lamdha books -
Catalogue of books on tea

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83306 Blofeld, John The Chinese Art of Tea George Allen & Unwin, London, 1985. First edition. Hardcover, octavo, with black boards and gilt spine titling; 169pp., monochrome plates. Minor wear; faint spotting to upper text block edges and mildly scuffed black dustwrapper. Very good to near fine. The first book to introduce to Western readers the Chinese art of tea, which - unlike its Japanese counterpart - is informal and wholly unrestricted by fixed rules. Besides the long history of tea, told with a wealth of legends, anecdotes and poems, we learn about mountain springs, tea houses and gardens, tea-loving emperors, Taoists, monks, potters, ladies, poets, scholars and many other colourful characters. All the material is taken from Chinese sources or from the author's own experiences roaming the length and breadth of China. Click here to order $60

207351 Goodwin, Jason The Gunpowder Gardens Travels Through India and China in Search of Tea Chatto & Windus, London, 1990. Octavo hardcover; black boards with gilt spine titling; 230pp. Mildly toned and faintly spotted text block edges. Very good to near fine in like dustwrapper now professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film with white paper backing. Jason Goodwin, inspired by his grandmothers who spent their lives in China and India observing the custom of afternoon tea, set off to explore the relics of this imperial age and its worldwide trade, delving into the extraordinary history of tea. Evoking a vanished world, he follows the origin of tea, its use, influence and importance, from the Canton factories through the establishment of British India and the Opium Wars, all the way to that great tea metropolis, London. Click here to order $22

207781 Hayashiya, Seizo (Foreword by Grand Master Sen Soshitsu; Preface by Goto Noboru; Emily J. Sano, trans.) Chanoyu - Japanese Tea Ceremony Essays by H. Paul Varley, Louise Allison Cort, Rand Castile & Sondra Castile Japan Society/John Weatherhill Inc./Tankosha, Tokyo Japan, 1979. Quarto; paperback, with silver-gilt spine and upper board titles and decorative endpapers; 189pp., with a monochrome frontispiece and many full-colour and monochrome illustrations. Minor wear. Dustwrapper now backed by archival-quality white paper and professionally protected by superior non-adhesive archival film. Near fine in a titled slipcase. Accompanied by 'In Memorium - Sen Tomiko (1930 - 1999)', a prominent tea ceremony practitioner. Click here to order $40

207531 Sadler, A.L. Cha-No-Yu The Japanese Tea Ceremony Charles E. Tuttle Company, Rutland VT, 1963. First edition thus: quarto; hardcover, full cloth with gilt spine and upper board titles, blind-stamped upper board decoration and decorative endpapers; 265pp., with a monochrome portrait frontispiece, 14pp. of plates likewise, many monochrome illustrations and a folding genealogical chart. Minor wear; text block edges toned; retailer's bookplate to the front pastedown. Price-clipped dustwrapper is mildly rubbed and edgeworn; sunned along the spine panel; now backed by archival-quality white paper and professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film. Near fine. Click here to order $85

207527 Sen, Soshitsu (Masuo Yamaguchi, James T. Conte, et al., trans. & eds.) Chado The Japanese Way of Tea Weatherhill Inc., New York NY, 1979. Royal octavo; hardcover, with gilt spine titles; 187pp., with a monochrome frontispiece, many diagrams likewise and many colour and monochrome illustrations. Minor wear. Dustwrapper is lightly edgeworn; now backed by archival-quality white paper and professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film. Near fine. Click here to order $34

207585 Sen XV, Soshitsu (ed.) (Alfred Birnbaum, trans.) Chanoyu The Urasenke Tradition of Tea Weatherhill Inc., New York NY, 1988 Royal octavo; hardcover, full silk cloth, with gilt spine titles and decorative endpapers; 171pp., with a monochrome frontispiece, 60pp. of full-colour plates and many monochrome illustrations. Minor wear. Dustwrapper now professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film. Near fine. Click here to order $100

207853 Soshitsu XV, Sen (trans. V. Dixon Morris) The Japanese Way of Tea From its Origins in China to Sen Rikyu University of Hawai'i Press, Honolulu, 1998. Octavo hardcover; brown cloth boards with red gilt spine titling, green endpapers; 229pp., colour plates and monochrome illustrations. Minor wear only; fine in like dustwrapper now professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film with white paper backing. Almost a millennium before the perfection the Way of Tea by Sen Rikyu, the Chinese scholar-official Lu Yu wrote exhaustively about tea and its virtues. Grand Tea Master Sen Soshitsu begins his examination of tea's origins and development from the eighth century through the Heian and medieval eras. This volume illustrates that modes of thinking and practices now associated with the Japanese Way of Tea can be traced to China - where from the classical period tea was imbued with a spiritual quality. Click here to order $60

207560 Stella, Alain, Nadine Beautheac, Gilles Brochard & Catherine Donzel (Deke Dusinberre, trans.; preface by Anthony Burgess) The Book of Tea Flammarion S.A., Paris France, nd. (2005). Quarto; hardcover, with upper board titles and decorative endpapers; 256pp., with many full-colour illustrations. Minor wear. Dustwrapper professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film. Near fine. Each day, over one and a half billion cups of tea are consumed on the planet, and more tea is drunk worldwide than any other beverage except water. This exquisitely illustrated volume leads readers on an investigation of the many faces of tea: a mythic plant, a ritual, the cause of wars (remember the Boston tea party), and ultimately the world's favourite beverage. The Book of Tea provides a comprehensive history and background of the beloved ritual of tea, providing photographed accounts of tea farming, tea barons, teatime, and the various tastes and nuances of teas from English tearooms to the mountains of Tibet. Novelist Anthony Burgess and a host of historians and writers paint fascinating portraits of the kings of the tea trade: Thomas Twining, whose London tea room was the first to serve tea by the cup, Robert Fortune, who slipped into China to steal tea plants and learn the secrets of tea production, and adventurer Sir Thomas Lipton, who conquered America with his quality teas. Click here to order $40

207530 Tanaka, Sen'o & Sendo (Preface by Edwin O. Reischauer; Foreword by Yasushi Inoue) The Tea Ceremony Kodansha International Inc., Tokyo Japan, 1998. Revised: quarto; hardcover, with decorative endpapers; 223pp., with a monochrome portrait frontispiece and many full-colour and monochrome diagrams and illustrations. Minor wear. Dustwrapper now backed by archival-quality white paper and professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film. Near fine. Click here to order $50