Buddhist Transformations and Interactions: Essays in Honor of Antonino Forte(Cambria Sinophone World)

One of the greatest scholars of Chinese and Japanese Buddhist history was Antonino Forte (1940-2006), who was Director of the Italian School of Oriental (later East Asian) Studies in Kyoto for many years. Professor Forte's approach to Buddhist Studies was like that of a detective attempting to solve a difficult case. He displayed his investigative skills in a series of important projects such as those in which he addressed the riddle of the origins of The Great Cloud Sutra, the mystery of Empress Wu's massive tower and astronomical clock, and the case of the Iranian prince held hostage at the Tang court. Few Buddhist historians have dedicated so much attention and energy to reading archaeological reports and even going into the field to carry out onsite investigations as Antonino Forte. The same data-driven spirit informs the chapters in this tome dedicated to Professor Forte's legacy. This volume is unusual in the way that it assembles the research of distinguished scholars from various fields and regions. One of the main themes that runs through Buddhist Transformations and Interactions is that of borders and their crossing. In very concrete ways, the individual chapters look at how Buddhism passed from India to Central Asia and China and Korea, and from China and Korea to Japan. But crossing is not merely geographical, hence cultural and doctrinal transformations and adaptations are also examined closely. Offering a rare and rich assortment of cutting-edge Buddhological research on diverse topics, this study examines topics such as nirvana and maya, sacred sites, monastery origins, biographical writing, sectarianism in China and Japan, funeral rituals, miracle tales and strange stories, architecture, and lineage transmission. An attentive reading of Buddhist Transformations and Interactions will provide readers with a much better appreciation and understanding of East Asian Buddhism. This book is a valuable resource for scholars and students in Asian studies, particularly Buddhist studies, history of religions, the history of East Asian art and archeology, textual analysis, South Asian studies, and Liao/Khitan studies.

About the Author :
Victor H. Mair is professor of Chinese language and literature at the University of Pennsylvania. He holds a PhD from Harvard University and an MPhil from the School of Oriental and African Studies of the University of London. Professor Mair is the general editor of the Cambria World Sinophone Series, as well as the editor of Sino-Platonic Papers and of the ABC Chinese Dictionary Series at the University of Hawaii Press. He is the coauthor of Sacred Display: Divine and Magical Female Figures of Eurasia and The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West (2000), the author of The Art of War: Sun Zi's Military Methods (2007), and the editor of The Columbia History of Chinese Literature (2001).

Review :
"This study holds substantial and innovative contributions that explore little-known but important topics in Buddhist studies and Chinese religious studies. A remarkably well-constructed and organized collection, each chapter reads like a node in a vast and ongoing network of themes, and promises to become the starting point for new and exciting lines of research. This book is a most valuable resource for scholars in Buddhist studies and Chinese religious studies." --Fabio Rambelli, University of California, Santa Barbara "This book is marked by very high levels of technical Buddhological knowledge and critical research. The list of its contributors reads like a 'who's who' in the fields of Buddhist and Asian Studies. The volume effectively covers large areas of eastern and southern Asian history, while pursuing pointed interest in Buddhist-informed cultures which interacted with each other over millennia and exchanged a multitude of ideas, images, scriptures, and rituals. This book is an outstanding contribution to our knowledge of Buddhist and Asian culture in many of its previously uncovered aspects and nuances." --Tanya Storch, University of the Pacific "This volume demonstrates how actively Buddhist ideas and ideologies intersected with transregional polities and politics. We see in the studies here the importance of the multidirectional transmissions of Buddhist traditions: the usual route of India to China to Japan is here problematized by the recognition that at particular moments the influences were substantially interactive and bilateral. Forte would be very pleased by these border crossings, as his own work did so much to make the cosmopolitanism of Tang Buddhism so vividly real for us." --Daniel Boucher, Cornell University "The work of Antonio Forte was a unique combination of tremendous intellectual creativity and profoundly rigorous scholarship that spanned the geographical and chronological boundaries of Chinese, Indian, and Japanese Buddhism. The impressive originality, depth, and range of the global scholarship in this volume honors, celebrates, and reflects the very qualities that define Forte's legacy." --D. Max Moerman, Barnard College, Columbia University "A remarkable collection of essays by eminent Buddhist scholars and Sinologists who have, in one way or another, been strongly influenced by Antonino Forte's methods, ideas, and personality." --Bernard R. Faure, Columbia University