The dynasty reached the peak of its wealth and power during the early 8th century, which was a golden age for its arts. The aristocracy, scattered, murdered, and incarcerated under the empress Wuhou, was restored and oversaw an era of reform.

One of the most remarkable women in Chinese history, Wu Zhao (known by Wuhou, her posthumous name), intrigued her way into the role of empress during the reign of the Gaozong emperor (649–683).

He emulated the first Sui emperor in establishing a highly competent bureaucracy, and he adopted the same pattern of local administration.

The first Tang emperor, Li Yuan, known by his temple name, Gaozu, began as a contender for the rule of the Sui, of which he had been an official

rose in duplicity and murder, and it subsided into a kind of anarchy. But at its apex, in the early 8th century, the splendour of its arts and its cultural milieu made it a model for the world.

Tang dynasty, (618–907 ce), Chinese dynasty that succeeded the short-lived Sui dynasty (581–618), developed a successful form of government and administration on the Sui model, and stimulated a cultural and artistic flowering that amounted to a golden age.

already a part of Chinese folk and literary tradition in the form of colloquial stories, a poetic novelette, and a six-part drama when Wu Cheng’en formed it into his long and richly humorous novel.

The novel is based on the actual 7th-century pilgrimage of the Buddhist monk Xuanzang (602–664) to India in search of sacred texts.

Journey to the West, foremost Chinese comic novel, written by Wu Cheng’en, a novelist and poet of the Ming dynasty (1368–1644)

Kenji Miyazawa

He died at age 37 of pneumonia. Relatively unknown in his lifetime, his work enjoyed a revival in the 1980s, and he is now recognized as one of 20th-century Japan’s foremost writers.

After leaving teaching, Miyazawa devoted his life to writing and assisting farmers in the region of his birth

“For Miyazawa, what will happen in the future is inextricably part of what is happening now, and what happened in the past. It is all part of ‘the monstrous bright accumulation of time.’ He, living or dead, or you, or me, or anyone else, experiences this fusion of time, congealed into the present moment from which we look forward and back. To be conscious of all time at once is to be enlightened.”

Miyazawa’s fiction, poetry, and children’s stories sketch an ecological vision well ahead of its time

He self-published his first book, a work for children, in 1924. Three of his books from the 1930s—Milky Way Railroad, Matasaburo of the Wind, and Be not Defeated by the Rain—were published posthumously.

he soon returned home to care for his sister, who eventually died. During this period, Miyazawa taught agricultural science and continued to write.

moved to Tokyo, and began writing poetry, short stories, and children’s books.

He studied geology

Poet and farmer Kenji Miyazawa was born in Iwate Prefecture.

A Letter

White Birds

Wind Woods

it uses the Latin alphabet with Spanish orthography

Popol Vuh, Maya document, an invaluable source of knowledge of ancient Mayan mythology and culture

The little incident recalled to mind the copy of a missionary paper brought to my notice a few days ago, in which a "Christian" pugilist commented upon a recent article of mine, grossly perverting the spirit of my pen. Still I would not forget that the pale-faced missionary and the hoodooed aborigine are both God's creatures, though small indeed their own conceptions of Infinite Love. A wee child toddling in a wonder world, I prefer to their dogma my excursions into the natural gardens where the voice of the Great Spirit is heard in the twittering of birds, the rippling of mighty waters, and the sweet breathing of flowers. Here, in a fleeting quiet, I am awakened by the fluttering robe of the Great Spirit. To my innermost consciousness the phenomenal universe is a royal mantle, vibrating with His divine breath. Caught in its flowing fringes are the spangles and oscillating brilliants of sun, moon, and stars.

Brushing away from my eyes many like pictures, I offered midday meal to the converted Indian sitting wordless and with downcast face. No sooner had he risen from the table with "Cousin, I have relished it," than the church bell rang.

Like instantaneous lightning flashes came pictures of my own mother's making, for she, too, is now a follower of the new superstition

Shifting uneasily about in the straight-backed chair he sat upon, he began: "Every holy day (Sunday) I look about our little God's house, and not seeing you there, I am disappointed. This is why I come today. Cousin, as I watch you from afar, I see no unbecoming behavior and hear only good reports of you, which all the more burns me with the wish that you were a church member. Cousin, I was taught long years ago by kind missionaries to read the holy book. These godly men taught me also the folly of our old beliefs.

