East Asian Philosophy in a Comic Book?
If Lao Tzu had meant to have his poetic classic illustrated by cartoon characters, he would have done so himself. On the other hand, Lao Tzu is just about as much an historical fiction as Jesus, and he certainly isn’t alive today, so who cares? Lao Tzu isn’t here, if he ever really lived at all. We are here.
Translated by Brian Bruya and adapted by Tsai Chi Chung, The Tao Speaks takes the Tao Te Ching, one of the central texts of Taoism, and coverts it into a comic book. Why? Well, for some readers the addition of pictures makes it easier to understand the point of the text as it describes the path to ultimate harmony through short chapters with titles such as The Ideal Leader and Honor’s Disgrace.
Is it sacrilege to make a cartoon out of the Tao Te Ching? I doubt that many real Taoists would care, or even take much notice, although Western Scholars who study Taoism might raise their eyebrows. On the other hand, the creators of this book take care to leave the Chinese version in the margins of each page for the sake of purists who must have the original. The truth is that even the modern Chinese version of the Tao Te Ching has been copied so many times that scholars argue over what it actually says.
Any translation has its flaws, so why worry? If you want to get a quick and easy introduction to the basic ideas of the Tao Te Ching, pick up a copy of The Tao Speaks, read it with a light spirit, and relax about the details. You can always go pick up the latest authoritative translation with one hundred pages of scholarly notes later. Forget about getting it right — it’s all about harmony anyway, right?
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