More ironic and self-contained but equally original, Engendering is a companion piece to the book that precedes it. More difficult of accomplishment than Realization (considering its narrower scope), linguistically bolder (Chinese syntax is introduced as purely American idiom), MM’s study of Norman, Oklahoma is sympathetic to this resident of the university town, whose “gown” dominates its day-time yang-like realm (where a Confucian intertext instructs us), and whose “town” dominates the night-time yin-like realm (where a more laid back Taoism prevails). Though Ezra Pound is a distant model, Morrison has surpassed the pioneer in his assimilation of Chinese thought to the requirements of a western audience. My own reading, informed, as I say, by no direct knowledge of the Chinese originals, views with modesty the book’s more competent reception at the hands of the Chinese themselves (who have reissued and introduced it) and the even more trenchant Sinology of Stevenson, an American scholar familiar with the original traditions (see below). The singularity of Engendering, which applies Realization’s in situ method to a single locale, seems consistent with the more monolithic, cohesive and continuous (but withal narrower) Chinese tradition, one that suffers in contemporary comparison with the greater ethnic, social and cultural variety of India.
Full text of Engendering,1 and Engendering,2
Frank W. Stevenson, “Sign and Ritual in Engendering”
一群OU學生與慕老師的邂逅，藉躍然紙上的描寫，激盪出一陣陣發自內心會心微笑，與一波波衝擊思緒深處的箴言。Engendering -- 孔子、老子、美式幽默最另類的完美結合。
-- 鄭婉伶