The Peony Pavilion: Mudan ting, Second Edition

One of the most interesting, fun, and engrossing books I've ever read--literally going to Hades and back, with a host of humorous characters along the way. "Scabby Turtle," anyone? You learn a lot about traditional Chinese culture, as well... views on the afterlife, the role of bureaucracy, etc. It's a shame there aren't more English translations of Xianzu Tang's works, and it's an even further shame there aren't yet Kindle versions of the few additional ones that exist. Get on it, Amazon!

I am not familiar with Chinese literature and this was a wonderful introduction. As just a "read", this had all the action, love and suspense that one could want. It is a very readable translation, and once into the story it became very difficult to set it down. I would recommend it to anyone that likes a delightful story well told.

This was very convenient for me, since it was an e-book. It was an interesting read, and I definitely recommend it to anyone looking for a light read. I had to read it for class.

I gave this book to an actor as a gift, because I want to show Chinses culture to him. I hope he'll read it and fal in love with it.

I haven't read it yet, but I am very delighted to finally have a copy of this ancient rare book.

A difficult read....only read because of my book club.Would not of bought otherwise.

Great

I have nothing against the translation, but the failure to proofread for the e-book edition is unforgivable. The book contains frequent sloppy mistakes from Optical Character Recognition (OCR) errors ("Li" as "r.i.", "enterS", "Mengmei" as "Mengrnei" etc) that could have been easily caught if the publisher bothered to have someone proofread or spellcheck the e-book. These mistakes would be forgivable if it was self-published or a cheap translation, but for a university press to be so sloppy and still charge full price is pathetic. If I could, I would definitely return the e-book and get a hard copy which I assume is error free. Unfortunately, Amazon will not allow me to return the e-book.

This book arrived in excellent condition and served to inspire me deeply in my research into the drama of this period.

A classic story, known by various different names in English. Difficult if you are not familiar with the genre, but worth reading if you are interested. The Chinese habit of showing just parts of what are sometimes very long plays means that each different section opens with an exposition of who is there and why, which gets a bit much, but is useful for reminding the reader of the scene as well as reminding an audience which is only being treated to that part of the play, who the characters are and where in the story they have arrived at. This story will be referenced by much other Chinese literature, and is a classic, must-read for anyone with an interest in Chinese literature.

Excellent translation and introduction