Many thanks to all attendees, to SOAS Library for hosting and to Jemimah Steinfeld, CEO of Index on Censorship, for moderating. Thank you to the volunteers who generously gave their time to ensure a smooth-running event and thank you to Tibetan Heritage for documenting the event.

Please continue to keep supporting the book, see this link for all ordering information: https://highpeakspureearth.com/order-information-for-ocean-as-much-as-rain-by-tsering-woeser/

(If re-posting photos, please apply the appropriate photo credit.)

Reviews and Coverage

March 7, 2026, Lhakar Diaries
“Ocean, As Much As Rain: Woeser’s Testimony of Resistance Against State-imposed Amnesia” By Thinley Chodon

Link to full review here.

February 25, 2026, HIMAL Southasian
Tibet and the Politics of Memory

Link to coverage here.

February 2026, Spring Issue, Tricycle
“Spring” – A poem by Tsering Woeser

Link to coverage here.

February 10, 2026, High Peaks Pure Earth
“Ocean, As Much As Rain – Stories, Lyrical Prose, and Poems from Tibet” By Tsering Woeser: Book Review by Kamila Hladíková

Link to full review here.

February 2, 2026, Words Without Borders
First Read – “Only This Useless Poem—For Lobsang Tsepak” By Tsering Woeser

Link to coverage here.

January 13, 2026, China Books Review
Resolute Reading for 2026

Link to coverage here.

December 28, 2025, Tricycle
“My Tongue Surgery” By Tsering Woeser – A Tibetan writer confronts a displaced self following years of Sinicization.

Link to coverage here.

September 30, 2025, National Translation Month
Ocean, as Much as Rain: Poems From Tibet by Tsering Woeser Translated by Fiona Sze-Lorrain with Dechen Pemba

Link to coverage here.

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We would like to extend our thanks to Kamila Hladíková for the below book review. Scroll to the end for Kamila Hladíková’s short bio and also for information on how to order the book depending on where you are based.

“Ocean, As Much As Rain – Stories, Lyrical Prose, and Poems from Tibet”
By Tsering Woeser: Book Review by Kamila Hladíková

The “Ocean” in the title of the new book of translations of Tsering Woeser’s texts might seem poetic but it in fact refers to something very mundane: the “rain” of silver coins (in Chinese called “dayang”, which also means “ocean”) minted by the Chinese Communist Party in the early 1950s in order to buy Tibetan support for their invasion.

“Ocean, As Much As Rain”, edited and translated by Fiona Sze-Lorrain with Dechen Pemba, includes twenty texts, written over an extended period of time, starting with Woeser’s earliest poetry from the 1990s, to more recent pieces written or re-written shortly before the Covid Pandemic. The publication consists of “stories, lyrical prose, and poems from Tibet”, as the subtitle informs the reader, but at the heart of the book are the longer lyrical prose texts, which, just like the one about the “oceans”, tell the stories of Tibetans in Tibet.

Almost all texts included in this book were at some point previously published, some of them on the website High Peaks Pure Earth but it is still quite surprising that this is the first collection of Woeser’s literary essays in English. Prior translations of Woeser’s work include two books of poetry, several compilations of political commentary were published in English and other Western languages, and Woeser’s monumental book on the Cultural Revolution, using the rare and extremely valuable photographs of her late father Tsering Dorje, Forbidden Memory, was translated into Japanese, French, and finally English. But none of the lyrical essays, perhaps Woeser’s signature literary form that many years ago caused her banishment from the Chinese literary circles and turned her into a dissident (for the benefit of readers around the world) are available till now in English. Her first banned book, Notes on Tibet (Xizang biji, originally published in 2003), was translated only into the Czech language (2015) and the genre is not much known beyond Sinophone literary circles.

The collection opens with an essay in which Woeser describes her education in the post-Cultural Revolution China as a “tongue surgery”, a colonial imposition of a foreign language and culture, illustrated by a photograph of the teenage author with classmates in front of the Southwestern Minority Institute in Chengdu in the early 1980s. The two closing texts are poems, the first being one of Woeser’s earliest works written in 1990 and the second written under the lockdown during the Covid Pandemic, the time, which from the distance of several years can be seen as the symbolic end of one era in recent development in Tibet and the start of a new one, characterized by omnipresent surveillance and almost absolute social control.

Woeser’s essays (biji or sanwen in Chinese) are lyrical and highly subjective, imbued with a specific “irony”, which Fiona Sze-Lorrain in the introduction aptly interprets as a (sub)conscious result or perhaps an intentional reference to the “inherent linguistic and cultural colonization” manifesting in Woeser’s forced adoption of Chinese as the primary language of her literacy and literary creation. The stories she tells in such essays, that of Garpon-La, the head of the Dalai Lama’s music ensemble who was harshly persecuted for twenty-two years following the Lhasa uprising in 1959 and during the Cultural Revolution, or another about the “King of Dzi” Karma Samdrup who in 2010 was sentenced to fifteen years in prison for his effort to preserve Tibetan culture and natural environment, record the fates of real Tibetans living in contemporary Tibet. The “Land of Snows” as lived and described by Tsering Woeser is full of absurdities which include for example a public toilet built, as urban legend goes, especially on the occasion of the former Chancellor of West Germany Helmut Kohl’s 1987 visit to Tibet, but also full of painful memories surviving in numerous ruins marking the landscape as memorials of what the past was like and what has been lost forever.

The book includes an insightful introduction retelling Tsering Woeser’s life story and her development as a writer and poet. The final chapter is an original interview with the author, conducted over several years, with the first part previously published in 2012 and subsequently further expanded in 2018 and 2022–23. What I find extremely useful is the list of all of Woeser’s printed publications, her books in Chinese (since 2003 published in Taiwan) and all books of translations into all languages, including Tibetan. As a pleasant bonus there are around thirty of the author’s photographs taken over the period of more than three decades during her travels in Tibet and interviews with people. The photographs are, along with the texts, arranged into a pattern bridging the past with the present.

While there are many oral narratives, memoirs, and even novels, accessible in English telling the stories of the bygone era, of escapes from Tibet and generational trauma brought along by those who left their native land, never to return, the stories from the heavily-controlled and securitized present-day Tibet are hard to come across. They are in many aspects similar to the stories of exile (and can be called stories of “spiritual exile” as Woeser herself describes her life between Beijing and Lhasa), expressing the same uprootedness and sense of irretrievable loss. Only the dream of the faraway homeland, a bucolic image of childhood landscape and rich cultural tradition passed from one generation to another, which is the background of many diaspora-narratives, is in Woeser’s texts turned into an ugly nightmare, showing people in Tibet not only forced to compromise with the Chinese communist regime, but sometimes even fully adapted to it: like the young generation of rich Tibetan “princes”, children of the new indigenous Party elites, pictured in “The Killing Trip”. The text was written in 2001, in the time when Tibet seemed to be on the way to the Chinese-designed eternal prosperity, that, however, was ultimately shattered by the 2008 Tibetan uprising caused by the accumulated frustration of young Tibetans, sidelined and marginalized in their own land.

In the West, Woeser has been widely known and appreciated as a poet and “activist.” However, I have always seen her primarily as a “witness”, a survivor providing testimony about what she personally, her family, and people in Tibet in general had to come through after what the Chinese authorities label as the “peaceful liberation of Tibetan people.” She formulated it explicitly in one of her essays about Lhasa’s ruins, mapping them as “evidence” of “political violence”, positioning herself as the “eyewitness” (jianzhengzhe), preserving the “hidden geography and history” that the Chinese Communist Party wished to ban and erase from people’s memory. Woeser’s unique position as an insider in Tibet with direct access to places and people and at the same time a brave objective observer have turned her into one of the most valuable Tibetan voices of the first three decades of the twenty-first century.

About Kamila Hladíková

Kamila Hladíková is Assistant Professor of Chinese literature at Palacký University Olomouc, Czech Republic. She graduated from Charles University in Prague and her Ph.D. dissertation thesis focused on representation of Tibet in Chinese and Tibetan literature in the PRC (The Exotic Other and Negotiation of Tibetan Self, 2013). She published academic articles on Chinese Tibet-related literature and film and Sinophone Tibetan literature. Her recent project maps Chinese ideological narratives about Tibet from a historical perspective, based on so-far unexplored primary sources provided by Czechoslovak visitors to Tibet in the 1950s. Her first book of translations of Sinophone Tibetan literature was published in 2005. After the large-scale Tibetan protests in 2008 she started to translate Tsering Woeser’s Notes on Tibet into the Czech language (2015) and published two research articles on Woeser’s literary essays.

“Ocean, As Much As Rain – Stories, Lyrical Prose, and Poems from Tibet” By Tsering Woeser, Edited and Translated by Fiona Sze-Lorrain with Dechen Pemba

Publisher: Duke University Press
Pages: 210
Illustrations: 50
Release Date: February 10, 2026
Author: Tsering Woeser
Editors: Fiona Sze-Lorrain, Dechen Pemba
Translators: Fiona Sze-Lorrain, Dechen Pemba
Contributor: Pankaj Mishra
Cover Art: Tenzing Rigdol

Paper Price: $23.95 / CA$31.95 / £17.99
Hardcover Price: $89.95 / CA$135.95 / £83.00

Paper ISBN: 978-1-4780-3311-0 / Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-4780-2968-7 / eISBN: 978-1-4780-6186-1 / DOI: https://doi.org/10.1215/9781478061861

Purchasing Information

United States, Central/South America: https://www.dukeupress.edu/ocean-as-much-as-rain

Canada: https://utpdistribution.com/9781478033110/ocean-as-much-as-rain/

Asia, Australia, Europe, UK, and elsewhere: https://mngbookshop.co.uk/9781478033110/ocean-as-much-as-rain/

Thank you to the Amdo Translation Collective མདོ་སྨད་ལོ་ཙྭ་མཐུན་ཚོགས། for submitting these important and invaluable translations. The collective has also translated “Poems Lamenting the Sudden Loss of the Tenth Panchen Lama, Summer 1989” by Mangrawa Dukar Bum, prison poems by Mangrawa Dukar Bum and be sure also to read the incredible alphabetic poem bearing witness to the Cultural Revolution in Amdo by Akhu Tsultrim Sangpo.

About the Amdo Translation Collective

The Amdo Translation Collective (ATC) is an international group of Tibet scholars who work collaboratively on translating texts and media from early Post-Mao and contemporary Amdo into English, in order to make them accessible to larger publics. Their translation philosophy is to preserve as much as possible of the content, tone and form of the originals while crafting English language “siblings” that are accessible and poignant to readers who are not literate in Tibetan. In recent years, they have been focusing on translating texts related to the life and times of the tenth Panchen Lama, Lobsang Trinley Lhundrub Chokyi Gyaltsen (1938-1989).

The Triumphant Return of the Panchen Lama

Offering Poems for the One Year Anniversary of the Panchen Rinpoche’s Passing, by Yidam Tsering (1933-2004), Winter 1989 [1]

Submitted by Amdo Translation Collective མདོ་སྨད་ལོ་ཙྭ་མཐུན་ཚོགས། on the thirty-seventh anniversary of the passing of the tenth Panchen Lama, January 28, 2026

[1] The Chinese language original poems were published in Yidam Tsering’s second anthology of poems, 雪域集, Snowland Collection, 1992, pp. 110-113. A Tibetan translation, perhaps by Yidam Tsering’s close friend and frequent translator, Khargang Traba (Tashi Tsering), was published in པན་ཆེན་སྐུ་འཕྲེང་བཅུ་བའི་རྟག་བཏན་གྱི་མཛད་འཕྲིན་རྗེས་སུ་དྲན་པ། Remembering the Glorious Deeds of the Tenth Panchen Lama (2007), a commemorative volume, edited and printed in Bis mdo, of the Panchen Lama’s 1987 visit to his home region of Bis mdo.

