To Celebrate~

After all these months, a new post! I've discovered blogging is a skill not yet developed by this writer. But it seems only fitting to report the recognition Gia-fu's biography has received. In addition to many kind, thoughtful letters, phone calls, and emails from readers, Still Point of the Turning World: The Life of Gia-fu Feng was winner of a gold medal and a finalist for two other awards.

•ForeWord Reviews' Book of the Year Award Gold Medal in Biography

(click on Biography on this page: http://www.bookoftheyearawards.com/ );

• 2010 Indie New Generation Awards, Finalist in General Nonfiction;

• Colorado Authors' League Top Hand Award, Finalist in General Nonfiction.

What a delight and surprise to watch the book take on a life of its own. But then, perhaps it's not so surprising given its subject. Thanks to all who have been so responsive and encouraging on this unanticipated leg of the journey. xie xie

Multiple Facets

One of the most helpful comments I heard during my interviews with Gia-fu's family, friends, colleagues, and acquaintances, came from C.H., Gia-fu's next youngest brother.  When I asked C.H. about a circumstance revealing what seemed a contradiction between Gia-fu's words and actions, he said this.  "Ah, Carol.  People are multi-faceted.  And Gia-fu, even more so."

I've come to appreciate C.H.'s wisdom again and again as I hear from people who knew Gia-fu. Some knew him well, others slightly, still others knew him only for a short time, perhaps a few months and in a particular environment. Many understood the complex being they encountered. Others focused primarily on one or two facets, not seeing the complexity beyond. But all hold this in common: whether one, two, or many, all found Gia-fu's facets  memorable.

Reciprocity

David and I have just returned from Sitka, Alaska where we participated in the Island Institute's Summer Symposium. This year's theme was Shaping an Enduring Human Culture, with Gary Snyder, Gary Holthaus, and Robin Kimmerer as faculty. Wonderful teachers! They provoked us to think deeply, differently, and about many angles of the theme, one of which was reciprocity -- how we give and take in the world.  It seems we know quite a bit about taking, and not so much about giving back to other people, animals, the world.

Reciprocity.  From the Latin word reciprocus, meaning 'moving backward and forward.' Robin, Gary, and Gary provided multiple lenses through which to view reciprocity, including the notions that we need first to know the world, to look closely, with an open mind and heart, to be able to call things by their proper names. 

 

Naturally, I thought of Gia-fu and what he dreamed of for Stillpoint, about families living simply, honestly, in nature, giving, and receiving.  Gia-fu knew that this isn't some easy, idyllic idea.  It takes courage to look at oneself honestly, to be honest with others.  It takes some grit to live that way, day after day, giving and receiving. And it takes the will to stay with it. 

Book Launch & Tea Ceremony

What a wonderful book launch celebration we had on Sunday, May 24th!  Ken Cohen demonstrated a Chinese tea ceremony and had lovely tea for all 45+ participants.  It was the perfect way to relax into our time together and read from Still Point of the Turning World. 

 

A communal reading seemed to reflect the spirit of Stillpoint as I've come to understand it, so Carmen Baehr and David Chrislip joined me.  The reading included excerpts from the early 1950s when Gia-fu was caught in this country by political forces spinning out from the Korean War.  He had completed his Master's Degree in International Banking at the Wharton School and had enrolled in a Ph.D. program in statistics at New York University.  This he did not complete. He was bewildered, bereft, lost, depressed for some time.  

Most people, myself included prior to researching this time, had no idea that the U.S. government forbade Chinese students in technical areas to return home.  Some committed suicide.  Others endured somehow.  

Gia-fu's consequent U.S. travel and searching ultimately landed him just where he needed to be.  A divine accident, he would say.  Others might call it good fortune.  Still Point of the Turning World seems both to me.

I'm delighted to announce that Stillpoint of the Turning World is now available through Amber Lotus Publishing, Amazon, and many local booksellers!  Please see my website for links to Amber Lotus and Amazon:  www.carolannwilson.info

The website also includes excerpts that will give you a sense of how I've approached writing about this multi-faceted, elusive person known as Gia-fu Feng.  What a rich, challenging, humbling journey it's been.  I so appreciate the many people who have shared information and insights along the way.  For the many I didn't have the good fortune to talk with, I welcome your thoughts and perspectives here.  There's always much more to learn, another lens through which one can see, for how can we ever truly convey all the dimensions of another person's life?

As Nicole Mones so eloquently writes in A Cup of Light, "I can only give you this sum of what I have heard, mixed with my own opinions of the matter."  Now, I welcome yours.

