R. McCray

September 4, 2000

Gernet, Jacques, A History of Chinese Civilization, (Cambridge U. Press, 1982) [an excellent introduction to classical China]

Barber, E. W., The Mummies of Urumchi (W. W. Norton, 2000) [fascinating speculations about the prehistoric peoples of the Silk Road, based on mummies and textiles.]

Torday, Laszlo, Mounted Archers: The Beginnings of Central Asian History (Durham Academic Press, 1997) [authoritative, but a hard slog]

Frye, Richard N., The Heritage of Central Asia (Princeton: Marcus Wiener Publ., 1996) [a very readable and authoritative introduction].

Grousset, Rene, The Empire of the Steppes (Rutgers Univ. Press, 1989) [a monumental study of the Turkic and Mongol peoples, first published in 1939]

Hopkirk, Kathleen, A Traveler's Companion to Central Asia (London: John Murray, 1993) [delightful and authoritative: don't go there without it]

Whitfield, Susan, Life along the Silk Road (U. of California Press, 1999) [a delightful series of vignettes derived from actual documents found in the caves of Dunhuang]

Foltz, R. C., Religions of the Silk Road (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999)

Schafer, E. H., The Golden Peaches of Samarkand: A Study of Tang Exotics (1963: U. of California Press) [a wonderful account of the luxurious tastes of the Tang aristocrats].

Wiggins, Sally H., Xuanzang: a Buddhist Pilgrim on the Silk Road (Westview Press, 1998) [the definitive biography of one of the greatest explorer-scholars of all time].

Waley, Arthur (transl.), Monkey: Folk Novel of China by Wu Cheng-en (New York: Grove Press, 1958) [an abridged translation of Journey to the West, the Ming dynasty picaresque folk novel about the mischievous monkey god who travels to India and back with Xuanzang. A masterpiece, both for children and adults.]

Hopkirk, Peter, Foreign Devils on the Silk Road (U. Mass. Press, 1989) [the history of the re-discovery of the Silk Road at the beginning of the 20th C -- a great adventure story].