Introduction to the Author Yidam Tsering

Yidam Tsering was widely known and revered across Tibet, China and the Tibetan diaspora, as what Lara Maconi calls “one of the most vigorous and unconditional of spokesmen on Tibet” (p. 166)[2]. Born in 1933 to a family of poor herders in Tsong kha, near Kumbum monastery in northeastern Amdo, Yidam Tsering did not receive formal schooling until his early teen years, and then only in Chinese language. Coming of age amidst the tumultuous years of the Guomindang and the Qinghai warload Ma Bufang, Chinese language schooling was the only education available to poor Tibetans, and then only to a few being groomed as translators and mediators for Muslim Hui or Han Chinese troops. As Yangdon Dhondup points out, Yidam Tsering was part of the first cohort of Chinese-language trained Tibetan writers who came from impoverished backgrounds and thus the socialist message of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had been appealing to them[3]. Yidam Tsering enthusiastically joined the CCP at age 16 in 1949 and his early writings embraced the promise of a new modern socialist nation in which Tibetans could enjoy equality and autonomy. He was famously multi-talented, joining the Northwest Nationalities College’s Song and Dance troupe in the 1950s, where he directed, produced and wrote performances and songs. He also chaired a literary institute and directed the Gansu Folk Art Institute.

However, Maoist atrocities in the late 1950s and during the Cultural Revolution, in which he was attacked as a local nationalist, led to Yidam Tsering’s deep disillusionment with Chinese-led socialist transformation. During the 1980s post-Mao reform years then, he turned to a personal journey of travel, reflection and meditation on reclaiming his Tibetan heritage. The majority of his poetic oeuvre was written then and began to reflect an exuberant Tibetan cultural nationalism. In this work, Yidam Tsering experimented with form and meaning in his Chinese language poems to both reflect his deepening pride in his Tibetan identity and to urge younger Tibetans to embrace the dignity and value of their own culture and history in order to forge a specifically Tibetan modernity. He also worked hard to encourage and mentor younger generations of Tibetan artists and writers, and even though he wrote largely in Chinese, he championed the development of Tibetan language literature and education, such that, as Maconi notes, he himself learned written Tibetan well enough to read it fluently and comment on translations of his work.

[2] “Lion of the Snowy Mountains: The Tibetan Poet Yi dam Tshe ring and his Chinese Poetry: Reconstructing Tibetan Cultural Identity in Chinese,” in Tibet, Self, and The Tibetan Diaspora: Voices of Difference, ed. P. Christiaan Klieger, Proceedings of the Ninth Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies (Leiden: Brill, 2000).

[3] “The Roar of the Snow Lion: Tibetan Poetry in Chinese,” in Lauran R. Hartley, and Patricia Schiaffini-Vedani, eds., Modern Tibetan Literature and Social Change, New York, USA: Duke University Press, 2008.

Translators’ Introduction to the Poem

We first encountered Yidam Tsering’s suite of four poems dedicated to the memory of the tenth Panchen Lama in a Tibetan language version that had been included, with no indication of the translator, in a 2007 anthology produced in the Panchen Lama’s hometown of Bis mdo to commemorate the thirtieth anniversary of his visit to Bis mdo in 1987. That lead us to the Chinese original, where we realized that our English translation should start there. We treat Yidam Tsering’s four poems for the Panchen Lama as four episodes of a single narrative. It is hard to say when exactly they were written. Yidam Tsering ends each poem with the colophon, “written in winter 1989.” Yet the title of the whole is “Offering for the Anniversary of Panchen Rinpoche’s Passing.” The tenth Panchen Lama passed away January 28, 1989, thus Yidam Tsering could have composed these in December 1989, as the one year anniversary of that tragic event approached. They were first published in 1992 in his second anthology of poems, Snowland Collection (雪域集).

These four poems were included together in the section of the book called “Snowland Ballads,” in which, as Lara Maconi says, Yidam Tsering enthusiastically explored the landscape, history and culture of Tibetan regions, playing with the theme of agentive movement and travel. Here, she tells us, Yidam Tsering developed his trademark poetic pattern of “4-1-2” or seven-line poems divided into 4-line, 1-line, and 2-line stanzas, each of which has a specific role to play in the overall narrative and meaning of the poem. In the first quatrain, the poet uses rich and allusive metaphor to avoid censors and convey deep emotion and tension. In the second one-line stanza, the poem peaks as the poet evokes the main meaning of the poem. In the final couplet, the tension eases, and the poet admonishes the reader to consider broader implications. Maconi further explains that even as poets like Yidam Tsering who wrote in Chinese struggled with the cultural and linguistic tensions between their mother tongue and Chinese, Yidam Tsering stood apart for the ways in which he “Tibetanized” the Chinese language in his poems. This is strongly evident in these four poems, in which the poet selectively chooses Chinese characters and tweaks Chinese idioms to convey exclusively Tibetan cultural meaning. As Maconi put it, these are poems “in fluent Chinese but with no Chinese meaning” (p. 186). A monolingual Chinese reader would have a very hard time understanding the deeper meanings of Yidam Tsering’s paean to the Panchen Lama here.

In this light, we were drawn to these poems because, as a memorial for the Panchen Lama, whose passing had been so recent, they are absolutely remarkable in their tone of ecstatic triumph and hope, rather than despairing lament. As a well-known Amdo Tibetan intellectual and artist, Yidam Tsering’s coming of age under CCP auspices, and his post-Mao efforts to champion Tibetan cultural and linguistic pride, mirrored the tenth Panchen Lama’s own journey. The Panchen Lama, imprisoned for some fourteen years and brutally struggled during the Cultural Revolution for his 70,000 character petition to Chinese central leaders on Maoist atrocities in Tibetan regions, emerged from prison in 1978 and spent the next decade conducting tours of Tibetan regions and powerfully advocating for Tibetan political and cultural autonomy. His death at his monastic seat of Tashilhunpo in Shigatse at the young age of 51 was a devastating blow across the Tibetan world. He had been uniquely positioned to challenge Chinese state policies and advocate for Tibetan-led development.

However, Yidam Tsering’s four-part poem reads not like a lament, but as a manifesto, a Tibetan nationalist anthem for restoration and reemergence in an almost kingly, even martial Buddhist framework. Hearkening back to the tone of the young poet Dondrup Gyal’s call to a new generation of Tibetans in his 1983 “Waterfall of Youth,” Yidam Tsering positions the Panchen Lama in his persona as a powerful, even wrathful, yet compassionate tantric lama, who intentionally leaves for the benefit of sentient beings. On his way, he tamps down and conquers the demon armies of the plateau with his Dharmakaya body and particularly with his traveling feet. The four sections of the poem narrate the journey of the Panchen Lama back to the Dharmakaya and then to his reincarnation, depicting an explosion of the senses in a kind of synaesthetic cultural scenario of Tibetan sights, sounds, dance and music, where the Panchen Lama is empowered and expanded immeasurably in his passing from this life and and his return in glory to his next one. His enlightened mind then both creates the world anew and discerns right from wrong to help build a righteous, multi-national and democratic state in which Tibetans unite and Tibetan culture and language thrive.

The poem’s narrative assimilates the Panchen Lama to the Snowland landscape and equates his tremendous, transcendent power with the forces of nature, framing his passing as the beginning of a powerful storm high on the plateau (Thunderbolt) that produces massive flash floods and waterfalls surging down the mountains (Waterfall). It then opens out to a clearing sky with the morning sun and a rainbow of hope and new life with his reincarnation (Rainbow), and the reborn Panchen Lama becomes once again the source of all rivers, but also of insight, moral discernment and Tibetan national accomplishment high on the plateau (Source).

We thought that Yidam Tsering’s offering of this commemorative anthem is a powerful message of hope and national pride for the 37th anniversary of the tenth Panchen Lama’s passing, as well as an offering for the long life of the disappeared eleventh Panchen Lama.

Four Poems by Yidam Tsering

迅雷
————–班禅大师圆寂周年祭 （一）

你去了。你去时那步履正气凛然，
脚下的风吹皱了铁马金戈的淫威，
难怪迎面的路已流泻昨夜梦见的神韵，
以至于撩拨起三代人同步精进的雾围!

动地的管弦共一曲气贯长虹的壮美！

待春风化雨般鼓舞了久久封冻的冰河，
我雪域八江里再急驰不及掩耳的迅雷！

1989.冬

Thunderbolt
An Offering for the Anniversary of the Panchen Rinpoche’s Passing (1)

You left. When you left your steps were majestically righteous,
The wind beneath your feet crushed the tyranny of the demon army,
No wonder the path ahead flowed with the dakini’s music of last night’s dream,
so that it incited three generations to walk ahead together through the fog!

The magnificence of earth-shattering orchestral music swells with one tune like a rainbow across the sky!

Like the spring wind and rain, it drummed on the long-frozen glaciers and,
the eight rivers of our Snowland once again surged down with an ear-splitting thunderbolt!

Written in winter 1989

飞瀑
————–班禅大师圆寂周年祭 （二）

你去了。你去时步履象海啸山呼，
任一路数落有如银河决口的飞瀑，
难怪苍茫雪域又闪烁风云不惑的灵光，
以至于凝重了四百万交口呼应的音符！

数往的声浪共一腔交响知来的乐谱！

待净滤的泉露酿就了河清海晏的美酒，
再听我阿里琴弹拨那雍布拉冈的谈吐！

1989.冬

Waterfall
An Offering for the Anniversary of the Panchen Rinpoche’s Passing (2)

You left. When you left your steps roared from the mountains like a tsunami,
From every way cascaded a waterfall as if the milkyway had broken loose,
No wonder the vast Snowland again shone with a divine light unafraid of the storm,
So that it deepened the musical notes of four million united voices!

The harmony of past melodies will compose the joyous symphony of the future!

Like clear spring water, it fermented into the fine liquor of peace,
Listen again to the voice of Yumbulagang[4] plucked on my Ngari lute[5]!

Written in winter 1989

[4] Yumbalagang, located in Lhokha on the Yarlung Tsangpo river 192km southeast of Lhasa, is considered to be the first palace of the Tibetan kings. It was destroyed during the Cultural Revolution and only partially rebuilt.

[5] A dranyan (སྒྲ་སྙན) or Tibetan lute is a fretless three-stringed musical instrument. Ngari is in far western Tibet.

彩虹
————–班禅大师圆寂周年祭 （三）

你去了。你去时那步履雷厉风行，
头上的汗腾湿了火烧云霞的焦躁，
难怪今朝的天空涌动万道彩虹的风彩，
以至于萌发了又一茬耕播史诗的新潮！

振翅的百鸟共一派春意烂漫的舞蹈！

待光风霁月般宽敞了人人坦白的胸襟，
再看我雪域人倾注给五颜十色的奥妙！

1989.冬

Rainbow
An Offering for the Anniversary of the Panchen Rinpoche’s Passing (3)

You left. When you left your steps struck like thunder and moved like the wind,
The sweat from your brow dampened the disquiet of the fiery clouds of sunset,
No wonder this morning’s sky surged with countless colors of a rainbow,
So that once again a new era of poetry, history and debate sprouted forth!

Hundreds of birds, wings outstretched, together perform a vibrant dance of spring!

Like a light breeze and clear sky, it opened everyone’s honest minds,
Look again at the devotion of our Snowland people to the marvel of many colors.[6]

[6] Ostensibly referring to the auspicious rainbow, this metaphor is hard to translate in English elegantly because it is so loaded with layers of potential connotations. The Chinese idiom for “multicolored” is usually 五顏六色, literally “5 colors and 6 hues”. Characteristically, Yidam Tsering tweaks the idiom, perhaps to Tibetanize it, to 五顏十色, literally “5 colors and 10 hues”. In the Tibetan context, “multicolored” could refer to the Buddhist idioms of five-colored prayer flags, the five colors representing the five elements, or the color-coded multi-faced tantric deities. In a secular vein, it could also connote the multicolored Tibetan national flag, or the vision of a multinational democratic state. Multi-colored here would stand in opposition to the mono-chrome world of the Mao-suited revolution, or to Han Chinese domination and assimilation policies.