As our tribe is one large family, where every person is related to all the others

In both my hands I hold her shaggy head and gaze into her large brown eyes. At once the dilated pupils contract into tiny black dots, as if the roguish spirit within would evade my questioning.

Interwoven with the thread of this Indian legend of the rock, I fain would trace a subtle knowledge of the native folk which enabled them to recognize a kinship to any and all parts of this vast universe. By the leading of an ancient trail I move toward the Indian village.

What an ideal warrior he became, baffling the siege of the pests of all the land till he triumphed over their united attack. And here he lay, – Inyan our great-great-grandfather, older than the hill he rested on, older than the race of men who love to tell of his wonderful career

Here the Stone-Boy, of whom the American aborigine tells, frolics about, shooting his baby arrows and shouting aloud with glee at the tiny shafts of lightning that flash from the flying arrow-beaks.

Beautiful is the spiritual essence they embody.

Their quaint round faces of varied hue convince the heart which leaps with glad surprise that they, too, are living symbols of omnipotent thought

And they, the lovely little folk, soothe my soul with their perfumed breath.

My heart and I lie small upon the earth like a grain of throbbing sand. Drifting clouds and tinkling waters, together with the warmth of a genial summer day, bespeak with eloquence the loving Mystery round about us. During the idle while I sat upon the sunny river brink, I grew somewhat, though my response be not so clearly manifest as in the green grass fringing the edge of the high bluff back of me.

With half-closed eyes I watch the huge cloud shadows in their noiseless play upon the high bluffs opposite me, while into my ear ripple the sweet, soft cadences of the river's song

The Great Spirit

While being sharply critical of assimilation, she was firm in her conviction that Indigenous people in America should be American citizens, and that as citizens, they should have the vote: “In the land that was once his own – America… there was never a time more opportune than now for American to enfranchise the Red man!”[3] As original occupants of the land, she argued, Native Americans needed to be represented in the current system of government.

Sun Dance was the first American Indian opera written. It is a symbol of how Zitkála-Šá lived in and bridged both her traditional Native American world and the world of white America that she was raised in.

Afterwards, Zitkála-Šá spent some time back at home on the reservation taking care of her mother and collecting stories for her book, Old Indian Legends. She also took work at the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) office at Standing Rock Indian Reservation as a clerk. She married Captain Raymond Talefase Bonnin in 1902. They were assigned to the Uintah-Ouray Reservation in Utah, where they lived and worked for the next fourteen years. While there, they had a son, Raymond Ohiya Bonnin.

he school sent Zitkála-Šá back to the Yankton Reservation to gather more students. She was shocked to find her family home in disrepair. Many people on the reservation lived in deep poverty, and white settlers were occupying land given to the Yankton Dakota people by the federal government.

She returned to live with her mother on the Yankton Reservation in 1887, but left only three years later. She felt that she did not fit in after her experiences at the Institute.

While being sharply critical of assimilation, she was firm in her conviction that Indigenous people in America should be American citizens, and that as citizens, they should have the vote: “In the land that was once his own – America… there was never a time more opportune than now for American to enfranchise the Red man!”[3] As original occupants of the land, she argued, Native Americans needed to be represented in the current system of government.

Afterwards, Zitkála-Šá spent some time back at home on the reservation taking care of her mother and collecting stories for her book, Old Indian Legends. She also took work at the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) office at Standing Rock Indian Reservation as a clerk. She married Captain Raymond Talefase Bonnin in 1902. They were assigned to the Uintah-Ouray Reservation in Utah, where they lived and worked for the next fourteen years. While there, they had a son, Raymond Ohiya Bonnin.

the school sent Zitkála-Šá back to the Yankton Reservation to gather more students. She was shocked to find her family home in disrepair. Many people on the reservation lived in deep poverty, and white settlers were occupying land given to the Yankton Dakota people by the federal government.

