Tao Te Ching (Penguin Classics)

Rating:
Summary: Tao Te Ching, Lao Tzu
Review: A very good translation, and graphically and typographically and very nice book. Straightforward, and SOME insightful narative, this book is a standard for those seeking more about the tao.

Rating:
Summary: 'Theses are convincing - but deceptive...'
Review: Although D. C. Lau's edition of the Tao Te Ching has been sitting on my shelves for years, I've never felt particularly drawn to it. In contrast to my well-thumbed copies of Lin Yutang, J. J. L. Duyvendak, Ellen M. Chen, Zen adept Stephen Mitchell, and others, the Lau is still in a relatively pristine condition.

I don't think this is because of the quality of the translation, a translation which, though occasionally a bit wordy, reads well enough in other places. I think it's more because Lau strikes me as a hard-boiled Confucian with a thesis.

Today we are all more than used to theses. The air is thick with them. Given a bit of time, any clever woman or man can easily construct one. But we should never forget what Lu Chi (+ 754-805) reminds us of in his brilliant 'Essay on Literature,' the 'Wen fu,' when he tells us that: 'Theses are convincing - but deceptive...'

Chapter 18 of the Tao Te Ching offers what seems to me to be a perfect comment on thesis books:

"When the body's intelligence declines, / cleverness and knowledge step forth" (tr. Stephen Mitchell).

In Ellen M. Chen the same passage reads: "When intelligence (hui) and knowledge (chih) appear, / There is great artificiality (wei)" (page 99).

And in Lau: "When cleverness emerges / There is great hypocrisy" (page 74).

Many readers will probably find that Lau's edition suits them well enough for their purposes, but those who might prefer an edition which is not merely scholarly but also sympathetic might take a look at Professor Ellen M. Chen's 'The Tao Te Ching - A New Translation with Commentary' (New York: Paragon House, 1989 ISBN 1-55778-238-5). I think that for your money you'll be getting a little more than "cleverness."

Rating:
Summary: Confucian-based interpretation
Review: D.C. Lau's translation is as good a place to start as any if you're new to the Tao Te Ching, though his introductory essay might scare off some with its dry, scholarly tone. I would suggest that you avoid reading it, unless of course you really want to hear his thoughts on the text. Given the ambiguity of Lao Tzu's masterpiece to interpretation, translations of the Tao Te Ching are wide and varied. Lau's is very much a Confucian-based interpretation. Which is not to say it is not any good, however, be aware that you're essentially reading one school of thought on the text. As for the text itself and it's meaning, it is difficult to explain. The Way is the path to truth, but what has to be understood is that this path has no start or finish. To put it another way, it is eternal and cyclic, much like the idea of Karma. It's about finding the true nature of existence and in turn, non-existence. Lao Tzu says, "Those who speak do not know; those who know do not speak". So perhaps I don't know what I'm talking about! I guess the meaning of the Tao Te Ching is up to the individual to decide upon. Regardless, D.C. Lau's translation is recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Confucian-based interpretation
Review: How many translations of Lauzi are there on the market? Twenty? A hundred? How many do we need? This one has been around for a long time, but it has stood the test of time better than most.

Believe me when I say that there is no such thing as an even marginally adequate translation of the Dao De Jing, and there never will be. All the translator can hope to do is keep it simple and have a nice presentation on the page. This translation does this, without overdoing it.

Rating:
Summary: A perplexing but profitable read
Review: I first encountered the Tao Te Ching in the Mithcell translation as a sophomore in college, and we read it--fitting the context of a course on world religions--as a religious text. What is really nice about D. C. Lau's translation (and he mentions this in his fine intro) is that, in keeping with a longstanding tradition in Chinese culture, he attempts to restore some of the political import to the text. Re-reading Lao Tzu's lyrical fragments in Lau's rendering of them really brought home to me an aspect of the text that is completely overshadowed, in most translations, by the religious angles that are important but not sole determiners of the Tao's relevance and message. (This view sees me in disagreement with the avowed "Taoist" reviewer below who lamented Lau's attention to Lao Tzu's political import.)

While I heartily disagree with the political message of the Tao Te Ching--which sponsors a hands-off, laissez-faire, small-government formation, letting everything work itself out without intrusion from leaders and other well-intentioned officials, as if things ever just work themselves out on their own!--I appreciate Lau's efforts to recover in his translation a crucial, crucial aspect of Lao Tzu's thought, and one that has been shuffled under the magic carpet by Taoism's New Agey popularity among many Anglophones.

Rating:
Summary: A perplexing but profitable read
Review: I first encountered the Tao Te Ching in the Mithcell translation as a sophomore in college, and we read it--fitting the context of a course on world religions--as a religious text. What is really nice about D. C. Lau's translation (and he mentions this in his fine intro) is that, in keeping with a longstanding tradition in Chinese culture, he attempts to restore some of the political import to the text. Re-reading Lao Tzu's lyrical fragments in Lau's rendering of them really brought home to me an aspect of the text that is completely overshadowed, in most translations, by the religious angles that are important but not sole determiners of the Tao's relevance and message. (This view sees me in disagreement with the avowed "Taoist" reviewer below who lamented Lau's attention to Lao Tzu's political import.)

