A guiding light amid the world's chaos and a manual for rejecting materialism, in the form of writings by Japanese Buddhist monks

These simple, inspiring writings by three medieval Buddhist monks offer peace and wisdom amid the world's uncertainties, and are an invitation to relinquish earthly desires and instead taste life in the moment.

Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we see ourselves - and each other. They have inspired debate, dissent, war and revolution. They have enlightened, outraged, provoked and comforted. They have enriched lives--and upended them. Now Penguin brings you a new set of the acclaimed Great Ideas, a curated library of selections from the works of the great thinkers, pioneers, radicals and visionaries whose ideas shook civilization and helped make us who we are.

Three Japanese Buddhist Monks, Meredith McKinney, Penguin Books, Paperback, 112 pp, 2021

Meredith McKinney studied modern and classical Japanese Literature at the Australian National University, where she is now a Visiting Fellow. She lived for many years in Kyoto, where she taught and translated. Her main publications include re-translations of The Pillow Book, as well as of Soseki Natsume's Kusamakura and Kokoro, all in Penguin Classics. She has translated Yoshikichi Furui's White-Haired Melody for JLPP. In 2000 she won the Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission Translation Award, for Yoshikichi Furui 's Ravine and Other Stories. She has also translated A Thousand Strands of Black Hair, by Seiko Tanabe, and Masahiko Shimada's Death by