Instead of returning home, Zitkála-Šá accepted a scholarship she was offered at Earlham College in Richmond Indiana. It was while at Earlham that she began to collect stories from Native tribes. She translated the stories into Latin and English. In 1897, just six weeks before she was to graduate, Zitkála-Šá had to leave Earlham because of financial and health issues. Again, she chose not to return to the reservation. Instead, she moved to Boston, where she studied violin at the New England Conservatory of Music.[1]

At fifteen years old, she returned to the Institute to further her education. Her study of piano and violin led the Institute to hire her as a music teacher. She graduated in 1895. When she received her diploma, Zitkála-Šá gave a speech advocating for women’s rights

She returned to live with her mother on the Yankton Reservation in 1887, but left only three years later. She felt that she did not fit in after her experiences at the Institute

It was alternatively referred to as “the Bible”, or “the Don Quixote” of Latin America,

A truly revolutionary work, Marquez’s novel is comparable with the modernist breakthroughs of James Joyce and Virginia Woolf, and with Franz Kafka’s fantastic existentialism.

The novel’s impact

When readers hear the term “magical realism”, the first author who comes to mind is usually García Márquez. It is a style of writing where supernatural, magical events happen, and the characters who experience them think they are normal. Magic is mundane, annoying even.

Father Nicanor Reyna, levitates when he drinks hot chocolate, until the trick becomes irritating, and he gets beaten down by the military.

discovers the alchemical formula for turning metals into gold, his son is quick to tell him his glossy treasure looks “like dog shit”.

There is magic in Macondo, but in García Márquez’s novel, magic rarely warrants surprise or excitement

The fact that a powerful company was able to get away with it, and then calmly deny the massacre with impunity led to the creation of the term “banana republic”.

he Buendías are constantly entangled in passionate and unhealthy love affairs, driven by their obsessions, haunted by their secrets.

It goes back to José Arcadio Buendía and Úrsula Iguarán, who found Macondo in the middle of the jungle, and it finishes roughly 100 years later with baby Aureliano, the cursed child born with a pig’s tail.

The novel tells the family’s story across seven generations (

the Buendía family is the protagonist here.

First published in 1967,

In terms of style, it opened the doors to new ways of writing, but it also decentralised Europe as the heart of new literature. The first edition of the novel sold out in a matter of weeks, unheard of for a Latin American author.

The fact that a powerful company was able to get away with it, and then calmly deny the massacre with impunity led to the creation of the term “banana republic”.

The Buendías are constantly entangled in passionate and unhealthy love affairs, driven by their obsessions, haunted by their secrets. Members of each generation repeat, or respond to, the destructive choices of the last, the patterns of behaviour they are raised with and locked into.

One Hundred Years of Solitude is funny, tragic, sensual and political. The novel explores cyclical time, meta-fiction, social taboos, the history of Latin America and more specifically, Colombia.

It goes back to José Arcadio Buendía and Úrsula Iguarán, who found Macondo in the middle of the jungle, and it finishes roughly 100 years later with baby Aureliano, the cursed child born with a pig’s tail.

Most recently, I read the book because Netflix is about to release an adaptation of the novel, which I find exciting and alarming in equal measure.

The manuscript contains the history of Macondo and the Buendías, written before it actually happened, and that history will be complete, with Aureliano’s death and the destruction of Macondo, as soon as Aureliano finishes deciphering the manuscript.

osé Arcadio returns home from Rome and opens the house to children he picks up, some of whom come back later, murder him, and make off with a stash of gold.

Meanwhile, Aureliano (son of Meme and Mauricio Babilonia) becomes obsessed with Melquíades’s mysterious manuscript

This had taken place in the early years of Macondo, the town that the elder Buendía, his wife Úrsula, and others had founded after José Arcadio and Úrsula had sought to escape the ghost of a man who José Arcadio had killed

The characters are marked by their complex relationships, tragic love stories, and a series of misfortunes that reflect both personal and collective histories. Central to the narrative is the idea of repeating events, culminating in a poignant conclusion that reveals the preordained fate of the Buendías and Macondo itself.

The story follows the Buendía family across several generations in the fictional town of Macondo, exploring themes of solitude, memory, and the cyclical nature of history.