While I heartily disagree with the political message of the Tao Te Ching--which sponsors a hands-off, laissez-faire, small-government formation, letting everything work itself out without intrusion from leaders and other well-intentioned officials, as if things ever just work themselves out on their own!--I appreciate Lau's efforts to recover in his translation a crucial, crucial aspect of Lao Tzu's thought, and one that has been shuffled under the magic carpet by Taoism's New Agey popularity among many Anglophones.

Rating:
Summary: The worst translation of such a great work
Review: The Tao Te Ching is a great book of early Asian Philosophy. Unfortunately, this is by far the worst translation available, which is regrettable because I love Penguin classics. Penguin is a great publisher of the classics. I would really like to see Penguin publish this timely classic by Stephen Mitchell, which most will now admit is the "best" translation of this great book.

Dr. Lau has a good "introduction" for the book but his "English" and word choice is rather poor and outdated. Comparing translations is good, since I have quite a variety of translations to look at. But for a really good translation, see Stephen Mitchell's version.

Rating:
Summary: OK introduction to the text
Review: The Tao Te Ching is one of those hyped-up texts that come about with the proliferation of the New-Age establishment. One can walk into most bookstores to be hounded by dozens of editions, finely illustrated, with plenty of white space, printed on unbleached, acid-free paper, almost saying "buy me, simplicity and enlightenment beckons". So, to cut away from the hype into reality, there are two issues - what's the actual text like and how good is this edition?

The Tao Te Ching is a very short text (I think about 5000 characters in Chinese). It is one of the primary Taoist texts but it has been used in many, many other contexts since. It's attributed to Lao Tzu, the sage of Taoism, although scholarly opinion about authorship varies widely. It opens with a line that can be translated as "the Way that can be named is not the Way," so it's quite impossible to convey the principles without breaking them. The general pop analysis is that it accentuates simplicity, intuition, the under-dog, adaptability, spontenaiety and harmony with the universe. And these all seem to be at least partially, true while of course missing the unattainable essence as all analyses of the work must. Some of the teachings are certainly radical in interpreted literally ("exterminate the sage...and the people will benefit a hundredfold").

As to the edition, it has plenty of white space (this time, sarcasm aside, I think that's a very underrated aspect of works, especially translated ones). I've described the New-Agey side of the Tao's interpretation but there's also a dry and scholarly side which is concerned with manuscripts, variant readings and the like. This edition is a good introduction for someone with no ideological predisposition because it is quite in the middle, though a tad on the dry side. There are some explanatory notes but not to the extent of overwhelming the text. Basically, it's quite bare which is the point. If you're new to the text and are expecting profound insights of a new age, this is not the edition, as it presents the skeleton, and it's hard to process a skeleton into a profound insight.

An OK start if you want to see a fairly neutral translation before deciding if this is a mystical goldmine or accidental textual anomaly. But it seems there are better editions on both the scholarly and flowery ends of the scale.

Rating:
Summary: A fine and elegant translation!
Review: This is a review of D.C. Lau's translation of the _Tao Te Ching_, as republished in the Everyman's Library series.

The _Tao Te Ching_ is a collection of brief sayings and verse attributed to Lao Tzu. Lao Tzu is semi-mythical. He is traditionally supposed to have been a contemporary of Confucius (about 500 B.C.), but he may just be a "composite" of stories about various early sages. The _Tao Te Ching_ itself is probably an anthology of early wisdom literature. It is concise to the point of being cryptic. Ironically, this probably helps to account for its popularity. Since it is so hard to understand, people tend to find in it what they want to find.

For millennia, the standard text of the _Tao Te Ching_ was the "Wang Pi text," named after an early commentator. However, earlier versions of the text were unearthed in a tomb in China in the 70's. These were called the "Ma-wang-tui" versions, after the place where the tomb was located.

D.C. Lau was one of the most talented translators of the 20th century. His translations of the _Analects_ of Confucius, the _Mencius_, and the _Tao Te Ching_ are among the best available. His original translation of the _Tao Te Ching_ was based on the Wang Bi text, and was published by Penguin Books. The book on this page includes both the original Penguin Books translation and a revised translation based on the Ma-wang-tui texts.

Lau is a very well informed scholar, but he does not allow the scholarship to overwhelm the translation. The language of his translation is concise and elegant. There will always be deep controversy over how to translate this deeply enigmatic text, but Lau's interpretations are always defensible.

One disadvantage of this book is that it does not include the introduction to Lau's Penguin Books translation. That introduction was itself one of the better philosophical studies of the _Tao Te Ching_. Overall, though, this is a fine translation in an elegant (and reasonably priced) format. I strongly recommend it.

Some different, but equally good, translations are those by Victor Mair and Philip J. Ivanhoe. Mair's translation has been published as a separate book, while Ivanhoe's is included in Ivanhoe and Bryan W. Van Norden, eds., _Readings in Classical Chinese Philosophy_. If you would like some help interpreting the _Tao Te Ching_, a good collection of secondary essays is Mark Csikszentmihalyi and Philip J. Ivanhoe, eds., _Essays on Religious and Philosophical Aspects of the Laozi_.

Rating:
Summary: Unsatisfactory
Review: This translation was done by a scholar who is completely out of touch with what Taoism is about. Lao Tzu himslef would have laughed at the translation. The translator thinks that the purpose of Taoism is merely a matter of survival. Cowards survive longer, is his attitude towards Taoism. As a Taoist I have read many translations of the Tao Te Ching and this is the worst one I have ever read.