源流
————–班禅大师圆寂周年祭（四）

你去了。你去时象一轮红日升起，
任阳光再梳理松柏和杨柳的新意，
难怪满路的花卉间蜂蝶儿交相翻飞，
以至于彩绘了解释宇宙人生的哲理！

通达的情理共一脉心血而奔流不息！

待菩提萨婆们辨明了善于恶不同的源流，
自觉本性的大家将仔细平等待人的真谛！

Source
An Offering for the Anniversary of the Panchen Rinpoche’s Passing (4)

You left. When you left it was as if a morning sun rose,
Letting sunshine again sort out the new ideas of pines and willows,
No wonder the bees and butterflies playfully fluttered among the flowers,
So that they painted the logic that explains the universe and human life!

Like heart blood, the clear insight of reason surges constantly through one vein!

Allowing the Bodhisattvas to discern the different sources of good and evil.
And everyone awakened to their true nature will attend to the truth of equality.[7]

[7]  An allusion to the bodhicitta of བདག་གཞན་མཉམ་པ།, literally “equalizing self and others”. Equalizing self and others means recognizing the equality of yourself and others in wishing to find happiness and wishing to avoid suffering.

Tsering Döndrup is one of modern Tibet’s most prolific and respected authors. Born in 1961 in Malho (Chinese: Henan) Mongolian Autonomous County in Amdo (Qinghai Province), he published his first story in 1983.

In this piece, Tsering Döndrup summarises his 2025 activities almost month by month, providing an interesting glimpse from the inside into literary life in Tibet. Regular readers will be familiar with the work of Tsering Döndrup from his short stories such as “Baba Baoma” translated by Christopher Peacock who is mentioned in the piece and kindly contributed the two photos. His short story collection “The Handsome Monk and Other Stories” was published by Columbia University Press in 2019.

Most recently, the English translation of his most famous work “The Red Wind Howls” was published in 2025, also by Columbia University Press. Tsering Döndrup mentions that this work was selected among the 2025 Best China Books of 2025 by China Books Review.

Thank you to Françoise Robin for submitting this wonderful piece and translation and also to Palden Gyal and Christopher Peacock for their help.

“Looking Back on 2025’s New Writings” By Tsering Döndrup
Translated by Françoise Robin

2025 is coming to a close. From the monarchs of autocratic nations to the beggars in democratic countries, everyone became one year closer to the Lord of Death, walking together, shoulder to shoulder.

I started writing the novel “The Year of the Snake” (སྦྲུལ་ལོ།) on January 1 because it was easy to remember. Initially, I hadn’t decided on a title, so I temporarily named it “Tears and Machu”. However, later, I discovered by chance that 1941, when Ma Bufang slaughtered [the monks of] the monastery of Tsang Dondrup Rabten Ling, along with the entire populace of its dependent village called Tsang Yüngo, was the year of the Snake according to the lunar calendar. So I opted for that title. Although I am not sure if I have been successful in writing this novel, I had long examined all the materials related to this massacre that I could find, I also had interviewed many survivors. In particular, my wife’s aunt, who was 104 years old when she passed away in 2023, was with the Fifth Tsang Pandita, Lobsang Thubten Chökyi Nyima, when he fled and escaped danger. Her husband then was among the bodyguards to the Tsang Pandita. She often spoke vividly about what she saw and experienced during that time, and all this had remained in my memory, allowing me to write with relative ease.

Generally, the terrifying massacre, with its origins, consequences, development, high tide and key figures as well as minor protagonists, is a moving story even without embellishing it on the head and the horns, and I had long wanted to turn this great massacre into a true historical novel, but upon reflection, the main and real characters, the main and real events, the real places, the real time, etc., were all essential conditions for a historical novel. This is the reason why the relationship between the Lama Tsang Pandita and Ma Bufang, the relationship between Tsang Monastery and Labrang Monastery, etc., are not easy to write. Moreover, there are many differences between historical sources and actual events. For example, the great scholar Sungrab Gyatso, who was a monk of Dhitsa Monastery at the time, and served after the Communist takeover as the head of the Department of Education of Qinghai Province and Vice-Chairman of the Qinghai CPPCC, wrote in his “Notes on Things Heard about the Killing and Looting of Tongde Tsang Monastery” (桑热嘉措《杀掠同德藏寺侧闻记》——青海文史资料集粹之民族宗教卷) that a year later, Ma Bufang deceived Lama Tsang Pandita by bringing him back to Tsang Monastery and murdered him by poisoning. In fact, Lama Tsang Pandita passed away in Atati, about fifteen kilometers east of my home area, known now as Yögenyin Town in Malho Sogdzong County, as many elders in this area are aware. I have also interviewed people who attended his funeral. I am convinced that it was not that Sungrab Gyatso did not know about that, but that he was deliberately made to write it this way. Therefore, I have long known that historical books and material can sometimes be less reliable than novels. Under such circumstances, I abandoned the idea of writing a historical novel and wrote it as a fictional novel.

At the end of February, my Japanese [translator], Chime [星泉 – Hoshi Izumi, Tokyo University], came to Xining to discuss and finalize some translations, addressing any doubts encountered during the translation process. After returning to Japan, she contacted the publishing house that had previously published a Japanese translation of my short story collection entitled “Black Fox Valley” and said we needed to sign a publishing contract. Soon afterward, I received the publishing contract and she requested my feedback. I knew that Japanese were meticulous people, but still she was particularly thorough, requiring not only explanations of word meanings but also justifications for them, often leaving me at a loss. She also insisted that her Japanese translation of the folk stories collection “Tales of the Golden Corpse” should be presented to the original publisher, the Qinghai People’s Publishing House, so I accompanied her there. The Vice-Director of the publishing house, a longtime acquaintance of mine, took us to the newly appointed president, so he introduced him and they quickly became familiar with each other, as if they were old acquaintances. I then spoke candidly about how we, despite being the largest nomadic people in the world, still lack a comprehensive dictionary of pastoral terms. This is why, for instance, in my short stories, if I use pastoral vocabulary common in our daily speech, they are not found in dictionaries, causing difficulties for readers, especially young readers. The Mongols, on the other hand, have numerous pastoral dictionaries, and do not face such issues.

A few years ago, under Professor Chime’s guidance, a dictionary called “Tibetan Pastoral Culture Dictionary” was edited and published [in Japan]. You, people of the publishing house, it would be good if you initiated a collaboration with these Japanese people to start by translating that dictionary into Tibetan and then, you could add as many missing entries as possible, and publish it. As they say in ancient biographies, “The minds became one.” I pray that this work will be realized soon.

At the end of March, about one-third of “The Year of the Snake” was completed. The excerpt “The Monk and Abdu” was published on the “Chodme Tibetan Literature” website. I had planned to travel after completing the writing but in early April it is the peach blossom festival in Nyingtri, and my family said they wanted to go there.

Therefore, it was not a problem to temporarily put aside this story and take a break. Especially for me, Central Tibet is like a magnet, and I can’t bear to not go at least once a year, so we took the train to Lhasa. When we arrived in Lhasa, the young scholar Namchukgyal drove a car to welcome us at the railway station. He is very knowledgeable about Tibetan grammar and has sharp eyes. Whenever I write something, if I first show it to him, he hardly ever misses any typos. So, I jokingly call him “Hawk Eyes”. He said that he found his government job meaningless and was very tired of it. If he could live like me, he said, reading, writing, and traveling as he pleases, how happy that would be. I told him that I too had had put up with work for over thirty years for the sake of a monthly salary, as was his present case. When tired of government work, meditate on money! Many people make smoke offerings to gods, and offer backdoors to men, but not everyone can get a job like his, can they? Later, seeing him complain less, I thought perhaps my instruction to meditate on money when tired of government work had produced extraordinary results.

We spent two days leisurely visiting and relaxing. Ju Kalzang had also arrived in Lhasa, so we had a chat over tea and shared a meal. We got to know each other at a literary conference in 1984, and our friendship gradually deepened over the years, now marking its 40th year. Although he has two phones, it’s really difficult to get in touch with him, probably because he’s very busy. Often, publishing houses and magazines are left with no option but to contact him through me. That is why I never fail to tease and joke with him that reaching him is harder than contacting the President of the United States. However, that time, we had made plans to meet in Lhasa early on, so it was easy to get in touch, and I was particularly happy that we were together again, so we went on purpose to the Potala Palace to take a commemorative photo. I suggested that his collection “The Story of the Family Reunion” included in the 4th series of “Yudrukar Collection” could be classified as “versified novel”, and he basically agreed. We also referred to the famous versified novel Eugene Onegin by the Russian poet Pushkin. However, when it was actually published in mid-November, the book title came out just as Ju Kalzang’s Long Narrative Poem, with its Chinese title given as 居·格桑长诗集 [Ju Gesang zhang shiji, Long Poetry Collection], without even the shadow of the word “fiction” or “novel”. Anyway, like his other literary works, this book received a warm welcome from readers, and hardly had a month passed since its release, that the initial print run (2000 copies) was sold out, and a second run was printed.

My own “Literary Musings” is also included in this series. Initially, when the publishing house asked me if I had any writing for them, they inquired whether I had some fiction writing [ready for publication]. I replied that I didn’t, but I had enough material for a collection of “literary musings”. They said it would be fine. It comprises twenty-seven literary pieces written from the 1990s until this year, including creative writing, notes for lectures, book reviews, travel notes, and short funny snippets. Honestly, these were not crafted through long-term thinking and numerous revisions like fiction writing, but were rather spontaneous writings only, so my hopes were fairly low but, incredibly enough, the 2,000 copies print run is almost sold out. Apparently, it is the second-best selling book in the series, after Ju Kalzang’s book. I suspect this is due to the praise in the Chinese-language promotion done by the publishing house, according to whom these literary pieces have a distinct literary style, are full of erudition, and humorous. Regardless, I sincerely thank my dear readers.

My arrival in Lhasa, for the city, is as meaningless as a drop of rain, but for me, arriving in Lhasa feels like coming home, and it fills me with happiness and comfort. I especially feel a strong desire to immerse myself in the lap of the mountains, rivers, and forests. After parting with Ju Kalzang, I went for a walk alone in the “Lhalu Marshes”, which are considered as the lungs of Lhasa. Every time I visit this place, exactly as I admire the good nature of the people and the beautiful scenery, I feel disheartened and even angry by garbage, as well as spelling and translation errors, that litter the place. In this pleasant place where various water birds freely roam amidst the reeds, this is how it goes: many introductory texts misidentify the water birds: for example, the Bar-headed Goose (Anser indicus, 斑头雁) is introduced as “Red-headed Duck”. I sighed to myself and returned to the hotel with a heavy heart.

Renting two cars in Lhasa, my family and I traveled to Nyingtri [Nying khri], stopping on the way to view the Bragsum Tso. Back in 2018, there was only one row of ticket booths, but now it has become a small town. At this rate, before long, the place will become so crowded that one cannot but keep wondering if there will still be space enough to set one’s foot, and one cannot escape worrying about it. In Nyingtri, we visited the peach tree gardens, a 3,200-year-old giant cypress tree, and the Southeastern Tibet Cultural Relics Museum, among others. Then, on the way to Powo, we passed through Lunang and visited the ruins of the Kanam Depa’s Palace, a 600-year-old site from Tibet’s ancient [Kanam] kingdom. My traveling experiences about these places are detailed in my “Southern Tibet Notes,” so I won’t repeat them here.

In the summer of 1987, the editorial office of “Tibetan Literature and Art” magazine organized a writers’ group – most of the participants were from central Tibet. Only three were from Amdo: Dong Norde, Machu Konlo, and myself. From then onwards, I became acquainted with some central Tibet writers, and over the years our connection became more frequent and deeper. A few years ago, we set up a WeChat group called the “87 Writers’ Collective,” which includes members who have written or translated 500- to 600-page books, in several volumes. Dong Norde and I have repeatedly invited them, and most of them have only visited Amdo Golog and my hometown once. However, I have often been to central Tibet, and each time they invited me to the best restaurants, and sometimes even booked hotels and paid for the room. Because of this, I had to visit there secretly later. However, this time, I had brought with me a special gift for the writer Tsering Yangkyi: a pirated copy of her book “The Flowers of Lhasa” that I found in a bookstore in Xining, and I felt she absolutely had to see it.

