The Chinese language in European texts : the early period / Dinu Luca.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Luca, Dinu, author.

Series:

Chinese literature and culture in the world

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Chinese literature--Appreciation--Europe.

Chinese literature.

Chinese literature--Appreciation.

Europe.

Physical Description:

xvi, 242 pages : color illustrations ; 22 cm.

Place of Publication:

New York : Palgrave Macmillan, [2016]

Summary:

This detailed, chronological study investigates the rise of the European fascination with the Chinese language up to 1615. By meticulously investigating a wide range of primary sources, Dinu Luca identifies a rhetorical continuum uniting the land of the Seres, Cathay, and China in a tropology of silence, vision, and writing. Tracing the contours of this tropology, The Chinese Language in European Texts: The Early Period offers close readings of language-related contexts in works by classical authors, medieval travelers, and Renaissance cosmographers, as well as various merchants, wanderers, and missionaries, both notable and lesser-known. What emerges is a clear and comprehensive understanding of early European ideas about the Chinese language and writing system.

Contents:

Introduction: Entering the Language Continuum

1. Silence, Script, and "New Understandings"

2. Figures, Hieroglyphs, and Ciphers,- 3. Ships, Bricks, and the Majesty of Writing: The New Century

Conclusion.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

1137512253

9781137512253

OCLC:

942380468