Table of Contents

Preface 1. The Stuff of Books 2. The Editor's Texts 3. The Scholar's Dream 4. The Physician's Lament 5. The King's Canons 6. The Cost of a Priceless Book Epilogue: The Boy Who Wrote Sutras on the Sky Appendix 1. Buton Rinchendrup's Letter to Editors Appendix 2. The Contents of the Buddhist Canons Appendix 3. The Cost of the Canon at Dege Notes References Index

Promotional Information

Drawing on sources spanning the fourteenth through the eighteenth centuries, Kurtis R. Schaeffer envisions the scholars and hermits, madmen and ministers, kings and queens responsible for Tibet's massive canons. He describes how Tibetan scholars edited and printed works of religion, literature, art, and science and what this indicates about the interrelation of material and cultural practices. The Tibetan book is at once the embodiment of the Buddha's voice, a principal means of education, a source of tradition and authority, an economic product, a finely crafted aesthetic object, a medium of Buddhist written culture, and a symbol of the religion itself. A meticulous study that draws on more than 150 understudied Tibetan sources, The Culture of the Book in Tibet is the first volume to trace this singular history, allowing for a greater understanding of the Tibetan plateau.

About the Author

Kurtis R. Schaeffer is a student of the cultural and intellectual history of Tibet. He is professor in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia and the author of Himalayan Hermitess: The Life of a Tibetan Buddhist Nun and Dreaming the Great Brahmin: Tibetan Traditions of an Indian Buddhist Poet-Saint.

Reviews

[A] brilliant study. -- Lauran R. Hartley The Journal of Asian Studies This elegant, readable work portrays the considerable traditional Tibetan enterprise of book production. -- Jonathan C. Gold Religious Studies Review This innovative and highly original exploration into the Tibetan culture of the book... is highly recommended reading for everybody interested in Tibetan Studies and cultural studies in general. Journal of the American Oriental Society