Art & Architecture of Cambodia (World of Art)

Rating:
Summary: A little disappointing
Review: Not up to T&H's usual standard in terms of production - binding not great (refers to pbk edition), printing of the images below current expected standards. But none of that can be blamed on Jessup - and these faults are the downside of a book which is very cheap for what you get. However, the text is another matter - by no means authoritative as the blurb proclaims - in particular, the first chapter is best left totally unread because of the errors - indicative of which is the howler on page 8 which states that Thai is a Mon-Khmer language - even the most sleepy editor should have spotted that one - unfortunately not the worst example - just the first that jumped out. BUT not all is bad - the selection of images is good and there will be at least some new to people who have an interest in this field, the bibliography has most of the important references and generally the documentation is very good. There are good examples of most of the important aspects of Cambodian art and architecture. If you want a book with a reasonable overview of art and architecture (but not of the Cambodian background) and you don't mind a small format for the photographs, then this is it.