The Ambivalence of Creation: Debates Concerning Innovation and Artifice in Early China - Hardcover

"Lucid, cogent, and stimulating, it should make an instructive and delightful read for anyone who is interested in Chinese philosophy, religion, and history." -- Zhou Yiqun "...a clearly written, well-argued, and important book [that] performs a valuable service to the field by problematizing deeply entrenched assumptions about early Chinese thought." "Puett's brilliant textual, intertextual, and contextual analysis allows him to discern heretofore largely neglected aspects and nuances of intellectual controversies and their impanct on early imperial thought. . . . The Ambivalence of Creation is a welcome addition to the field of ancient Chinese thought and culture, as well as mythology, historiography, and literature." -- The Journal of American Studies

This book studies the debates that raged in China from the Warring States period to the early Han concerning how and under what circumstances new institutions could be formed and legitimated.