Book Title: Reviews Of Different Books Author(s): Publisher: View full book textPage 8
________________ 84 REVIEWS Letterature d'Oriente is much more comprehensive. The articles dealing with the more important literatures are more detailed, but literatures of less importance have not been overlooked (for a detailed table of contents see IIJ, vol XIII, p. 67). For the readers of the Indo-Iranian Journal the most important volume is the third which deals with the literatures of India, Ceylon and South-East Asia. Almost half of this volume is taken up by Oscar Botto's history of the ancient literatures of India. It is an excellent and lucid survey in which no branch of Indian literature is omitted. Part I deals with Vedic literature, Part II with the epics and the Puranas, Part III with the Buddhist and Jain literatures, Part IV with classical literature and Part V with the technical literatures (philosophy, philology (grammar, lexicography, metrics, poetics), trivarga (law, politics, erotics) and sciences). An extensive bibliography (pp. 339-350) is added by the author. The second part of this volume comprises the medieval and modern Indian literatures (Indo-Aryan and Dravidian). The Indo-Aryan literatures (Bengalese and Oriya by John V. Boulton, Hindi by Ganesh Dutt Gaur, Assamese by Tarapada Mukherji, Marathi and Gujarati by Ian Matthew Paton Raeside) occupy pp. 351-555, the Dravidian literatures by John R. Marr pp. 557-626.' The penetration of Indian culture into Central Asia is studied in Mario Bussagli's article on IndoEuropean literatures of Central Asia (pp. 627-645). The literatures of Laos, Cambodia and Thailand are described by Solange Thierry (pp. 647-735). D. E. Hettiaratchi writes on Singhalese literature (pp. 737-761) and Wimal Dissanayake on modern Sinhalese literature (pp. 737-761). The volume concludes with the history of Malaysian and Indonesian literatures by Andries Teeuw (pp. 771-860). As to the other articles, mention must be made here of the article on Persian literature by Gianroberto Scarcia in volume II (pp. 243-452). This article contains a few pages on the ancient literatures of Iran (pp. 259-265). This is one of the few topics dealt with in greater detail in the second volume of the Le Civilta dell'Oriente in which Antonino Pagliaro wrote on "Letterature dell'Iran Preislamico" (pp. 301-344). Volume II contains also articles on the literatures of Pakistan and Afghanistan (Pashto) by Alessandro Bausani (pp. 581-657, 659-676). Volume IV contains articles on Burmese literature by Hla Pe (pp. 243-301), Tibetan literature by the late Marcelle Lalou (pp. 303-338) and Mongolian literature by Charles R. Bawden (pp. 339-379). In a collective volume of this nature no absolute uniformity can be expected. Most authors intersperse the text with excerpts and add a bibliography. Each volume contains an index of names of persons and literary works. The articles are illustrated by plates of which many are in colours. These four splendid volumes will be of great interest to all those who read Italian. They will be very much indebted to Professor Botto for having undertaken this exarting and arduous task and to the publisher for the care given to the material aspects of these volumes. Australian National University J. W. de Jong Hermann Jacobi, Kleine Schriften, Herausgegeben von Bernhard Kolver, 2 Teile. (Glasenapp-Stiftung, Band 4,1 + 2). Wiesbaden, Franz Steiner Verlag GmbH, 1971. XII + 1156 pp. Ln. DM 98.-.. The Kleine Schriften of Hermann Jacobi (1850-1937) is the fourth volume of the publications of the Glasenapp-Stiftung. The systematic bibliography, compiled by the editor, shows the wide range of Jacobi's interests which extended to many branches of Indology (pp. VII-XXII). His first publication, an edition of chapters III-XII of the Laghu-Jataka, was published in 1872. The last to appear during his life was his translation of Vasubandhu's Trimsikavijnapti (Stuttgart, 1932). During the span of sixtyPage Navigation
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