Notes from Asia Library

In previous weeks, we’ve showcased manuscripts from the Kamada Collection related to Japanese performance arts and warrior history. Here we introduce texts related to traditional Japanese poetry, specifically the famous anthology Hyakunin isshu 百人一首, or One Hundred People, One Poem Each.

In our last post on the Kamada Collection, we showcased nineteenth-century images related to warriors of the fourteenth century. This week, we will continue with an earlier manuscript of a more practical sort. The following illustrations come from the two-volume Heihō yūkan 兵法雄鑑, sometimes translated as The Paragon of Military Strategy.

This week and next we are featuring images from a Kamada Collection text related to warriors.

In our last post, we discussed Asia Library’s purchase of more than 20,000 volumes from the Kamada Library in Sakaide, Kagawa Prefecture, and highlighted a couple of items from the collection. This time we are featuring two more texts related to the traditional performing arts.

Unlike most other large East Asia libraries in North America, the University of Michigan’s started its collection with materials related to Japanese rather than Chinese Studies. In October 1950, the library made a significant addition to its newly formed collection by purchasing nearly 20,000 volumes from the Kamada Library in Sakaide, Kagawa Prefecture.

A new exhibit, "Staging Theater: Chinese Operatic Practice and Performance," is opening at Asia Library on Friday, April 12, and continuing through Sunday, June 30.

The Next Event in the Deep Dive into Digital and Data Methods for Chinese Studies is April 4-5

We are excited to announce a showing of Secret Love in Peach Blossom Land (暗戀桃花源 An Lian Tao Hua Yuan) at the State Theatre on Wednesday, March 27. We will be joined by the film's legendary director, Stan Lai, who will be available for Q&A after the film.

Asia Library and the Lierberthal-Rogel Center for Chinese Studies are collaborating on a new film series.

Asia Library has had a wonderful year already: on January 3 we received a donation of some 200 Kodachrome slides from Margaret Condon Taylor (Ph.D. psychology, 1983).