Since “The Flowers of Lhasa” was printed in 2016, it has totaled seven editions and the overall print run has reached 39,000 copies. Given that each book costs 28 Yuan, this represents a total of 1,092,000 Yuan. I do not know how many counterfeit copies have been printed, and who knows if some other bootleg books exist. No one is more heartless than people who make and sell these counterfeit books. However, considering things coldly, in today’s world and in this place, it’s quite normal for products that are genuine to also have counterfeits. Moreover, the existence of a book counterfeiter is a sign that the book has value and is in high demand. Therefore, I told her, both jokingly and to offer her some solace, “Congratulations on your book being pirated.”

In fact, before going to Nyingtri, I had already met the writers Tashi Palden and Tsering Yangkyi, and offered her the pirated copy, so, after returning from Nyingtri, as we had agreed, we met leisurely. Both had invited Samshopa Konchok Yondan, Pelha, and Chungdag, who were members of the “87 Writers’s Collective” and were then in Lhasa. They were waiting for us in a nice restaurant. They also invited the poets Jampa Tenzin and the playwright of the Tibet Drama House, Nyima Dondrup, as well as others, and I wish to thank them all for the happy time with songs and dances we spent together.

After returning from central Tibet, I kept writing “The Year of the Snake” and in early June, Mr. Christopher Peacock, who had translated two of my books into English, arrived in Xining, bringing with him the translation of a novel published by Columbia University Press in the United States this year.

As, at that very moment, I was invited to participate in an event in my hometown, the two of us went to my hometown. Needless to say, on the way, we talked about literature, especially Tibetan literature, and even more so fiction. He said that Tibetan fiction still had to develop, but a very few works can definitely be considered among the best in the world. Not only had my French translator, Françoise Robin, made a similar statement in the past, but she added that Tibetan novels had developed greatly in the short span of forty years, from nothing to something and from merely existing to being quite good, and that such a development is probably rare in the world. At that time, I was not that confident at all, and even laughed. But later, her translation of my novel won a French literary award, and sold well, because a “paperback version” that could fit into a pocket was also published. My conversation with Chris reminded me that, at that time, she had asked me if I was still laughing. Christopher is now a literature professor at an American university, mainly teaching modern Tibetan literature. Also, although it is called a “lecture”, the teacher mainly recommends to the students some works which he thinks have such and such characteristics and values, and after the students have personally read the work, they debate about their own opinions, and it is unthinkable they do as in our literary courses where the teacher says, “The meaning of this work is this, the style and symbolism is that,” leaving no room for debate.

At the end of June, I completed the novel “The Year of the Snake” and sent it to the young novelist Yungok Tsetra, as well as to the aforementioned friend “Hawk Eyes,” and the learned monk Zopa Gyatso, to gather their views. They corrected typos and I wish to thank them for their valuable suggestions. Then, I was invited again and again by Norpal Gyal, who, without ever having been to school, became literate by self-study alone, read countless books, published four books, is an educated herder who owns a large book collection, including the complete Kangyur and Tengyur. So my wife and I, along with a friend, went to his home in Yakmo Village in Kangtsa County. Then, we went to a scenic spot with a hot spring at the source of the Dala River, by the shores of Kokonor Lake, a spot which is managed by the community itself, which does not let anyone else handle it. I talked with the village officials and we took photos in memory. At noon, Norpal Gyal pitched up a cotton tent by the lake and warmly entertained us. The weather was great that day, so we cooked mutton, boiled milk tea, ate and drank while enjoying the scenery of Kokonor Lake. We exchanged views about the books we had read, and talked about the grass and plants in our home place, etc. He said that white gentians did not grow in this place, so I told him he should definitely come to see them in my hometown someday. Conversation turns strangers into acquaintances, acquaintances into old friends. While talking, we discovered that we were the same age. He has read many more Tibetan books than I have, and most importantly, I was impressed that he has his own opinion and is not the type to blindly follow others. At the same time as I was thinking that if one day I could break my “iron bowl” and, like him, read and scribble down while herding a few cattle and sheep, I recalled how until I was 13, I was a herder. Then, I felt sorry for many youngsters who, upon graduating, will not return home to farm and herd, but instead work as humble waiters in towns.

I did the final revision of “The Year of the Snake” in September. At the end of that month, I submitted it to Qinghai Ethnic Publishing House with a brief summary in Chinese. They generously asked me whether it should be included in the “Novels” series or published as a standalone book, what format the book should be, adding that it would be printed according to my preference.

On December 20, i.e. the morning of the winter solstice according to the traditional calendar, news reached me from across the vast ocean: in 2025, six hundred and fifty-five English translations of China-related books had been published in America. Among these, ten non-fiction books and ten literary works received particular praise, and my long novel ranked among the latter. This is not just a recognition of my own literary work, but a high recognition of Tibetan literature. More importantly, the fact that the Tibetan language exists and flourishes on the other side of the vast ocean deeply moved me, and I blurted out, “My thirty consonants may be absent in the East, but they are present in the West.” Then I swiftly moved on to write this summary of 2025, mainly focusing on contemporary literature.

2025.12.25

We are delighted to share that “Ocean, As Much As Rain: Stories, Lyrical Prose, and Poems from Tibet” by Tsering Woeser, translated and edited by Fiona Sze-Lorrain with Dechen Pemba (Duke University Press, out on February 10, 2026) is available for preorder.

“Ocean, as Much as Rain” presents for the first time in the English-language world a collection of masterfully translated literary writings by prominent Tibetan writer Tsering Woeser. In these stories, lyrical essays, and poetry, Woeser interweaves texts, photographs, silences, and documentary details. Featuring a distinctively imaginative use of satire and digressive rhetoric, Woeser’s stories bring to life Tibetan characters whose lives are entwined with politics, history, and religion. Woeser illuminates the ruins and places that she has come across during her various sojourns in Chinese-ruled Tibet, reviving sites from the past of her parents and their generation.

These writings range from ingenious retellings of cultural encounters and confrontation to insightful commentaries on ecological issues and tourism in Tibet that never shun contradictions, dilemmas, or questions about the future.

The book contains a foreword by Pankaj Mishra, an introduction by Fiona Sze-Lorrain and an author interview by editors-translators Sze-Lorrain and Pemba. It features cover artwork by Tenzing Rigdol. Ocean, as Much as Rain is a landmark publication that celebrates the work of a steadfast dissident and a leading Tibetan literary figure of our times.

To preorder (from your location):

United States, Central/South America: https://www.dukeupress.edu/ocean-as-much-as-rain

Canada: https://utpdistribution.com/9781478033110/ocean-as-much-as-rain/

Asia, Australia, Europe, UK, and elsewhere: https://mngbookshop.co.uk/9781478033110/ocean-as-much-as-rain/

Please help to support by purchasing the book from the above links. Please feel free to share this information with friends and networks as the number of preorders boosts the book’s success at publication time and for a potential reprint in the future.

Thank you.

High Peaks Pure Earth for the first time presents a Spring Tibet Reading List! This is the first Tibet Reading List to follow up the (end of) Summer 2024 Tibet Reading List and includes over 25 more titles covering the span of the entire Tibetan Buddhist world.

If you think we’ve missed anything or if you have a particular recommendation please feel free to get in touch with us, it’s impossible for us to keep track of all Tibet-related publications! You’re also welcome as always to write short reviews in the comments section or on your social media, just tag us so that we see it or use the hashtag #TibetReadingList.

We’ve continued to add links to Bookshop.org, if you buy books linked from our site, we may earn a small commission and, at the same time, you are supporting independent bookshops! Where books are not available on Bookshop we have provided links to either Amazon or to the publishers direct.

See below for the new books added to the existing Tibet Reading Lists. For ease, we have (broadly) categorised the titles, and then listed them alphabetically by author’s first name. For publications not in English or journals, we have placed them in the section at the bottom called Special Mentions. Do also look out for the titles which are Open Access.

Happy reading!

Politics, History and Non-Fiction

“The Power of Publishing in Early Modern Tibetan Buddhism” By Benjamin J. Nourse

Published by Lexington Books in February 2025, “The Power of Publishing in Early Modern Tibetan Buddhism” By Benjamin J. Nourse explores the historical and religious dynamics that led to the “golden age” of Tibetan printing in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when Tibetan woodblock publishing reached its zenith.

From the publisher’s website:

By tracing the publication and circulation of Tibetan books in early modern Asia, from the Fifth Dalai Lama’s Potala Palace in Lhasa, through cosmopolitan Qing Beijing, and into monastic colleges on the Sino-Tibetan borderlands, this book demonstrates how woodblock publishing helped shape the religious and political landscapes of Tibet, Mongolia, and China into the twentieth century. Intertwined with this larger historical narrative, this volume explores the meaning and purpose of books in early modern Tibetan Buddhist cultures, especially the role of Mahāyāna Buddhist ideas as a driving force behind both the growth of woodblock publishing at that time and the use of Tibetan Buddhist books for a variety of activities, including scholarship, exchange, ritual, and a wide range of reading practices.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781666958003

“Buddhism and Healing in the Modern World” By C. Pierce Salguero, Kin Cheung, and Susannah Deane (Eds.)

Published by University of Hawaii Press in September 2024, “Buddhism and Healing in the Modern World” focuses on the nexus between Buddhism and healing in the modern and contemporary world, highlighting the many ways Buddhists have adapted in response to and in dialogue with modern science, biomedicine, and other facets of modernity from the nineteenth century to today.

From the publisher’s website:

Buddhist healing activities are much more diverse than the narrow range of mindfulness techniques that have dominated scholarly and popular focus. From the community-based healing practices of Asian American Buddhists and transnational Tantric sex therapy retreats to concerns about balancing being contemporary with being authentically Buddhist, contributors explore how Buddhists have rethought the mind-body relationship against the backdrop of the modernization and globalization of Buddhism. They examine Buddhists navigating the differences and commonalities that exist in their practice and modern systems of mental and physical healthcare, paying attention to how they have negotiated shifting configurations of legitimacy, authority, and authenticity. Through historical and ethnographic case studies, the work details these ruptures and reconciliations in Japan, Sri Lanka, Tibet, Korea, and the United States, in addition to mapping the transnational pathways of exchange as knowledge about Buddhism and medicine has traveled between Asia and the West.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9780824897697

“Voice for the Voiceless: Over Seven Decades of Struggle with China for My Land and My People” By His Holiness The Dalai Lama

Published in March 2025 by HarperCollins, “Voice for the Voiceless” by His Holiness The Dalai Lama tells the full story of his 75-year struggle with China to save Tibet and its people.

From the publisher’s website:

The Dalai Lama has had to contend with the People’s Republic of China his entire life. He was 15 years old when communist China invaded Tibet in 1950, only 19 when he had his first meeting with Chairman Mao in Beijing, and 24 when he was forced to escape to India and became a leader in exile. Almost 75 years after China’s initial invasion of Tibet, the Dalai Lama has faced communist China’s leaders – Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping – in his effort to protect Tibet and its people.

In Voice for the Voiceless, the Dalai Lama reminds the world of Tibet’s unresolved struggle for freedom and the hardship his people continue to face in their homeland. The book captures his extraordinary life, uncovering what it means to lose your home to a repressive invader and build a life in exile; dealing with the existential crisis of a nation, its people, and its culture and religion; and envisioning the path forward.

