The Fracture of Meaning: Japan's Synthesis of China from the Eighth through the Eighteenth Centuries

From the beginning of its recorded history until the opening to the West in the last century, Japan was caught between a love for and a rejection of Chinese civilization. David Pollack argues that the dialectical relationship between the two countries figured more importantly in the Japanese sense of identity and signification than any particular borrowed Chinese cultural materials.

Originally published in 1986.

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