Bruce Lee the poet

Most know about Bruce Lee the martial artist and actor; Many know about Bruce Lee the philosopher; Few know about Bruce Lee the poet. Indeed, Bruce Lee spent much of his free time writing poetry and translating Chinese poems. In fact, his poetry is of a high quality, worthy of acknowledgement although his other accomplishments are far overshadowing. Most of his poems seem to have been for his wife (or possibly wife-to-be at the time). He often speaks of being distanced from the one he loves. Although distant love is a recurring theme, each poem still has a certain uniqueness.

Confucius Lives Next Door, or not…

I picked up an intriguing book while browsing Barnes & Nobles entitled Confucius Lives Next Door: What Living in the East Tells us About Living in the West. Recently I have found myself addicted to Chinese philosophy and so the name of Confucius drew my attention. Then I read the back. It is a book about living in East Asia mostly from the perspective of living in Japan. Yes, Japan is in East Asia, but Confucius was not Japanese so the title was misleading. Okay, that’s fine, the book the still seems like it might be a good read. However, using Japan to generalize the lifestyle of East Asia is like using Germany to generalize the lifestyle of Western Europe. There are many similiarities to the way they think and conduct everyday life amongst the different countries, but also many, many differences. Perhaps the book should be entitled A Samurai Lives Next Door because Japanese thought is far more influenced by Samurai customs than by Confucius (or Kongzi). A most important difference between the most identifiable nations in East Asia, Japan and China, is that Japan has been much more influenced by western customs than has China. This is very significant when an author tries to write about a region. Perhaps the book is good, and perhaps the author does take these ideas into account – I have yet to read the book and may soon do so.