Writing as Enlightenment: Buddhist American Literature into the Twenty-first Century(SUNY series in Buddhism and American Culture)

This title explores the prevalence of Buddhist ideas in American literature since the 1970s.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments Foreword Jan Willis Introduction John Whalen-Bridge & Gary Storhoff PART I. Widening the Stream: Literature as Transmission 1. The Transmission of Zen as Dual Discourse: Shaku Soen and Okakura Kakuzo Jane Falk 2. Black American Buddhism: History and Representation Linda Furgerson Selzer PART II. The New Lamp: Buddhism and Contemporary Writers 3. Some of the Dharma: The Human, the Heavenly, and the "Real Work" in the Writings of Gary Snyder Allan Johnston 4. "Listen and Relate": Buddhism, Daoism, and Chance in the Poetry and Poetics of Jackson Mac Low Jonathan Stalling 5. A Deeper Kind of Truth: Buddhist Themes in Don DeLillo's Libra Gary Storhoff PART III. Speaking as Enlightenment: Interviews with Buddhist Writers 6. "The Present Moment Happening": A Conversation with Gary Snyder about Danger on Peaks Julia Martin 7. Embodied Mindfulness: Charles Johnson and Maxine Hong Kingston on Buddhism, Race, and Beauty John Whalen-Bridge 8. Poetry and Practice at Naropa University John Whalen-Bridge List of Contributors Index

About the Author :
John Whalen-Bridge is Associate Professor of English at the National University of Singapore. His books include Norman Mailer's Later Fictions: Ancient Evenings through Castle in the Forest. Gary Storhoff is Associate Professor of English at the University of Connecticut, Stamford. He is the author of Understanding Charles Johnson. Together they are coeditors of The Emergence of Buddhist American Literature and American Buddhism as a Way of Life, both also published by SUNY Press.

Review :
"...every contribution invites us to dig deeper, to go back to the original writings and discover the interplay of Buddhism and American culture for ourselves." - Relegere: Studies in Religion and Reception "Whalen-Bridge and Storhoff ... contend that Buddhism has been transmitted effectively through US literature and become 'an important cultural dimension of America.' The editors and their contributors are convincing in advancing this view ... Highly recommended." - CHOICE "Writing as Enlightenment ... will be most useful to ... college and university students and teachers who are working to define and shape the emerging field of Buddhist literary criticism." - Buddhadharma "Literature has long been a vital part of the Buddhist search for wisdom, a fact that is particularly true of American Buddhism. Writing as Enlightenment is an engaging and wide-ranging study that expands our understanding of Buddhist American literature." - David Landis Barnhill, translator of Basho's Journey: The Literary Prose of Matsuo Basho