The Daode jing Commentary of Cheng Xuanying: Daoism, Buddhism, and the Laozi in the Tang Dynasty (Oxford Chinese Thought)

This is a wonderful piece of scholarship.

This is a terrific resource.  English language sources often focus exclusively on the Warring States (or Han) aspect.  This book documents and illuminates a high point in the official standing of Daoism as a state religion.  Key names and phrases are given in transcription of course, but also in Chinese characters which will be extremely helpful for many readers.  Anyone knowing a bit of Chinese will wonder which "Cheng" is in Cheng Xuanying's name?  Is the "Xuan" in that name the same word as in "xuanxue" (the classical "study of the dark")?  The answers are visible on the page.  (As to "xuan" yes it is the same word both times.)Unfortunately, OUP chose not to use the standard, excellent, pinyin romanization.  They use an abbreviated form omitting tone marks.  So you cannot tell how any of these names or phrases are pronounced in Chinese.   OUP would never publish French language phrases without accent marks.  They would never publish quotes from German or other western European languages without the correct spelling including diacritics.  Indeed all the tones marks of Hanyu pinyin are already being used by OUP for European languages.  They ought to be used for Chinese as well.

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