Reviews of English Translations of the Lieh Tzu

The Lieh Tzu is the third great classic of philosophical Taoism, and though it has been thought of as being much later than the Tao Te Ching and Chuang Tzu, the age of much of it seems to keep pushed back. It consists of short stories/discourses, similar to the structure of the CT.

Taoist Teachings Translated From the Book of Lieh Tzu, Lionel Giles (1912)
Actually, as it turns out, this is on the web quite a bit, presumably because it is unencumbered by copyright (e.g.: http://www.sacred-texts.com/tao/tt/). It is also almost unecumbered by Taoism, as well. Giles, while formulating good English, makes Lieh Tzu a monotheist teaching immortality, heaven: in short, a Christian. You are very much better off never reading the Lieh Tzu than believing that this is what Taoism is.

The Book of Lieh Tzu: A Classic of Tao, A.C. Graham (1960)
For many years this was the standard translation. Maybe it still is (the only earlier one I have even heard of is an ancient thing by Giles). No one doubts the quality of Graham's scholarship, but I have to admit that this translation didn't really get me into the LT, which for years (using Graham) I thought of as a kind of mediocre imitation of the Chuang Tzu. The translation I am sure is solid, but it doesn't really have much flair or flavor.


Lieh Tzu: A Taoist Guide to Practical Living, Eva Wong (1995)
This volume surprised me by making me reconsider the LT. It becomes obvious why the book is central to the history of Taoism, and even the history of China (bits of it have been incorporated into a thousandchildren's books, for instance). Wong's introduction and remarks on translation and her own procedure (which she actually says is not a translation) are fascinating. The text itself is rendered in absolutely plain, almost flat, English. This makes you see that LT is considerably more common-sensical and maybe more applicable to everyday life than the TTC or the CT. I kind of thought I would skim it; instead it pulled me through cover to cover quickly, and taught me something.



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