“One Hundred Years of Solitude” is a renowned novel by Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez, published in 1967

José Arcadio (the son) returns, enormous and tattooed, and marries his adopted sister (Rebeca), and Pietro Crespi turns his affections to Amaranta

the ghost of a man who José Arcadio had killed

The story follows the Buendía family across several generations in the fictional town of Macondo, exploring themes of solitude, memory, and the cyclical nature of history

Between going and staying the day wavers, in love with its own transparency. The circular afternoon is now a bay where the world in stillness rocks. All is visible and all elusive, all is near and can't be touched. Paper, book, pencil, glass, rest in the shade of their names. Time throbbing in my temples repeats the same unchanging syllable of blood. The light turns the indifferent wall into a ghostly theater of reflections. I find myself in the middle of an eye, watching myself in its blank stare. The moment scatters. Motionless, I stay and go: I am a pause.

CounterpartsIn my body you search the mountainfor the sun buried in its forest.In your body I search for the boatadrift in the middle of the night.

Octavio PazFollowLast DawnYour hair is lost in the forest,your feet touching mine.Asleep you are bigger than the night,but your dream fits within this room.How much we are who are so little!Outside a taxi passeswith its load of ghosts.The river that runs by                                                is alwaysrunning back. Will tomorrow be another day?

Porfírio Díaz served as president from 1876 to 1909, and although he brought many improvements to the country, he was also a ruthless dictator whose policies benefited the powerful at the expense of the poor.

Diseases brought by the conquistadores killed an estimated twenty-four million Indigenous people by 1605.

The Aztecs were the first people to interact with Europeans.

Aztec wise men created folded, painted books on paper made from bark of the wild fig tree or treated deerskin. These books were used to educate young people in schools around the empire and as a way to record and save their knowled

The last major pre-Columbian civilization of Mexico was the Aztec Empire. It grew in the central valley about 1427 through a partnership with Toltecs and Mayas.

Many Toltec motifs have been found at Mayan sites, which lead researchers to believe that some Toltec peoples migrated to those locations and settled there. The Toltecs and Mixtecs of Oaxaca used glyphs, created stone inscriptions, and painted books.

The Toltec people arrived in central Mexico about the tenth century.

The Mayas are regarded as the most advanced civilization in pre-Columbian America. Their civilization was at its peak from about 250 to 900 CE. The Mayas are noted for their calendar, but they also developed a writing system. The civilization disappeared abruptly in the early tenth century.

Ancient writings were created by the Indigenous peoples of southern North America, including the Aztecs and Maya

explore themes of identity, history, and social justice, often drawing from personal experiences and the cultural legacy of their nation

Modern authors, including notable figures like Octavio Paz

Mexican literature encompasses a rich tapestry of works that spans from the pre-Columbian era to contemporary times, reflecting the diverse cultural and historical experiences of the country.

Porfírio Díaz served as president from 1876 to 1909, and although he brought many improvements to the country, he was also a ruthless dictator whose policies benefited the powerful at the expense of the poor.

The literature evolved through colonial influences, blending European and indigenous languages and themes, particularly during the tumultuous periods of the Mexican Revolution and subsequent sociopolitical changes.

and his most prominent theme was the human ability to overcome existential solitude through erotic love and artistic creativity.

and his most prominent theme was the human ability to overcome existential solitude through erotic love and artistic creativity.

His later prose works, some originally in English, include Conjunciones y disyunciones (1969; Conjunctions and Disjunctions), a discussion of the world’s cultural attitudes; El mono gramático (1974; The Monkey Grammarian), a meditation on language; and Tiempo nublado (1983; “Cloudy Weather,” translated as One Earth, Four or Five Worlds: Reflections on Contemporary History), a study of international politics with emphasis on the relationship between the United States and Latin America

His later prose works, some originally in English, include Conjunciones y disyunciones (1969; Conjunctions and Disjunctions), a discussion of the world’s cultural attitudes; El mono gramático (1974; The Monkey Grammarian), a meditation on language; and Tiempo nublado (1983; “Cloudy Weather,” translated as One Earth, Four or Five Worlds: Reflections on Contemporary History), a study of international politics with emphasis on the relationship between the United States and Latin America.