Carol Wilson

Still Point of the

Turning World:

The Life of Gia-fu Feng

by Carol Ann Wilson

to be released April 24, 2009 by Amber Lotus Publishing

Still Point of the Turning World: The Life of Gia-fu Feng interweaves the life of translator, teacher, Taoist rogue Gia-fu Feng with the tumultuous historical tapestry of 20^th century China and the United States. From Chinese warlords, Japanese occupation, and World War II to 1950s disillusionment, the Beats, Esalen and beyond, the story traces major events and personalities on opposite sides of the world. In the mix is Gia-fu and the Stillpoint community’s best-selling translation of the Tao Te Ching, the ancient Chinese classic that is the most translated book in the world, next only to the Bible.

Told from the perspective of someone who never knew Gia-fu but who became his heir through the untimely death of her beloved sister, Still Point of the Turning World tracks a life that began with external privilege but culminated in the gradual discovery of the still point within.

Advance Praise for

Still Point of the Turning World

This book is about far more than the life and times of well-known 20^th Century Taoist teacher and author Gia-fu Feng. As in the very best biographies, the reader identifies with the joys and sorrows, the strengths and weaknesses, the challenges and lessons. Gia-fu becomes a mirror for the reader’s own life and soul. Wilson’s work brilliantly explores and juxtaposes critical periods in Chinese and American social

and political history—the Japanese invasion of China and the bombing of Pearl

Harbor, the Communist Revolution and the Beatnik Movement. And what a cast of characters, from Chairman Mao to Alan Watts! Gia-fu reconciles the contradictions of his age through his radical Gestalt therapy-like approach to life—uncompromising honesty that flies in the face of the Confucian social decorum with which he was raised, spiced with a healthy dose of humor and rascality. His love of nature and the Tao eventually lead him to the still point between yin and yang and to creating an American community in which others can join him in the search for a truth beyond words. I highly recommend At the Still Point of the Turning World. Filled with wisdom and compassion, you will be engaged and entranced by Carol Wilson’s beautifully written book.

--Kenneth Cohen

author of The Way of Qigong and Taoism: Essential Teachings

***

Through reading this beautifully-written biography of my late husband, Gia-fu Feng, not only have I come to a deeper understanding of who he was, but also have a new appreciation of the complex events of the middle years of the 20th century, both in China and in the United States. As is often the case, history comes alive when viewed through the life of this one individual living his unique piece of that history.

-- Jane English, co-creator, with Gia-fu Feng, of a best-selling version of Lao Tsu's Tao Te Ching

****

This is a multi-layered, uniquely subtle book, meticulously and interestingly researched. Yes, it is a biography of a man who didn’t want to be a guru but was one. But it is also a compelling biography of a slice of a troubled time when the present and future of closely-linked families were shattered. I found myself remembering the double entendre in a line of the poet Herrick: “Look thy last on all things lovely every hour."

--John I. Goodlad

author of In Praise of Education

^^^^

This will be the definitive text on a fascinating, elusive, and wily character whose translations of classic Taoist texts have caputred the imagination of people around the world. Carol Wilson has provided us with the powerful story of Gia Fu's life and shares her own story of Gia Fu's influence on her own spiritual journey. It is a bittersweet story, complex and poignant, of the way the land and its "interconnected and inseparable stories" can bring open hearts and minds to "a place of quiet beauty" that heals our deep longing for what cannot return or perhaps we never had.

--Gary Holthaus

author of

Learning Native Wisdom: What Traditional Cultures Teach Us about Subsistence, Sustainability, and Spirituality

***

In tackling the improbable and highly original life of Taoist teacher and Tao Te Ching translator Gia-Fu Feng, Wilson completes a sisterly legacy – and also sheds unexpected light on the era when Beat artists and thinkers took the first steps toward a spiritual counterculture.

--Nicole Mones, author of The Last Chinese Chef

∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞

Carol Wilson has given us an indispensable look at a shadowy chapter of the journey of the Tao to America. She tells the story with warmth, insight and authority. You will find it engaging and. . .possibly. . .life altering.

--Luis Alberto Urrea, author of The Hummingbird's Daughter

Excerpt from Foreword by Dexter Woo, nephew of Gia-fu Feng

Carol Wilson’s biography of Gia-Fu is an extraordinary effort that traces the improbable life of my Uncle Jeff. It was fate that brought him to this country at precisely the right time. Contemplating the cultural and social changes Gia-Fu experienced in the early days living in this country, the underlying conditions were ripe for him to do what he was destined to do. I think no one in our family can really put a finger on exactly what his real vocation or profession was. We know that he translated Lao Tzu and taught Tai Chi. According to my mother, Gia-Fu’s sister Lu-tsi, he was an accomplished calligrapher, tutored by the masters during his youth in China. We now know that he was adept at identifying the people, even in the future sense, whom he ultimately partnered with to complete the most important projects during and after his life, people like Jane English, Margaret Wilson and the unsuspecting Carol Wilson who had never met him. I also know that he did not like being a “Master” to those he lived and interacted with. I believe Jane English was most perceptive in calling him a teacher of his art. I’d like to add entertainer to the list of descriptions.