The Duke of Zhou’s Interpretation of Dreams

Description

The Duke of Zhou’s Interpretation of Dreams is the perfect introduction to Chinese dream manuals and their place in Chinese culture. The two manuals translated here are associated with the Duke of Zhou, whose role as legendary patron of divination became prominent in the first millennium CE, when Duke of Zhou dream manuals dominated the genre. The older manual is a tenth century manuscript written on paper and bound in booklet form. It is the best preserved of the twelve dream manuals—in the form of paper scrolls and booklets—from the so-called Library Cave at Dunhuang in Western China (the cache of Dunhuang manuscripts came to light fortuitously in 1900 when the cave was opened for the first time since the tenth century).

—Donald Harper, editor of Books of Fate and Popular Culture in Early China: The Daybook Manuscripts of the Warring States, Qin, and Han, University of Chicago

This volume contains a complete and highly reliable translation of China’s most famous dream book. But there is much more: a thorough introduction to relevant texts on traditional Chinese views on dream and its interpretation, and a real treasury of annotations clarifying allusions and giving background information that hitherto has been unknown to western readers. I recommend this book not only to specialists in Chinese studies, but also to those interested in transcultural studies on the vast territory of dream lore in a global perspective.

—Michael Lackner, author of Der Chinesische Traumwald and editor of Fate and Prognostication in the Chinese Literary Imagination and Coping with the Future: Theories and Practices of Divination in East Asia

Thanks to the joint efforts of translator Nikita Bushin, editor Allen Tsaur, and Johan Hausen of Purple Cloud Press, we now have a thorough, thoughtful, and clear English translation of The Duke of Zhou’s Interpretation of Dreams. This translation elegantly renders the text into accessible English, briefly contextualizes the historical figure of the Duke of Zhou, and provides further references without becoming unwieldy or pedantic. In addition to delighting the general reader, it also offers seasoned scholars excellent primary source material for better understanding the beautiful complexity of dreams in China.

—Brigid Vance, dreams scholar, Lawrence University