Voice for the Voiceless is a powerful testimony from a global icon, sharing both his pain and his enduring hope in his people’s ongoing quest to restore dignity and freedom.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9780008743772
Available on Amazon here: https://amzn.to/4iBBW2o

“The Politics of Language Oppression in Tibet” By Gerald Roche

From the publisher’s website:

Gerald Roche explores the erosion of linguistic diversity through a study of a community on the northeastern Tibetan Plateau in the People’s Republic of China. Manegacha is but one of the sixty minority languages in Tibet and is spoken by about 8,000 people who are otherwise mostly indistinguishable from the Tibetan communities surrounding them. Recently, many in these communities have switched to speaking Tibetan, and Manegacha faces an uncertain future.

The author uses the Manegacha case to show how linguistic diversity across Tibet is collapsing under assimilatory state policies. He looks at how global advocacy networks inadequately acknowledge this issue, highlighting the complex politics of language in an inter-connected world. The Politics of Language Oppression in Tibet broadens our understanding of Tibet and China, the crisis of global linguistic diversity, and the radical changes needed to address this crisis.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781501777783

“Aflame for Freedom in Tibet: The Origin and Development of the Self-Immolation Movement” By Namloyak Dhungser, Translated by Namloyak Dhungser and Joshua Esler

Published by Lexington Books in July 2024, “Aflame for Freedom in Tibet” examines the Tibetan self-immolation protest movement.

From the publisher’s website:

Since 2009, images of Tibetans setting themselves on fire in protest of the repressive policies of the Chinese government have drawn attention from around the world. In “Aflame for Freedom in Tibet: The Origin and Development of the Self-Immolation Movement”, Namloyak Dhungser examines the protest movement and its motivations through interviews with Tibetans, both inside Tibet and abroad, and in the context of developments in Tibetan history, providing unique insight into the multifaceted origins of this movement in both contemporary and historic Tibetan perspectives. The number of self-immolating protestors continues to climb: a final plea from Tibetans to the world to secure their freedom. This book is not only a path to a deeper understanding of the Tibetan situation—past and future—but a call to action to recognize basic Tibetan human rights.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781666937794

“A Tibetan-American Educator’s Odyssey” By Nawang Phuntsog

Published in June 2024 by the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives, Dharamsala, India, “A Tibetan-American Educator’s Odyssey” by Nawang Phuntsog is a journey through the intricacies of the Tibetan diaspora in this insightful auto-ethnography.

From the book description:

Set against the backdrop of colonialism and modern geopolitics, the narrative offers a nuanced exploration of personal displacement and its far-reaching impacts. Delve into the experiences of individuals grappling with the challenges of leaving behind their homeland, navigating unfamiliar territories, and achieving academic milestones while preserving their cultural heritage in the face of adversity. Through heartfelt reflection and poignant storytelling, this narrative sheds light on the resilience and hope that permeates the Tibetan community and invites readers to engage with themes of identity, belonging, and the human experience in a rapidly changing world. The author’s academic odyssey mirrors the trajectory of Tibetan education in exile, infusing their story with authenticity and inspiration for future generations.

Available on Google Play here: https://play.google.com/store/books/details/A_Tibetan_American_Educator_s_Odyssey?id=pckMEQAAQBAJ&hl=en-US&pli=1

“Other Everests: One Mountain, Many Worlds” Edited by Paul Gilchrist, Peter Hansen and Jonathan Westaway

Published by Manchester University Press in November 2024, “Other Everests: One Mountain, Many Worlds” explores the wider social and cultural history of the mountain a hundred years after the tragic 1924 British Everest expedition. Please note this publication is available Open Access.

From the Manchester University Press website:

Mount Everest looms large in the popular imagination. Since the deaths of mountaineers George Mallory and Andrew Irvine in 1924, histories of the mountain have overwhelmingly focused on the mythologies of western male adventure and conquest. But there are many more stories waiting to be told.

Other Everests brings together new voices and perspectives on the historical and cultural significance of Everest in the modern world. The book shines a light on the overlooked role of local people and high-altitude workers, while also revealing the significant contributions women have made to climbing the mountain and writing its history. It explores the depiction of Everest in a range of media and investigates how the forces of nationalism and commercialism have shaped many different ‘Everests’.

After years of exploitation, Indigenous people are now reclaiming Mount Everest in the twenty-first century. Other Everests re-examines the past and present of the world’s highest peak, presenting an exciting vision of what Everest might become in the future.

Available on Bookshop: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781526179166

“Rivers of the Asian Highlands: From Deep Time to the Climate Crisis” By Ruth Gamble, Gillian G. Tan, Hongzhang Xu, Sara Beavis, Petra Maurer, Jamie Pittock, John Powers, and Robert J. Wasson

Published in October 2024 by Taylor & Francis, “Rivers of the Asian Highlands” delves into the intricate and multifaceted histories of Asia’s eight largest rivers, focusing on the upper reaches of the Brahmaputra and Yangzi river systems.

From the publisher’s website:

This book guides its readers through these two rivers’ physical, environmental, cultural, social, and political histories before providing a multifaceted assessment of their present. It uses general and detailed insights from multiple disciplines, including anthropology, conservation, geography, geomorphology, climate science, ecology, history, hydrology, and religious studies. The rivers’ stories explain how the catchments’ hazards—earthquakes, landslides, floods, droughts, and erosion—interact with their energetic, hydrological, ecological, cultural, and social abundance.

This book’s multiple cultural and disciplinary perspectives on the rivers will interest anyone who wants to understand the rivers of this critically important region as the environment faces climate change and other ecological crises.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781032490595
Available Open Access here: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003392033

“Amdo Lullaby: An Ethnography of Childhood and Language Shift on the Tibetan Plateau” By Shannon Ward

Published by University of Toronto Press in November 2024, “Amdo Lullaby: An Ethnography of Childhood and Language Shift on the Tibetan Plateau” by Shannon Ward is the first book-length study of Tibetan children in the People’s Republic of China.

From the Bookshop description:

In Amdo, a region of eastern Tibet incorporated into mainland China, young children are being raised in a time of social change. In the first decades of the twenty-first century, Chinese state development policies are catalysing rural to urban migration, consolidating schooling in urban centres, and leading Tibetan farmers and nomads to give up their traditional livelihoods. As a result, children face increasing pressure to adopt the state’s official language of Mandarin.

Amdo Lullaby charts the contrasting language socialization trajectories of rural and urban children from one extended family, who are native speakers of a Tibetan language known locally as “Farmer Talk.” By integrating a fine-grained analysis of everyday conversations and oral history interviews, linguistic anthropologist Shannon M. Ward examines the forms of migration and resulting language contact that contribute to Farmer Talk’s unique grammatical structures, and that shape Amdo Tibetan children’s language choices. This analysis reveals that young children are not passively abandoning their mother tongue for standard Mandarin, but instead are reformatting traditional Amdo Tibetan cultural associations among language, place, and kinship as they build their peer relationships in everyday play.

Available on Bookshop: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781487558673

“Satirical Tibet: The Politics of Humor in Contemporary Amdo” By Timothy Thurston

From the publisher’s website:

What does comedy look like when the wrong punchline can land you in jail?

In recent years, alongside well-publicized struggles for religious freedom and cultural preservation, comedians, hip-hop artists, and other creatives have used zurza, the Tibetan art of satire, to render meaningful social and political critique under the ever-present eye of the Chinese state. Timothy Thurston’s Satirical Tibet offers the first-ever look at this powerful tool of misdirection and inversion. Focusing on the region of Amdo, Thurston introduces the vibrant and technologically innovative comedy scene that took shape following the death of Mao Zedong and the rise of ethnic revival policies. He moves decade by decade to show how artists have folded zurza into stage performances, radio broadcasts, televised sketch comedies, and hip-hop lyrics to criticize injustices, steer popular attitudes, and encourage the survival of Tibetan culture.

Surprising and vivid, Satirical Tibet shows how the ever-changing uses and meanings of a time-honored art form allow Tibetans to shape their society while navigating tightly controlled media channels.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9780295753119
There is an Open Access version here: https://uw.manifoldapp.org/projects/satirical-tibet

“The Politics of Sorrow: Unity and Allegiance Across Tibetan Exile” By Tsering Wangmo Dhompa

From the publisher’s website:

The Dalai Lama escaped from Tibet in 1959 after its occupation by China and established a government in exile in India. There, Tibetan leaders aimed to bring together displaced people from varied religious traditions and local loyalties under the banner of unity. To contest Chinese colonization and stand up for self-determination, Tibetan refugees were asked to shed regional allegiances and embrace a vision of a shared national identity.

The Group of Thirteen established settlements in India in the mid-1960s with the goal of protecting their regional and religious traditions, setting them apart from the majority of Tibetan refugees, who saw a common tradition as the basis for unifying the Tibetan people. Tsering Wangmo Dhompa traces these different visions for Tibetan governance and identity, juxtaposing the Tibetan government in exile’s external struggle for international recognition with its lesser-known internal struggle to command loyalty within the diaspora. She argues that although unity was necessary for democracy and independence, it also drew painful boundaries between those who belonged and those who didn’t. Drawing on insightful interviews with Tibetan elders and an exceptional archive of Tibetan exile texts, The Politics of Sorrow is a compelling narrative of a tumultuous time that reveals the complexities of Tibetan identities then and now.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9780231212472

“Politics of Tranquility: The Material and Mundane Lives of Buddhist Nuns in Post-Mao Tibet” By Yasmin Cho

From the publisher’s website:

Yasmin Cho’s book challenges two assumptions about Tibetan Buddhist communities in China. First, against the assumption that a Buddhist monastic community is best understood in terms of its esoteric qualities, Cho focuses on the material and mundane daily practices that are indispensable to the existence and persistence of such a community and shows how deeply gendered these practices are. Second, against the assumption that Tibetan politics toward the Chinese state is best understood as rebellious, incendiary, and centered upon Tibetan victimhood, the nuns demonstrate how it can be otherwise. Tibetan politics can be unassuming, calm, and self-contained and yet still have substantial political effects. As Politics of Tranquility shows, the nuns in Yachen Gar have called forth an alternative way of living and expressing themselves as Tibetans and as female monastics despite a repressive context.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781501778810

“Chieftains, Lamas, and Warriors: A History of Kham, 1904–1961” By Yudru Tsomu

Published by Lexington Books in November 2024, “Chieftains, Lamas, and Warriors: A History of Kham 1904–1961” by Yudru Tsomo explores the region of Kham, situated between Central Tibet and China.

From the publisher’s website:

By highlighting Kham’s pivotal role in Sino-Tibetan relations and frontier dynamics, this book challenges the traditional focus of scholarly research that treat Kham as a mere transit point. Yudru Tsomu argues for the significance of frontier regions in shaping historical narratives and power structures. Tsomu explores how Kham forged its own identity amidst the assimilation pressures exerted by Central Tibet and China. Supported by a wealth of original sources in Chinese, Tibetan, and Western languages—including previously untapped personal and archival collections in China—this book offers a compelling reassessment of Kham’s historical agency and significance.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781666958997

Literature, Religion and Art

“Flight of the Bon Monks: War, Persecution, and the Salvation of Tibet’s Oldest Religion” By Harvey Rice and Jackie Cole

From the Bookshop description:

Providing an inside view into the Chinese occupation of Tibet and the tenets of Bon, one of the world’s oldest but least known religions, this book chronicles the true story of three Bon monks who heroically escaped occupied Tibet and went on to rebuild their culture through incredible resilience, determination, and passion.

After taking his vows to become a Bon monk and completing a pilgrimage around 22,000-foot Mt. Kailash, the holiest mountain in Tibet, Tenzin Namdak envisions a life of quiet contemplation at Menri, Bon’s mother monastery. Instead, he finds himself fleeing for his life across the highest and most difficult terrain on the planet. After being joined by a CIA-backed warlord, Tenzin’s escape party is ambushed and he is severely wounded. Narrowly escaping execution by Chinese soldiers, the dying Tenzin is taken to a concentration camp, where he is afforded special consideration because of his status as a monk. He overcomes his nearly fatal wound and makes an arduous escape from Tibet over the daunting Himalayas.

