Such a problem is not found with Fen lei tz'u tien which uses ample cross references to make the linkage between the original and later variations.

By offering a classified arrangement, Fen lei tz'u tien makes use of the dictionary easier for a reader who knows little about existing ch'eng yii. Yet, as in many classified arrangements, the determination of the subject scope and use of subject headings for certain ch'engyu, particularly those fitting into more than one subject scope, can be a potential problem. In general, this work has done a successful job with a good selection of topics. If readers find the classification difficult to use, the alphabetical pinyin index is a helpful addition. In terms of its coverage and content, Fen lei tz'u tien is equal to and, in some cases, better than the other two works.

Explanations and interpretations are one of the most important elements for this type of dictionary. In this regard, these three works are generally satisfactory. There are, however, a few mistakes in each of them. For instance, under chung yuan pan tang $%y1&j$. in Ta tz'u tien, Pan\^ and Tang^ are the names of two poems, not two chapters, in the Shih ching Minor mistakes are found in the use of characters and in pronunciation given in pinyin. For instance, in both Ta tz'u tien and Fen lei tz'u tien, hao kao wu yuan misuse the character w u ^ , which should be % . In pronunciation, Ta tz'u tien's given pronunciation in pinyin for j S^-fL^ is hie wu chang wu. The correct pronunciation for chang should be zhang in pinyin and chang, not ch'ang, in Wade-Giles, as given correctly in the other two works. This, in fact, is a common mistake made by many Chinese. Since the compilation of these works involved a large group of contributors, inconsistency is almost unavoidable even with detailed and thorough editing efforts. The readers should accept occasional inconsistency as being understandable in such circumstances.

In conclusion, given the shortcomings described above, this reviewer finds these three ch'eng yii dictionaries to be among the best ever published. They should be recommended by librarians to the more advanced students of Chinese language and literature.

(Richard T. Wang)

Historical dictionary of Taiwan. Compiled by John Franklin Copper. Asian historical dictionaries ; 12. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1992. Approx. 200 pages. US$27.50. ISBN: 0810826089.

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This handy reference supplies concise and vital information on Taiwan's geography, anthropology, history, social conditions, economy, military, news media, politics, foreign relations, and major figures. Data are presented in definitional form and alphabetized, with terms cross-referenced and explained analytically. A historical sketch of Taiwan, a detailed bibliography, and an appendix containing useful tables are also included.

This book attempts to be a complete and easy-to-use guide to one of the fastest-growing economically and most rapidly-changing politically of the so-called Newly Industrialized Countries. Taiwan, or the Republic of China, is also one of the world's most controversial nations (being claimed by China, it is nonetheless sovereign), and one of the most important geostrategically.

John Franklin Copper, the Stanley J. Buckman Distinguished Professor of Interna­tional Studies at Rhodes College, Memphis, TN, is the author of ten books on Asian affairs and has contributed to more than ten other books. He has lived in Asia for thirteen years.

(Taken from a flier from Scarecrow Press.)

Historical dictionary of Hong Kong and Macau. Compiled by Elfed Vaughan Roberts, Sum Ngai Ling, and Peter Bradshaw. Asian historical dictionaries ; 10. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1992. 406 pages. US$49.50. ISBN: 0810825740.

In 1997 the British Crown colony of Hong Kong reverts to the People's Republic of China after over 150 years under British control. Two years later the oldest colony in Asia, the Portuguese-administered territory of Macau, will be reunited with the mainland. Of the two, Hong Kong is by far the larger in population, size, and economic significance. Forcibly taken from the Chinese in the nineteenth century, it has changed from a small, relatively insignificant colonial possession into one of the economic powerhouses of Asia. Macau, with not nearly as many natural advantages as Hong Kong, has also undergone a remarkable change. How did these two capitalist systems manage to survive until the late twentieth century? How did they avoid the great postwar decolonization period, and why did the communist giant on their doorstep, who could have occupied the territories at any time it chose after 1949, allow the colonial administrations to continue to function? The authors address these questions coherently and systematically.

The book includes a long essay covering the entire history and development of Hong Kong and Macau; the dictionary itself, cross-referenced; and a comprehensive and extended bibliography.

Elfed Vaughan Roberts (University of Wales) has lectured since 1978 in political science at the University of Hong Kong. He has published widely on Hong Kong,

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most recently Political dictionary for Hong Kong (with Stephen Davies, Macmillan, 1990). Peter Bradshaw (University of Southampton), at the United Kingdom's Open University, recently oversaw publication of a distance learning course on Hong Kong society and the social sciences at the University of Hong Kong. Sum Ngai Ling (University of Hong Kong), a senior teacher at one of Hong Kong's most prestigious schools, now studying in the United Kingdom, was instrumental in writing and publishing several texts on contemporary Hong Kong society.

(Taken from a flier from Scarecrow Press.)

Annotated bibliography to the Shike shiliao xinbian & &*]%£jpj-£(f (New edition of historical materials carved on stone). By Dieter Kuhn and Helga Stahl. Wiirzburger sinologische Schriften; ISSN: 0938-6416. Heidelberg: Edition Forum, 1991. ISBN: 3-927943-04-5

The main textual sources of this bibliography are stone inscriptions of various types from the Song, Liao, and Jin dynasties recently excavated from tombs in China. This work is an attempt to identify and list the titles, authors, editors, and other publication information of the more than one thousand publications and manuscripts in which the stone inscriptions have been transcribed and reproduced.

The manuscript of the work was written using the program SPRING %Jy^ TEXT-SYSTEM created by Zhang and Li, Wiirzburg. It is a word processor for Chinese and western languages that runs on an IBM AT computer. Several fonts, including ts'ao shu^^ and // shu^jfe-ijt, are in the system and additional characters in ASCII, Cyrillic, Arabic, Persian, etc., can either be created by the program EDIT FONT or be scanned in.

(Adapted from material sent in by Ina Asim through Maureen Donovan)

II. Japan

Japanese information resources: Papers of the Budapest Conference 5-8 September 1990. Edited by Gordon Daniels and Hamish Todd. Published in 1992 and available from the European Association of Japanese Resource Specialists, c/o Department of History, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, United Kingdom. 92 pages.

The European Association of Japanese Resource Specialists was founded in 1989 at a workshop hosted by the Statsbibiothek PreuBischer Kulturbesitz in what was then West Berlin. The founders of the Association sought to bring together scholars and information specialist interested in Japan, and to promote the strengthening of intra-Europe and Euro-Japanese intellectual cooperation.

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The Association's first annual conference was held at the International Culture Institute, Budapest, Hungary from 5-8 September 1990 and was attended by over fifty information specialists from Europe, Japan, and the United States. The papers deal with issues, developments, and collections in Europe, in Japan, and an overview of Japanese librarianship in North America together with two appendixes showing the growth of Japanese collections in the United States and cooperative collection development models of regional consortia there. This information was presented to the conference by Yasuko Makino, Mihoko Miki, and Kenji Niki. See CEAL Bulletin no. 92 (February 1991): 28-30 for a summary report of this meeting. (Information taken from the front matter of the book; sent in by Frank Joseph Shulman.)

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