Tuesday, September 25, 2012

The World of Korean Ceramics - Available Book



This is a very quick post on the availability of the book The World of Korean Ceramics.  
I recently was able to make arrangements with the surviving author of this book Dr. Alan Covell for us to handle sales of the remaining copies of this out of print book.  Several of you have contacted me about this book but it was not yet available.  Now it is available, please contact me again if you are still interested.  I will accept orders in the order I receive them after this post.  
The book will be signed by Dr. Covell.   The price is $35.00. plus shipment from the USA.  The original price of this book at the time of its publication was $39.50.  I realize that this is slightly higher than some used copies.  However a blog based on the content of this book is being developed and will be available to those who have obtained the book from this source.  All proceeds from the sale of this book will go toward our work promoting ceramics - particularly Korean.

Contents:
1. The Prehistoric World
2. The Horserider-Shamanist World
 3. The Buddhist World
4. The Confucian World
5.  The Japanese World
One may wonder why Japan is included.  This in part explains Korea's influence on Japanese pottery including chanoyu, Japanese gains in the "Pottery War" and more.
6.  The Modern World
  Each section provides very interesting and rare information in .
  Appendices
Included are chronological tables, kiln Illustrations and maps of Koryo kilns, partial list of musuems and major Korean collections, bibliography, and maps of porcelain and buncheong (punch'ong) kiln sites.  

The book is richly illustrated.



This is just one of the many pages of illustration found in this book.  All of these Korean chawan are in Japanese museums. In case you are interested, the text below these chawan reads:
No one individual could take *Hideyoshi, who first was hospitable to the Portuguese traders and Jesuit missionaries, as his predecessor Nobunaga had been, but by 1587 came to see that they presented a rival power, a rival loyalty, and he demanded absolute obedience from his subjects.  Kyushu had been difficult to conquer, and was not under such strong control because of its distance from his center of power (Kyoto-Osaka).  By sending troops only from the maritime provinces of Kyushu and western Japan, Hideoshi revealed his wariness of these strongly Christian areas.

Dr. Jon Covell, now deceased, was a learned scholar of both Japanese and Korean.  She was the first person to earn her doctorate in Japanese studies and lived in the Daitoku-Ji Japan for 10 years doing extensive research.  Daitoku-Ji temple houses many famous chawan.  Then she also lived in Korea for 10 years doing extensive research there as well.  There are very few who can match her linguistic skills.  Her son Dr. Alan Covell is a leading authority on Korean Shamanism and scholar on many aspects of Korean and Japanese culture. 

Again if you are interested in getting a copy of this book signed by Dr. Alan Covell, please contact me and include your shipping address and phone number.  I'll email you a PDF invoice and explain payment arrangements. 

NOTE:  This book is currently not available from me.  I will place you on a 'wish list' and work on getting more copies.

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