The other monks, life-long friends Samten Karmay and Sangye Tenzin, witness Tibet’s capital explode in a violent insurrection against Chinese rule. Escaping to Nepal, they worry about the survival of the Bon religion and begin collecting scattered works of Bon scripture. A chance meeting with British scholar David Snellgrove brings the three monks together again and dramatically changes their lives. Snellgrove invites Sangye, Samten, and Tenzin to spend three years in London on a Rockefeller Foundation grant. There, they hone their English and forge influential relationships, enabling Tenzin to answer the pleas for help from the Bon community by founding a settlement in exile in India. Sangye is chosen as the 33rd Menri Trizen, Bon’s highest office, and together the three monks help rebuild the nearly extinct Bon religion.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781644118580

“Mandalas: Mapping the Buddhist Art of Tibet” By Kurt A. Behrendt

Published by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in September 2024, “Mandalas: Mapping the Buddhist Art of Tibet” by Kurt A. Behrendt accompanied the exhibition of the same name that explored Himalayan Buddhist devotional art throughout history.

From the museum website:

A mandala is a diagram of the universe—a map of true reality intended to provide a focus for Buddhist religious practice and inspire the devout. This book highlights the distinctive Tibetan approach to creating mandalas, exploring how it crossed over from India into Tibet, and how continuous exchanges of art and ideas between the two cultures, led by monks and spiritual teachers, gave rise to a uniquely Tibetan style of Buddhist imagery. Featuring more than one hundred paintings, sculptures, and ritual objects, this superbly illustrated volume reflects the dazzling complexities of the Tibetan imagery that has provided a foundation for mandalas through the centuries.

Most notably, a mesmerizing installation by the Tibetan American artist Tenzing Rigdol (b. 1982), specially created for the accompanying exhibition and published here for the first time, offers contemporary audiences a way of interrogating and understanding their world and underscores how this ancient tradition remains a vibrant living practice.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781588397829

“The Golden Garuda: The Extraordinary Life of Modern Day Mahasiddha Jigme Phuntsok Rinpoche” By Khenpo Sodargye

From the publisher’s website:

In this moving biography, Khenpo Sodargye—a lead teacher at Larung Gar Five Sciences Buddhist Academy—brings his beloved root teacher’s remarkable story and accomplishments to life with wisdom and reverence. His personal anecdotes coupled with the prophecies of great masters and verse from Buddhist texts offer a portrait that is at once intimate and profound, revealing Jigme Phuntsok’s legacy as the mythical “golden garuda” who was instrumental in the flourishing of Buddhism. During a pivotal period in modern Tibetan history, he created the world’s largest Buddhist institution, attracted thousands of followers with his nonsectarian teachings, and taught some of today’s great Tibetan Buddhist teachers.

The engaging narrative unfolds chronologically in dozens of short, impactful chapters. We’re introduced to Jigme Phuntsok’s previous incarnations and learn about his early years. We experience his teaching trips, including a journey to the holy Mount Wutai in China together with ten thousand Tibetan disciples. We learn about his visionary experiences and revelations, including one that failed—a rare account in Tibetan literature of such an occurrence. With elements of biography, travelogue, and magical tale, this life story contains adventure, suffering, and human connection.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781645473190

“Forty-Nine Days” By Sonam Tsomo Chashutsang

Published by Blackneck Books, India, “Forty-Nine Days” is a book of very personal poems. Sonam Tsomo, a tri-lingual Tibetan poet, reflects on her mother’s passing away as exile pulled them apart in two separate continents. “I wake up, I wash my face, I light the candle / and burn the incense, and chant prayers, / For your journey to the unknown – / I pray so it will be easier for you, in every way,” writes Sonam.

Contact Blackneck Books for this title via their social media channels: https://www.instagram.com/blackneckbooks/

“Young Days in Tibet” By Tsewang Y. Pemba

Published by Blackneck Books, India, “Young Days in Tibet” first published in 1957, is a fascinating account of independent Tibet through the eyes of a young man. Dr Pemba writes about his beloved homeland, its culture, its natural landscape and his own journey from home in the high mountains to a British school in India. The country he so vividly writes about no longer exists since it is now under China’s colonial occupation. So this becomes a crucial account for new generations of Tibetans who are born and raised in exile.

Contact Blackneck Books for this title via their social media channels: https://www.instagram.com/blackneckbooks/

“The Cosmos, the Person, and the Sādhana: A Treatise on Tibetan Tantric Meditation” By Yael Bentor

Published in June 2024 by University of Virginia Press, “The Cosmos, the Person, and the Sādhana” is a new translation and interpretation of a seminal fourteenth-century treatise on Tibetan Buddhist meditation.

From the publisher’s website:

Sādhana, which translates as “realization,” is the primary form of meditation in the Tantric Buddhism of Tibet. In this spiritual exercise, practitioners dissolve their ordinary reality—their identity and environment—and in its place visualize an awakened being. Eventually they actually transform into this divine being. In this vital new volume, Yael Bentor offers an invaluable translation of Tsongkhapa Lobzang Drakpa’s famous treatise on this form of meditation.

Tsongkhapa was an influential monk, philosopher, and tantric yogi whose activities led to the formation of one of the four main schools of Tibetan Buddhism. His treatise draws fascinating links between tantric practice, cosmogony, and the life cycle of a yogi engaged in the practice. Bentor’s vivid translation, accompanied by her expert introduction and commentary, provides the grounding necessary to properly understand the text, tracing the reception and trajectory of Tsongkhapa’s work through history and evaluating its great relevance up to the present day.

Available on Amazon here: https://amzn.to/3DBeWBt

Younger Audiences

“Loving Kindness” and “Peaceful Mind” By His Holiness the Dalai Lama

Published in March 2025 by Dorling Kindersley, “Loving Kindness” and “Peaceful Mind” are two titles developed in collaboration with His Holiness the Dalai Lama for young children. These calming board books contain beautiful original illustrations along with simple text that can be read out loud, helping to develop empathy skills.

“Loving Kindness” available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9780241690529
“Peaceful Mind” available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9780241681282

“Karma and the Snow Lion” By Jordan Quill, Illustrated by Mitthu and Sonam Lama Tamang

Published by Perky Parrot Books, an imprint of Niyogi Books India, in January 2025, “Karma and the Snow Lion” by Jordan Quill, and illustrated by Mitthu and Sonam Lama Tamang, is about Karma, a young pashmina goat.

From the publisher’s website:

Karma, a young pashmina goat, lives with his mother in the forested foothills of the Himalayas. He likes to wander. Little does he know of the origins of the pashmina shawl! One night, he has a surprise visitor. What follows is an adventure that takes him gliding through his roots and those of his custodians, the Changpa.

Available via Amazon (India): https://www.amazon.in/dp/8119626818

“Khando Drowa Sangmo – A Tale From The Land Of Mon Tawang” Comic Series by Lobsang Soepa

Published by India based comic book artist, illustrator and muralist Lobsang Soepa, “Khando Drowa Sangmo – A Tale From The Land Of Mon Tawang” is a series of four comic books re-telling the story of Khando Drowa Sangmo, the wife of King Kalawangpo. The tale originates from the land of Tana Mandal Gang, present day, Tawang, Arunachal Pradesh, India.

Enquire to order via the artist’s Instagram account: https://www.instagram.com/lopsangsoepa/

Tibetan Women Authors Series Published by The Tibetan Arts and Literature Initiative (TALI)

These Tibetan language e-book titles for children by Tibetan women authors are all available for free download from their website: https://talitibet.org/tibetan-women-authors-series/

Special Mentions

Volume 3.2 (2024) of the Journal of Tibetan Literature

The Journal of Tibetan Literature (JTL) is a biannual, peer-reviewed, open-access academic journal committed to publishing research, translations, and criticism on all aspects of Tibetan-language texts, from their earliest written forms to the present. This issue features a striking photograph by Nyema Droma on the cover. Available to read here: https://journaloftibetanliterature.org/index.php/jtl/issue/view/5

“Globo y Tharlo” By Pema Tseden, Translated by Isolda Morillo

For the first time in Spanish translation, this collection contains five of Pema Tseden’s best-known stories, published between 1995 and 2018. Available here: https://www.hermidaeditores.com/globo-y-tharlo

High Peaks Pure Earth presents the (end of) Summer 2024 Tibet Reading List! We’ve updated the previous Winter Reading List to include over 20 more titles covering the span of the entire Tibetan Buddhist world.

If you think we’ve missed anything or if you have a particular recommendation please feel free to get in touch with us, it’s impossible for us to keep track of all Tibet-related publications! You’re also welcome as always to write short reviews in the comments section or on your social media, just tag us so that we see it or use the hashtag #TibetReadingList.

We’ve continued to add links to Bookshop.org, if you buy books linked from our site, we may earn a small commission and, at the same time, you are supporting independent bookshops! Where books are not available on Bookshop we have provided links to either Amazon or to the publishers direct.

See below for the new books added to the existing Tibet Reading Lists. For ease, we have (broadly) categorised them. For books not directly about Tibet but may include Tibet or be of general interest, we have placed them in the section at the bottom called Special Mentions. Do also look out for the titles which are Open Access.

Happy reading!

Politics, History and Non-Fiction

“The Book of Compassion” By His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Kailash Satyarthi

Published by Penguin India in May 2024, “The Book of Compassion” brings together two Nobel Peace Prize Laureates, His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Kailash Satyarthi, along with writer Pooja Pande, to advocate for compassion in today’s world.

From the publisher’s website:

Nobel Peace Prize Laureates His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Kailash Satyarthi open a window to the concept ‘Compassion’, which according is undoubtedly the most significant requirement of our existence. Compassion is no longer a luxury’, says His Holiness the Dalai Lama. It is ‘a necessity if our species is to survive’. Kailash Satyarthi urges us all to consider a flight of compassion as it inspires everyone to free ourselves from the shackles of limitations in order to explore the limitless possibilities of life.

In the post-pandemic world, His Holiness the Dalai Lama and social reformer and global thought leader Kailash Satyarthi bring to light the idea to cultivate compassion and why honest concern for others is the key factor in improving our day-to-day lives. From inequalities to injustice to climate change, the influence of Gandhi to ancient Indian and Tibetan knowledge system, importance of education for children, and the idea of an interconnected world, among others, in The Book of Compassion two globally renowned spiritual and moral leaders reveal their vision for a globalized compassion that promotes freedom, joy and inner peace.

Available on Bookshop: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781846046339
Available on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3LWm5gc

“Imperial Games in Tibet” By Dilip Sinha

Published by Pan Macmillan India in May 2024, “Imperial Games in Tibet” by former Indian Ambassador Dilip Sinha is an account of how Tibet became the playground for global geopolitical ambitions and what the future may hold for this precarious region fighting for statehood. Read a review of the book written by Tibetan author Tsering Namgyal Khortsa.

From the publisher’s website:

Renowned as the ‘roof of the world’, Tibet is both a spiritual bastion and a hotbed of geopolitical intrigue. Its unique location, nestled amidst the majestic Himalaya and the vast Central Asian steppes, has historically attracted imperial contenders, thrusting it into the heart of the Great Game – a stormy nineteenth-century contest for supremacy involving Britain, Russia and China.

In “Imperial Games in Tibet”, former ambassador Dilip Sinha deftly guides us through the region’s complex geopolitical entanglements, charting its history from the rise of Tibetan Buddhism, through the cloak-and-dagger machinations of the Great Game, to its fateful invasion and annexation by China in 1950. In the process, he reveals the real factors leading up to the Fourteenth Dalai Lama’s escape to India in 1959 – an epochal event that drew the newly independent nation into this political maelstrom and heightened Sino-Indian tensions. More than seventy years later, despite citizens protests and global outcry, Chinese ‘suzerainty’ maintains its grip on Tibet, begging the question: Can Tibet ever be free?

Available on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3SE67vf

“My Life – Born in Free Tibet, Served in Exile” By Tashi Wangdi

Published in June 2024 by the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives, “My Life – Born in Free Tibet, Served in Exile” are the memoirs of Tashi Wangdi, former Minister of the Central Tibetan Administration.

