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Dear LITSIG Subscribers, New publications from University of Washington Press Free postage to UK customers http://www.combinedacademic.co.uk/idle-talk-under-the-bean-arbor [cid:B21D3B2A-28C7-4D00-893F-238D8016E169]Idle Talk under the Bean Arbor A Seventeenth-Century Chinese Story Collection Aina the Layman with Ziran the Eccentric Wanderer Edited by Robert E. Hegel Written around 1660, the unique Chinese short story collection Idle Talk under the Bean Arbor (Doupeng xianhua), by the author known only as Aina the Layman, uses the seemingly innocuous setting of neighbors swapping yarns on hot summer days under a shady arbor to create a series of stories that embody deep disillusionment with traditional values. The tales, ostensibly told by different narrators, parody heroic legends and explore issues that contributed to the fall of the Ming dynasty a couple of decades before this collection was written, including self-centeredness and social violence. These stories speak to all troubled times, demanding that readers confront the pretense that may lurk behind moralistic stances. Idle Talk under the Bean Arbor presents all twelve stories in English translation along with notes from the original commentator, as well as a helpful introduction and analysis of individual stories. Robert E. Hegel is Liselotte Dieckmann Professor of Comparative Literature and professor of Chinese at Washington University. The translators are Lane J. Harris, Robert Hegel, Li Fang-yu, Li Qiancheng, Mei Chun, Lindsey Waldrop, Annelise Finegan Wasmoen, Alexander C. Wille, Xu Yunjing, and Zhang Jing. University of Washington Press | | April 2017 | 320pp | 4 b&w illus. | 9780295999975 | Hardback | £43.00* 20% discount with this code: CSL17ITBA** http://www.combinedacademic.co.uk/symptoms-of-an-unruly-age [cid:D9DE1037-A512-47D7-B362-341CA8F2EE81]Symptoms of an Unruly Age Li Zhi and Cultures of Early Modernity Rivi Handler-Spitz Symptoms of an Unruly Age compares the writings of Li Zhi (15271602) and his late-Ming compatriots to texts composed by their European contemporaries, including Montaigne, Shakespeare, and Cervantes. Emphasizing aesthetic patterns that transcend national boundaries, Rivi Handler-Spitz explores these works as culturally distinct responses to similar social and economic tensions affecting early modern cultures on both ends of Eurasia. The paradoxes, ironies, and self-contradictions that pervade these works are symptomatic of the hypocrisy, social posturing, and counterfeiting that afflicted both Chinese and European societies at the turn of the seventeenth century. Symptoms of an Unruly Age shows us that these texts, produced thousands of miles away from one another, each constitute cultural manifestations of early modernity. Rivi Handler-Spitz is associate professor of Chinese language and literature at Macalester College. University of Washington Press | | April 2017 | 256pp | 5 illus. | 9780295741505 | Hardback | £43.00* 20% discount with this code: CSL17ITBA** *Price subject to change. **Offer excludes the USA, Canada and South America, Author and independent bookshop blog - Bookscombined.com<https://bookscombined.com/> Follow us on Twitter @CAP_Ltd<http://twitter.com/#!/CAP_Ltd>, Facebook Combined Academic Publishers<https://business.facebook.com/Combined-Academic-Publishers-196269570500/?business_id=10155394879930501> and Sign up to our newsletter email alerts here<http://www.combinedacademic.co.uk/content/34-subscribe-to-our-newsletter>