The Elegance of Ceramics
Tags
Summary
Traditional Chinese culture has a long and profound intellectual tradition, marked by a high degree of originality, inventiveness and literary quality. Its early forms of thought are highly distinctive: religious theology, classical texts of Chinese medicine, ancient military strategy, Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism and the Hundred Schools of Thought, feng shui and metaphysical learning, the Twenty-Four Histories, and customs and local gazetteers, among other fields, all offer vast and profound content. This series, Classic Essence of Chinese Traditional Culture: Original Texts, preserves the appearance of the original books and is devoted to conserving and spreading traditional Chinese thought and culture. By reading the literary essence left by the ancient sages, readers can cultivate their character and subtly come to appreciate the classics of Chinese learning.
Editor's review
Taoya (The Elegance of Ceramics) was written by Chen Liu of the Qing dynasty and is a specialized work on the connoisseurship of ceramics; included in the Classic Essence of Chinese Traditional Culture: Original Texts series, it preserves the appearance of the original book and is devoted to transmitting the authentic text. Its readability lies in its appraisal of objects through the lens of traditional connoisseurship, discussing kiln sites, glaze colors, forms and aesthetic judgments together; it contains both empirical records and the refined pleasure of a literatus's critical evaluation. For today's readers, this is not a modern textbook on ceramic craft but first-hand material for understanding how people in earlier times looked at porcelain and established standards of rank and quality. In reading, attend to its evaluative vocabulary and the grounds of its judgments, and appreciate the measure of traditional connoisseurial discourse; one may also consult it against general knowledge of ceramic history to distinguish which judgments reflect the experience of an era and which are personal preferences. It is suited to slow reading, note-taking and comparison with images of actual objects, rather than to being read straight through.
Who it's for
A good fit for
- Readers interested in the connoisseurship and object aesthetics of ancient ceramics
- Readers concerned with traditional connoisseurial discourse and the way literati made critical appraisals
- Readers who collect original classics of Chinese learning and prefer editions that preserve the appearance of the original book
- Readers engaged in museum education and teaching of traditional craft culture
Not a good fit for
- Readers seeking modern standards of ceramic authentication and scientific testing knowledge
- Readers expecting a systematic craft manual or an illustrated catalogue-style reference book
- Readers with little patience for classical-language connoisseurial writing who want only the conclusions
Reading tips
- Read the prefaces and postscripts and the general introductory passages first to grasp the author's basic framework for appraising ceramics.
- Prepare a basic work on ceramic history for comparison and consult it promptly when encountering kiln names and terminology.
- Take notes on key evaluative terms and compare the author's language of praise and blame for different objects and the grounds for it.
- Read slowly alongside images of museum collections, checking textual judgments against the visual impression of actual objects.
Contents
- 版权信息
- 匋雅
- 匋雅原序一
- 匋雅原序二
- 匋雅自序
- 匋雅上卷
- 匋雅下卷
- 附录
FAQ
Is Taoya about making ceramics or about connoisseurship?
Taoya focuses on the connoisseurship and appraisal of ceramics and belongs to the traditional category of connoisseurial writing; it is not a modern manual of ceramic craft. The book discusses objects from a literatus's perspective, touching on kiln sites, glaze colors, forms and judgments of rank and quality. Readers who want to learn modern authentication techniques should look for specialized works on testing and authentication.
Can someone without professional knowledge of ceramics read this book?
Yes, but there is a threshold. Its terminology and evaluative vocabulary require some grounding in ceramic history, and readers with no background at all would do well to read a general introduction first and then return to the original text. If one is interested only in traditional culture, the book can also be read as a specimen of how people in earlier times talked about objects, without insisting on judging the merits of each item one by one.
How does this book differ from modern works on ceramic authentication?
Modern authentication works mostly discuss clay and glaze composition, period characteristics, points for detecting forgeries and scientific testing, and pursue workable standards. Taoya, by contrast, is chiefly traditional connoisseurial experience and literati appraisal, valuing sensibility and rank and quality, with judgments colored by the individual and the era. The two can be read as complements, but the ancients' appraisals should not be taken directly as modern authentication conclusions.
Comments
Find this book
This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.
About the author
陈浏
Author
Chen Liu: reliable public information about his life, native place, and career is quite limited. The work currently associated with him is Taoya (Refined Ceramics), a text on ceramic connoisseurship that discusses the quality, aesthetic character, and appreciation of ceramic objects, corresponding to the category of literary appreciation noted in the database. Its writing combines aesthetic judgment with antiquarian scholarship, attending both to form and glaze and to the connoisseur's evaluative perspective, which gives the book some reference value in the literature of ceramic appreciation. Because no dependable records describe Chen Liu's education, official position, social circle, or the circumstances of his writing, this introduction avoids speculation and confines itself to the subject matter, style, and influence of his extant work; readers may consult the original book for a fuller sense of his connoisseurial eye and prose.