The book was launched in Dharamsala, India in the presence of Sikyong Penpa Tsering. It delves into a detailed first-hand narrative of pivotal moments in the history of Tibetan exile, encompassing the inception of the Tibetan government in exile, its negotiations with the Chinese government, and His Holiness’s global recognition through prestigious accolades such as the Nobel Peace Prize, the US Congressional Gold Medal, and Honorary Canadian Citizenship, among others.

The e-book is available via the Google Play store: https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=xeMOEQAAQBAJ

“Taken Away: The Ordinary Life of a Lama” By Doboom Tulku and Sudhamahi Regunathan

Published in May 2024 by Bloomsbury India, “Taken Away: The Ordinary Life of a Lama” is the autobiography of the late Doboom Tulku Rinpoche who passed away on 29 January 2024 at the age of 82.

From the publisher’s website:

The firstborn of a nomadic couple in Tibet, the child had barely learnt to walk when he was identified as the third reincarnation of Doboom Tulku and taken away from his parents. Told movingly but unsentimentally and with care and humour, Doboom Tulku’s to become a revered Rinpoche in the Gelukpa tradition. ‘I want to demystify the life of a monk,’ he declares. ‘It was like that of any other.’ And yet it obviously was not.

Told movingly but unsentimentally and with care and humour, Doboom Tulku’s life story is also the extraordinary story of Tibetans, especially those from monastic orders, finding their place and purpose in foreign lands.

Available on Amazon here: https://amzn.to/4dmWgle

“Tibetan Monastery Collections and Museums” By Christian Luczanits and Louise Tythacott (eds)

Published in January 2024, “Tibetan Monastery Collections and Museums” by Christian Luczanits and Louise Tythacott (eds) is the latest volume in the Vajra Academic series.

Endorsement by Clare Harris, Professor of Visual Anthropology at the School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography, University of Oxford:

“This is a fascinating book on a subject that has not previously received concerted academic attention. The editors have done an excellent job in bringing together the recent scholarship on this topic in a collection of 10 essays written by specialists, many of whom have hands-on experience of working with or in the museums under discussion.

With its detailed chapters, ranging from close-focus art historical analysis of Tibetan objects to theorised discussion of the processes of curating in Tibetan/ Himalayan contexts, I think the volume will be greatly appreciated by academics and students of Tibetan Buddhism and of Tibetan and Himalayan history and culture, as well as those in art history and in museum studies. It will also be invaluable for members of the communities where these museums have been created (especially in Nepal and Ladakh).”

Publisher’s website: https://vajrabookshop.com/product/tibetan-monastery-collections-and-museums-traditional-practices-and-contemporary-issues/

Available on Amazon here: https://amzn.to/3ymYfY0
Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9789937733410

“Wall Painting in Tibet: History, Technique, Survival and Environment” By Knud Larsen

Published by Tronfjell Publications in 2023, this book is a follow-up to the 2001 “The Lhasa Atlas. Traditional Tibetan Architecture and Townscape”.

From the book description:

This book is a result of an effort the educate Tibetan artists in modern conservation techniques, to carry out the first ever scientific investigation of traditional Tibetan wall painting, to describe traditional wall painting techniques and to illustrate this by surveying some of the finest surviving murals in 14 different locations, monasteries and caves, in Central and Western Tibet.

The book is extensively illustrated with more than 400 colour photographs, most of them by Roberto Fortuna from the Danish National Museum and by 18 new architectural drawings of monasteries and caves, most of which never surveyed properly before. The 350 pages also contain, in some cases extensive, descriptions of the sites by ten scholars of Tibetology. The scholars are Mainland Chinese, Tibetan, Swiss, German and American and their original manuscripts were written in Chinese, Tibetan and English.

Available for purchase here: https://www.namsebangdzo.com/Wall-Painting-in-Tibet-Knud-Larsen-p/9788230359389.htm

Two Online Publications by Roberto Vitali

There are two new online Open Access publications by researcher and scholar Roberto Vitali published this year in Dharamsala, India by Mutag Books. “Essays on the History of Tibet” and “Early bKa’ brgyud pa Masters on the “Upper side” (1191-1344) are both freely available to download from as PDFs from http://vitali-tibet.com

Literature, Religion and Art

“Tibetan Buddhism: A Guide to Contemplation, Meditation, and Transforming Your Mind” By Khenpo Sodargye

Published by Shambhala Publications in January 2024, “Tibetan Buddhism: A Guide to Contemplation, Meditation, and Transforming Your Mind” by Khenpo Sodargye is an overview of Tibetan Buddhism from a leading contemporary teacher.

From the publisher’s website:

This guide shares Tibetan Buddhist insight and tools that will benefit everyone in transforming their mind. Khenpo Sodargye, who has attracted hundreds of thousands of students worldwide with his concise, easy-to-follow teaching style, sketches the big picture of the Mahayana path in straightforward language with stories relevant to everyday life.

This book introduces a systematic approach to studying Buddhism. Through proper listening, contemplating, and meditating, we can generate the wisdom that enables us to recognize, control, and uproot our afflictions, which is the essence of Buddhism. This book is the perfect companion for anyone wanting to learn more about the basics of Mahayana Buddhism or to strengthen the foundations of their spiritual practice.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781645472247

Available on Amazon here: https://amzn.to/3SKp3s5

“Longing to Awaken: Buddhist Devotion in Tibetan Poetry and Song” By Holly Gayley and Dominique Townsend (Eds)

Published in August 2024 by the University of Virginia Press, “Longing to Awaken: Buddhist Devotion in Tibetan Poetry and Song” by Holly Gayley and Dominique Townsend (Eds) is a collection of Buddhist devotional poems and songs.

From the publisher’s website:

Longing to Awaken features twenty-five translations of Buddhist devotional poems and songs composed by revered Tibetan masters from diverse traditions and time periods. The anthology invites readers to experience a variety of poetic forms that embody a range of emotions, from grief and longing to skepticism and humor, demonstrating the ways that poetry can inspire faith as well as reflect the profundity and at times fraught nature of the teacher-student relationship. This collection gives weight to literary—not simply literal—translation as a crucial endeavor in the transmission of Buddhism today, one with the potential to raise the profile of Tibetan poetry onto the stage of global literature.

Featuring a remarkable interview with esteemed Tibetan master Jetsün Khandro Rinpoché to elucidate Buddhist devotion and a landmark essay by Lama Jabb articulating a Tibetan theory for translating poetry.

Available on Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9780813950693

Available on Amazon here: https://amzn.to/3yJSl38

“The Gongkar Lamdre: Masters in Khyenluk Style”

Published in April 2024 by Gongkar Choede Monastery in Dehradun, India, “The Gongkar Lamdre: Masters in Khyenluk Style” is a bilingual illustrated art book on the history of the Gongkar Lamdre lineage and the Khyenluk school of Tibetan painting (mkhyen lugs/mkhyen ris).  The project was funded by the Department of Religion and Culture (CTA, Dharamsala, India).

The book is available online for free here: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/The_Gongkar_Lamdre_Masters_in_Khyenluk_S/JugGEQAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0

“Sphinxlike” by Chime Lama

Published in January 2024 by Finishing Line Press, “Sphinxlike” is a collection of poetry by Tibetan American writer, translator and multi-genre artist Chime Lama. “Sphinxlike” is an exercise in stretching language, containing concrete poetry, Tibetan Buddhist thought, and the curated and out-of-body experience. It offers social critique and responds to capitalism and sexism with absurdity and humor. Activating visual art, sound poetry, and performance art, its poems collide and scatter across the page in an attempt to expand through space.

Available via the publisher: https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/sphinxlike-by-chime-lama/

“Learning Tibetan” By Lekey Leidecker

Published by Blackneck Books, India, “Learning Tibetan” is a poetry volume by Tibetan writer and poet Lekey Leidecker who was born and raised in Berea, Kentucky. Tenzin Dickie, editor of The Penguin Book of Modern Tibetan Essays, writes: Lekey dissects exile, belonging and unbelonging in language precise, spare and powerful. Ferocious and tender, these poems are both a surrender to heartbreak and a victory over it.’

Contact Blacknect Books for this title via their social media channels: https://www.instagram.com/blackneckbooks/

“Murder of Tenzin” (བསྟན་འཛིན་བསད་པ།) by Tenzin Nyima

Published in May 2024 by Blackneck Books, India, “Murder of Tenzin” (བསྟན་འཛིན་བསད་པ།) by Tenzin Nyima is a Tibetan language novel for young adults. This murder mystery is, perhaps, a first of its kind in Tibetan language written by a young college student.

Contact Blacknect Books for this title via their social media channels: https://www.instagram.com/blackneckbooks/

“Carrying Memories” By Kalsang Yangzom

Published by Blackneck Books, India, “Carrying Memories” by Kalsang Yangzom is a book of poems about home, longing, and belonging — in and between various spaces and cultures.

Contact Blacknect Books for this title via their social media channels: https://www.instagram.com/blackneckbooks/

“Queens Without a Kingdom Worth Ruling: Buddhist Nuns and the Process of change in Tibetan Monastic Communities” By Chandra Chiara Ehm

Published in April 2024 by Vajra Books, Nepal, “Queens Without a Kingdom Worth Ruling” by Chandra Chiara Ehm is an ethnography offering a first-hand account of life in a Tibetan Buddhist nunnery, carefully calibrated within a theoretical frame to investigate the historical social aspects of monastic institutions.

From the publisher’s website:

Looking through the walls of a cloistered monastic community, such as a Tibetan Buddhist nunnery, is nearly impossible as lay person. These religious communities are multi-layered in being simultaneously places of spiritual development, Buddhist scholasticism, and religious devotion. Chandra Chiara Ehm lived for nearly a decade behind the walls of Khachoe Ghakyil Ling nunnery in the Nepalese Himalayas. During this time, she collected the nuns’ stories and studied their lifestyle and their scholarship. This book invites the reader to step through the convent’s walls to explore Tibetan monastic life from the perspective of the nuns.

Another important theme Ehm depicts is the religious hierarchy and the remarkable changes that globalisation, feminism, and secularisation have brought to this gender balance and the nuns’ monastic life in recent years. This vivid and comprehensive study of female monastic life provides novel insights with essential implications for the inter- and intra-religious analysis of monasticism today.

Available from Bookshop here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9789937733380

Available from Amazon here: https://amzn.to/4ctVty9

“108 Exile Tibetan Visual Artists and Their Expression of Universal Responsibility and The Environment” By Whiteline Graphics

This publication is from Whiteline Graphics, an initiative by brothers Jamyang Tenzin and Tsering Namgyal and was launched in Dharamsala on July 3, 2024. The curated book titled “108 Exile Tibetan Visual Artists and Their Expression of Universal Responsibility and The Environment” is a postcard edition book uniting 108 artists to explore universal responsibility and environmental issues, particularly those affecting Tibet.

Inspired by the Dalai Lama’s dedication to peace and ecological preservation, the initiative presents diverse perspectives and shared goals through each artwork, highlighting the crucial link between humanity and the planet. Additionally, this project spotlights numerous visual artists within Tibetan communities who are often underrated and undervalued. The WhiteLine list of 108 exile Tibetan visual artists showcases a portion of this talent, fostering a vibrant and sustainable future for Tibetan heritage.

Find out more about Whiteline Graphics via their Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whiteline_graphics/

“Singer of the Land of Snows: Shabkar, Buddhism, and Tibetan National Identity” By Rachel H. Pang

Published by the University of Virginia Press in February 2024, “Singer of the Land of Snows” is a major study of Shabkar, an important Buddhist leader.

From the publisher’s website:

Shabkar (1781–1851), the “Singer of the Land of Snows,” was a renowned yogi and poet who, through his autobiography and songs, developed a vision of Tibet as a Buddhist “imagined community.” By incorporating vernacular literature, providing a narrative mapping of the Tibetan plateau, reviving and adapting the legend of Tibetans as Avalokiteśvara’s chosen people, and promoting shared Buddhist values and practices, Shabkar’s concept of Tibet opened up the discursive space for the articulation of modern forms of Tibetan nationalism.

