This introduction to both written and oral Mongolian literature from the thirteenth to the nineteenth century provides a rare insight into the changing world views of the Mongolian people: from clan society to Soviet culture. Translated by renowned scholar Charles Bawden, the work is organised into Histories, Legends, Didactic literature, Epics, Shamanistic Incantations, Folk tales, Myths, Sino-Mongolian Prose Literature, Lyrics and Other Verse and Reminiscences, concluding with a modern short story. This important work, which makes the rich tradition of Mongolian literature available for the first time, will be essential reading for many years to come.
This introduction to both written and oral Mongolian literature from the thirteenth to the nineteenth century provides a rare insight into the changing world views of the Mongolian people: from clan society to Soviet culture. Translated by renowned scholar Charles Bawden, the work is organised into Histories, Legends, Didactic literature, Epics, Shamanistic Incantations, Folk tales, Myths, Sino-Mongolian Prose Literature, Lyrics and Other Verse and Reminiscences, concluding with a modern short story. This important work, which makes the rich tradition of Mongolian literature available for the first time, will be essential reading for many years to come.
This book celebrates the power of music, dance, and oral narrative to create identities by imaginatively connecting performers and audiences with ethnic and political groupings, global and sacred landscapes, histories and heroes, spirits and gods.Three distinct cultural eras of Mongolian society are represented. Many Mongolsare now performing publicly the diverse traditions of Old Mongolia that they practised in private following the communist revolution of 1921; some are perpetuating the Soviet transformations of those traditions introduced prior to 1990; and yet others are dipping their curly-toed boots into new performance arts as they revel in musical encounters on the global stage. By highlighting the sheer variety ofrepertories, this book illustrates the rich diversity of Mongolia's peoples andperformance arts.An accompanying compact disc contains musical examples linked to the text.Carole Pegg is ethnomusicology editor for the New Grove Dictionary of Musicand Musicians and associate lecturer in social anthropology at the University of Cambridge, England. As an ethno-musicologist and musician she has been working with nomadic groups in remote areas of Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, China, and with urban Mongols in both countries since 1987. She has also toured with Mongol musicians in England and Hong Kong.
Over the course of the twentieth century, Mongolian life was transformed, as a land of nomadic communities encountered first socialism and then capitalism and their promises of new societies. The stories collected in this anthology offer literary snapshots of Mongolian life throughout this tumult. Suncranes and Other Stories showcases a range of powerful voices and their vivid portraits of nomads, revolution, and the endless steppe. Spanning the years following the socialist revolution of 1921 through the early twenty-first century, these stories from the country’s most highly regarded prose writers show how Mongolian culture has forged links between the traditional and the modern. Writers employ a wide range of styles, from Aesopian fables through socialist realism to more experimental forms, influenced by folktales and epics as well as Western prose models. They depict the drama of a nomadic population struggling to understand a new approach to life imposed by a foreign power while at the same time benefiting from reforms, whether in the capital city Ulaanbaatar or on the steppe. Across the mix of stories, Mongolia’s majestic landscape and the people’s deep connection to it come through vividly. For all English-speaking readers curious about Mongolia’s people and culture, Simon Wickhamsmith’s translations make available this captivating literary tradition and its rich portrayals of the natural and social worlds.
This fresh translation of one of the only surviving Mongol sources about the Mongol empire, brings out the excitement of this epic with its wide-ranging commentaries on military and social conditions, religion and philosophy, while remaining faithful to the original text.
In The Columbia Anthology of Chinese Folk and Popular Literature, two of the world's leading sinologists, Victor H. Mair and Mark Bender, capture the breadth of China's oral-based literary heritage. This collection presents works drawn from the large body of oral literature of many of China's recognized ethnic groups--including the Han, Yi, Miao, Tu, Daur, Tibetan, Uyghur, and Kazak--and the selections include a variety of genres. Chapters cover folk stories, songs, rituals, and drama, as well as epic traditions and professional storytelling, and feature both familiar and little-known texts, from the story of the woman warrior Hua Mulan to the love stories of urban storytellers in the Yangtze delta, the shaman rituals of the Manchu, and a trickster tale of the Daur people from the forests of the northeast. The Cannibal Grandmother of the Yi and other strange creatures and characters unsettle accepted notions of Chinese fable and literary form. Readers are introduced to antiphonal songs of the Zhuang and the Dong, who live among the fantastic limestone hills of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region; work and matchmaking songs of the mountain-dwelling She of Fujian province; and saltwater songs of the Cantonese-speaking boat people of Hong Kong. The editors feature the Mongolian epic poems of Geser Khan and Jangar; the sad tale of the Qeo family girl, from the Tu people of Gansu and Qinghai provinces; and local plays known as "rice sprouts" from Hebei province. These fascinating juxtapositions invite comparisons among cultures, styles, and genres, and expert translations preserve the individual character of each thrillingly imaginative work.
Mongolian proverbs reveal important values, while at the same time concealing them. They show the honorable destiny that comes with a good name and the shameful future connected with a bad reputation, assuring a promising future for those who keep Mongolian traditions and customs alive. Unity is important for success, and yet is often elusive in practice. The activities of the unseen world form a major aspect of the Mongolian worldview. When that is understood, the wisdom in their proverbs can be seen from a richer perspective than straight translation reveals. This book sheds light on Mongolian proverbs' enduring wisdom by engaging foreigners in dialogue with native speakers to uncover how their proverbs are used and their intended meanings.