His poetry after 1962 includes Blanco (1967; Eng. trans. Blanco), influenced by Stéphane Mallarmé’s poetry and John Cage’s theories on music; Ladera este (1971; “East Slope”), which is suffused with Paz’s understanding of East Indian myths; Hijos del aire (1979; Airborn),

including one as Mexico’s ambassador to India from 1962 to 1968; in the latter year he resigned in protest over Mexico’s brutal treatment of student radicals that year.

Paz entered Mexico’s diplomatic corps in 1945, after having lived for two years in San Francisco and New York, and served in a variety of assignments, including one as Mexico’s ambassador to India from 1962 to 1968; in the latter year he resigned in protest over Mexico’s brutal treatment of student radicals that year.

Before returning home Paz visited Paris, where Surrealism and its adherents exerted a profound influence on him.

Before returning home Paz visited Paris, where Surrealism and its adherents exerted a profound influence on him.

Paz’s family was ruined financially by the Mexican Civil War, and he grew up in straitened circumstances. Nonetheless, he had access to the excellent library that had been stocked by his grandfather, a politically active liberal intellectual who had himself been a writer

Paz’s family was ruined financially by the Mexican Civil War, and he grew up in straitened circumstances. Nonetheless, he had access to the excellent library that had been stocked by his grandfather, a politically active liberal intellectual who had himself been a writer

az was awarded the Cervantes Award in 1981, the Neustadt Prize in 1982, and the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1990. He died in Mexico City on April 19, 1998.

Paz was awarded the Cervantes Award in 1981, the Neustadt Prize in 1982, and the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1990. He died in Mexico City on April 19, 1998.

“Wouldn’t it be better to turn life into poetry rather than to make poetry from life,” he asks. “And cannot poetry have as its primary objective, rather than the creation of poems, the creation of poetic moments?”

His later work shows an ever-deepening intelligence and complexity as it investigates the intersection of philosophy, religion, art, politics, and the role of the individual.

In 1962, Paz became Mexico’s ambassador to India and resigned six years later in protest when government forces massacred student demonstrators in Mexico City. His later work shows an ever-deepening intelligence and complexity as it investigates the intersection of philosophy, religion, art, politics, and the role of the individual. “Wouldn’t it be better to turn life into poetry rather than to make poetry from life,” he asks. “And cannot poetry have as its primary objective, rather than the creation of poems, the creation of poetic moments?”

In 1962, Paz became Mexico’s ambassador to India and resigned six years later in protest when government forces massacred student demonstrators in Mexico City

This long poem, and Paz’s sociocultural analysis of Mexico, El laberinto de la soledad [The Labyrinth of Solitude]  (Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1950), established him as a major literary figure in the 1950s.

Paz’s poetic work Piedra de Sol [Sun Stone] (Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1957) borrows its structure from the Aztec calendar. This long poem, and Paz’s sociocultural analysis of Mexico, El laberinto de la soledad [The Labyrinth of Solitude]  (Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1950), established him as a major literary figure in the 1950s.

Paz’s poetic work Piedra de Sol [Sun Stone] (Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1957) borrows its structure from the Aztec calendar.

National University of Mexico in law and literature

educated

Octavio Paz was born in Mexico City on March 31, 1914, to a family of Spanish and native Mexican descent.

He was influenced by several different ideologies: Marxism, surrealism, existentialism, Buddhism and Hinduism. In his later works, love and eroticism were prominent themes.

best known works by Octavio Paz is El laberinto de la soledad (1950) (The Labyrinth of Solitude), a collection of essays in which he analyzes Mexican history and culture.

1946, he served as a diplomat for 20 years. During this period he published numerous collections of poetry and prose.

he became embroiled in the Spanish Civil War.

begun writing poetry as a teenager, he made his literary debut with the poetry collection Luna silvestre (Wild Moon) in 1933.

ccess to his grandfather’s library sparked his interest in literature at an early age

He grew up under poor circumstances

Octavio Paz was born in Mexico City, Mexico