I own more than 20 editions of Lao Tzu's famous classic, the Tao Te Ching. I found that Ralph Alan Dale's translation and commentary is the most poetic, the most relevant for today, and the most beautifully illustrated of all the English editions I know. The book is a work of art.
Dr. Dale's commentary combines the ancient wisdom of Lao Tzu with new insights into our 21st century social crises. The commentaries are rich in their references to the latest information in science and for me they provide a sound basis for optimism about our future.
I also found that Lao Tzu's unorthodox approach to personal issues became very much more real for me in Dale's translation. Issues such as fear and courage, possessions, morality, methods of learning, wisdom, satisfactions and unfulfillments, effort and effortlessness, blame and guilt...triggered some new ways of thinking about my own personality.
This is a book I keep nearby to reread verses and commentaries and to look again at some of the unique silver and black photographic illustrations by John Cleare. Sometimes I'll just reread one of the 81 verses and commentaries and let the ideas just take over my subconscious mind. That way I find that Lao Tzu's wisdom becomes much more than his wisdom. It becomes mine.
this book claims to be a TRANSLATION of the Tao Te Ching...it is nothing of the sort...this is an INTERPRETATION of the tao te ching, with an agenda...having read just about every translation available, i don't know how anyone could pass this off as an objective translation of the tao te ching...this book is like some sort of "hippie new-age peacenik proclamation of hope and desire for a peaceful loving world loosely based on the tao te ching"...
not that there's anything wrong with that...if that's your gig, wonderful...but don't claim that this is a translation...a translation is (ideally_ supposed to preserve the original meaning and convey specifically what the original author said, not what "i think he might have said if he were alive today and shared my world view and believed important the same things that i feel are important"...
the funniest thing is that the second part of the book is "commentaries on the verses"...now the author is interpreting his interpretations, in case you missed it the first time around...
if you like nice pictures, are all into the world peace thing and already are familiar with the tao te ching, you might enjoy this...but if you want a TRANSLATION of the tao te ching, i wouldn't bother...i only bought it to add to my collection...but it has done very little to add to my understanding of lao tzu's writings....
