Product Description
Among Tibetan Texts is part of Wisdom's acclaimed Studies in Indian and Tibetan Buddhism series. For three decades, E. Gene Smith ran the Library of Congress's Tibetan Text Publication Project (PL480)—an effort to salvage and reprint the Tibetan literature that had been collected by communities and exiles of Sikkim, Bhutan, India, and Nepal. Smith wrote prefaces to these reprinted books to help clarify and contextualize the particular Tibetan texts: the prefaces served as rough orientations to a poorly understood body of foreign literature. Originally produced in print quantities of 20, these prefaces quickly became legendary, and soon photocopied collections were handed from scholar to scholar, achieving an almost cult status. These essays are collected here for the first time. The impact of Smith's research on the academic study of Tibetan literature has been tremendous, both for his remarkable ability to synthesize diverse materials into coherent accounts of Tibetan literature, history, and religious thought, and for the exemplary critical scholarship he brought to this field.

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 5.0 based on 1 review)

An essential reference by Cameron D. Warner (Carlisle, PA)

5 Stars
January 06, 2002
It is impossible to overestimate the impact Gene Smith has had on Tibetan Studies. Smith is universally respected by Tibetologists, Western Buddhists, and Tibetan Lamas. The essays compiled in this book have something for everyone. Their scope covers all four of the major Tibetan lineages, their depth and specificity will interest specialists, their brevity and clarity will interest amateurs. Unfortunately so many publications these days lose their value shortly after publication. Despite their age (up to forty years old), Smith's essays still read like cutting edge research because he proposes so many roads of enquiry yet untrodden.

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