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China Open - China Closed
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 February 2024
Extract
Forbidden areas, i.e. areas (sites, cities, countries) that are inaccessible for topographical reasons or especially because of decisions based on political, religious, or other motivations are usually surrounded by an aura of mystery and almost necessarily arouse curiosity. The dream of generations of explorers was to reach Lhasa. An area can be closed not only to outsiders but also to “insiders:” nobody is allowed to leave for the “outside.” The isolation imposed on Japan by the Tokugawa regime was such a two-way seclusion aided, of course, by geographical conditions and hence easily enforceable. It has been suggested, perhaps not quite seriously, that the famous Chinese wall was meant not only to keep out barbarian invaders, but also to prevent Chinese from leaving. That there was some kind of border control is also suggested by the leger, according to which Lao-tse, before disappearing into the west, committed his teaching, the Tao-te-kinq, to writing at the request of the “gatekeeper.” One may well wonder whether there exists another equally influential text written at the behest of a border policeman!
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- Copyright © 1994 Fédération Internationale des Sociétés de Philosophie / International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP)
References
Notes
1. See B. Watney, English Blue and White Pottery of the 18th Century (London, 1963), 113.
2. See R. van Gulik postscript to his Judge Dee detective story The Willow Pattern (1965), 172-3.
3. See M.A. Yin, editor, Chinese Minority Nationalities (Beijing, 1989).
4. The Arab quarter of Canton plays a prominent role in one of van Gulik's Judge Dee stories, Murder in Canton.
5. See Arthur Waley, The Travels of an Alchemist: the Journey of the Taoist Ch'ang ch'un … from China to the Hindu-kush at the Summons of Chinqiz Khan, recorded by his disciple Li Chih-ch'anq (London, 1931).
6. (See Wen Fong, The Great Bronze Age of China (1980), and Vadim Eliseeff, Bronze dans l'Art Japonais (1976).
7. See R.L. Taylor, The Religious Dimensions of Confucianism (1990).
8. See Kato Shuichi or P.R. Will, The Resilience of Confucianism in Contemporary Societies (1991-1992).