Beating Devils and Burning Their Books: Views of China, Japan, and the West (Asia Past & Present)

Beating Devils and Burning Their Books considers several topics germane to today’s social and intellectual climate. Is religio-cultural conflict innate in religious belief? Is “difference” necessarily an antecedent of conflict? And on a purely expository level, how have governments, intellectuals, and religious devotees represented Asia or the West, and how did they distort those images in order to present diminutive representations of “the Other”? Following works such as Edward Said’s Orientalism and John Dower’s War Without Mercy, this important volume seeks to continue needed dialogue regarding how China, Japan, and the West have historically viewed and represented each other. A marvelous collection of insightful analysis on topics ranging from the Chinese picturesque in 19th-century Britain, to the twisted spirituality of Brad Warner’sHardcore Zen, to the representation of missionaries in China as baby-eaters and beasts, Beating Devils and Burning their Books illustrates the tendency to exaggerate radical difference―both positive and negative―that is part of the complex interaction that makes up cultural exchange.

ANTHONY E. CLARK is Professor of Chinese History at Whitworth University. His research is in the areas of early Chinese historiography and
late-imperial Christian missions. He is the author of Ban Gu’s History of Early China (2008).