Employing analytical lenses of cultural nationalism and literary studies, Rachel Pang explores the indigenous epistemologies of identity, community, and territory that predate contemporary state-centric definitions of nation and nationalism in Tibet and provides the definitive treatment of this foundational figure.

Available on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3XdFgZj

“Tibetan Manuscripts and Early Printed Books, Volumes I & II” Edited by Matthew T. Kapstein

Published simultaneously in March 2024 by Cornell University Press, “Tibetan Manuscripts and Early Printed Books” are two volumes in which Matthew T. Kapstein and an international team of specialists provide a comprehensive introduction to the material and aesthetic features of the wide range of Tibetan books, described in detail and illustrated with full-color photographs.

From the Cornell University Press website:

With a documented history of over thirteen centuries, Tibetan books have long served as a medium of culture and learning throughout Central and East Asia. Major collections of Tibetan manuscripts and printed books—for Tibetan works were put into print even before the age of Gutenberg—are found in libraries and museums far from the traditional centers of Tibetan learning. Yet the history, production, and design of these works remain poorly understood.

The first volume includes contributions by Michela Clemente, Brandon Dotson, Amy Heller, Agnieszka Helman-Ważny, Karl E. Ryavec, Sam van Schaik, Hanna Schneider, and Jeff Wallman. The second volume is authored by Helmut Tauscher, Cathy Cantwell, Rob Mayer, Hanna Schneider, Peter Schwieger, Charles Ramble, Petra Maurer, Stacey Van Vleet, Ricardo Canzio, Vesna Wallace and Jan-Ulrich Sobisch.

Volume I on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3XeEc7x

Volume II on Amazon: https://amzn.to/4dyAEmi

“The Life and Work of Auleshi: Sherpa Buddhist Artist and Adept” By Ngawang Tengye, Hugh R. Downs, Matthew T. Kapstein with translations by Tib Shelf

Published in April 2024 by Vajra Books, “The Life and Work of Auleshi: Sherpa Buddhist Artist and Adept” is a biography of the Sherpa Buddhist monk Ngawang Leksh (1913–1983), familiarly known as Auleshi.

From the Vajra Books website:

At once an accomplished artist and a yogi living always in retreat, he eschewed the trappings of a “Buddhist master” but taught instead through his art and, above all, his personal example. In this, he embodied the ideal of transmitting the Dharma without teaching a word. As we honor the hundred-and-tenth anniversary of his birth, and fortieth since his death, with those who knew him now few, it seems appropriate to make available to all what may be recalled of his life and work.

The book includes a brief history of Buddhism among the Sherpa, with new information gleaned from Tibetan written sources, the biography of Auleshi (1913-1983), in both Tibetan and annotated English translation, and a selection of reproductions of his paintings and drawings.

Available on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3WMb5XP

Available on Bookshop: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9789937624350

“The Words and World of Ge bcags Nunnery: Tantric Meditation in Context” By Elizabeth McDougal

Published in February 2024 by Brill as part of their Tibetan Studies Library series, “The Words and World of Ge bcags Nunnery” by Elizabeth Mcdougal is a study of Ge bcags (Gebchak) dgon pa, founded in 1892 in Nang chen, Khams. It is still active today with around 250 nuns practising intensive Vajrayāna rituals, yogas and meditation.

From the Brill website:

The nuns’ knowledge goal is embodied, nonconceptual awareness, yet they spend many hours daily reading texts as part of their training. By investigating the whole context of the nuns’ lifeworld and ways of learning, this ethnography questions the role of reading in Ge bcags’ tacit knowledge tradition. At a time when Tibetan learning practices are quickly modernising, this book demonstrates a Buddhist tradition whose textual knowledge is not exactly literal, but cultivated through continuous, whole person learning.

Available on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3Ascprw

Younger Audiences

“The Little Bear’s Family” By Rinchen Tara

The second bilingual children’s book by Rinchen Tara follows the adventures of a Little Bear (Thomtruk) living in a multigenerational household with his parents, grandparents, and sibling. This family structure is prevalent in Tibetan culture, and the book offers a glimpse into Thomtruk’s family.

Find out more via Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/little_yak_studio/

Four Short Stories Published by The Munsel

སྒྲུང་ཐུང་གནས་ལུགས་ཟབ།, translated as Collections of Stories with Morals, is a collection of 4 short stories, each delivering a heartfelt message of Friendship, Compassion, Kindness, and Courage to face the truth.

Available via The Munsel website: https://themunsel.com/products/munsel-childrens-book

Four Titles Published by The Tibetan Arts and Literature Initiative (TALI)

Four new Tibetan language titles, Norbu Nyima went to Lhasa, Ten Precious Yaks, Nursery Rhymes and The Three Princess Who Loved Music all available for free download: https://talitibet.org/books/

Special Mentions

“At the Edge of Empire” By Edward Wong

https://amzn.to/4fT7AaS

“A History of Uyghur Buddhism” By Johan Elverskog

https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9780231215251

“China’s Camel Country: Livestock and Nation-Building at a Pastoral Frontier ” By Thomas White

https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9780295752433

“Maharajas, Emperors, Viceroys, Borders: Nepal’s relations North and South” By Sam Cowan

https://amzn.to/3XfgqIG

“Uyghur Identity and Culture A Global Diaspora in a Time of Crisis” Edited By Rebecca Clothey, Dilmurat Mahmut

https://uk.bookshop.org/a/4863/9781032305271

This essay marks the third translation on High Peaks Pure Earth related to Wontoe Monastery (Tibetan: དབོན་སྟོད་དགོན། Wylie: dBon stod dgon), at risk of flooding by dam construction in eastern Tibet. The first translation was “The History of Wontoe Monastery in the Encyclopedia of Monasteries and Temples in Kham” and the second was “The Sacred Murals of Wontoe Monastery in Dege”.

It is notable that among those protesting the dam construction and trying to negotiate with authorities were senior monastics from Wontoe Monastery. Even though most of the detained protestors of the February protests have since been released, Radio Free Asia have reported that Wontoe Monastery’s Senior Administrator, Tenzin Sangpo, is one of two people singled out as “ringleaders” who have been transferred to a larger detention center in Dege County.

“Wontoe Monastery – Survived the Cultural Revolution but Now Faces the Disaster of Hydropower Development” By Woeser

The Chinese government and its power corporation have started to construct the “One Reservoir and Thirteen Levels” series of hydropower stations on the upper reaches of the Drichu (Ch: Jinsha) River, encompassing “the river between the mouth of the Zachu River in Yushu, Qinghai, and Kongtsera in Dechen, Yunnan, flowing through the four provinces of Qinghai, Tibet Autonomous Region, Sichuan, and Yunnan, along about 772 kilometers of the river”, and as a direct result, countless Tibetans living there for generations are required to relocate, and many monasteries with a long history, of precious value, several villages, and a rich natural environment of animals and plants along the river will be submerged. Known as the “leading” project of the cascade hydropower stations, the Kamtok Hydropower Station will completely flood at least six monasteries (Wontoe Monastery, Yena Monastery, Khardo Monastery, Rabten Monastery, Gonsar Monastery) and two villages in Dege, Eastern Tibet (now Dege County, Kardze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province), where Wontoe Monastery and Yena Monastery, located in Wontoe Township, Dege County, are currently facing forced relocation, prompting a peaceful petition by the local Tibetan monks.

Many people do not know the history, culture, ecology and beauty of these monasteries and villages that will be submerged by the cascade dam project. Chinese water experts who advised the authorities said arrogantly: “The upper reaches of the Drichu River, especially above Tiger Leaping Gorge, are sparsely populated and barren areas… These barren places will be choked with silt.” On Weibo, WeChat and Chinese websites I found a number of videos, pictures, and articles about Wontoe Monastery and I also tried my best to investigate and understand the issue from all angles. I learned that Wontoe Monastery contains historical relics and valuable religious heritage. I was even more surprised to learn that there are 300 monks and 2,000 people who depend on the monastery for their livelihood, they begged the authorities to save the monasteries and villages, they were subjected to inhumane treatment such as beatings, arrests and imprisonment.

According to a Master’s thesis “Preliminary Research on the Mural Paintings of the Hundred Column Hall of Wontoe Monastery in Dege County” from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in March last year, and during a presentation at the 8th International Academic Symposium on Tibetan Archaeology and Art in Hangzhou not long ago, the researcher stressed: “Wontoe Monastery is located on elevated land on the east bank of the Drichu River. There are a large number of exquisite murals in the Monastery. The complete murals were made public for the first time after the reinforcement of the monastery structure. In addition, a hydropower station is about to be built in Wonpotoe Township, Dege County, which will cause greater difficulties in the subsequent preservation and research of the murals in Wontoe Monastery. The research and protection of these murals in the monastery is urgent.”

According to the research, Wontoe Monastery contains preserved ancient murals, one set is in the old scripture hall on the mountain that is the Tara chapel; the other is in the Hundred Column Hall (Ka-brgya-lha-khang) with 100 columns with a height of 7 meters. The murals cover an area of more than 1,000 square meters. The paintings are complex and complete. The Tibetan inscriptions can be clearly identified. Its scale is unmatched among other monasteries along the Drichu River”. Some murals are “unique in Dege and even in the entire Kham area”. In addition to architectural ruins and ancient mural paintings, Wontoe Monastery also preserves cultural relics such as ancient thangkas and statues, as well as important historical documents related to the upper echelons of political and religious circles in Kham over various periods.

According to the research, “The murals in the Hundred Column Hall of Wontoe Monastery are much larger than the murals in the Dege Printing Press and Yena Monastery. Although the three monasteries are not far apart, only this large monastery remains along the Drichu River.” “It is one of the most important Tibetan Buddhist murals found in the region to date, and has high reference value for the study of Tibetan art.” “At present, it is one of the largest monasteries with the largest main space and the largest murals of Tibetan Buddhist monasteries in the Kardze region and even on either side of the Drichu River. It fills the gap in the research materials of art history in the Dege area. It has important and irreplaceable academic value for the study of development of Tibetan Buddhism and the history of art development in Dege and eastern Tibet.”

It should be emphasized that of the more than 6,000 monasteries in Tibet, including Amdo, U-Tsang and Kham, due to the military repression of the 1950s and the Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976, most of them were totally destroyed and though very few were able to survive, ancient Wontoe Monastery is one of them. This was thanks to the protection of devoted local villagers who used the Hundred Column Hall as a warehouse for storing barley and livestock feed. The monastery’s ancient statues and old thangkas were hidden away in the mountain. The mural paintings were basically undamaged and the main building was not demolished, so it was lucky to be saved. It wasn’t until religion was revived in 1983 that the local Chinese authorities allowed the monastery to open up once more and monks again to reside there that Wontoe Monastery came back to life. But today, four decades later, monasteries, villages and the environment are facing the fate of being submerged due to the China’s hydropower development. In other words: the monastery survived the Cultural Revolution but is now facing the disaster of hydropower development!

Also in 2012, twelve years ago, China Huaneng Group, which has built hydropower stations in many places throughout Tibet, planned to build hydropower stations between Dege County, Kardze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province, and Jomda County, Chamdo Prefecture, Tibet Autonomous Region, which would lead to the flooding of many villages and monasteries on both sides of the Drichu River, and the relocation of villagers and monks, including Wontoe Township, Wontoe Monastery, and Yena Monastery. Dege Tibetans appealed: “The building of hydropower stations not only makes us homeless but also destroys the environment. We and the monastery lamas firmly oppose this. Fearing that something would happen before the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China was held in November 2012), the government promised that it would not build a hydropower station without the consent of more than 80% of the local people, but these are methods used to deceive the people and we cannot believe them.”

I searched online for information about hydroelectric power plants. The hydropower resources contained in the Drichu River, which flows rapidly down from the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, are thought to “account for more than 40% of the Yangtze River’s hydropower resources, and the degree of hydropower enrichment of its cascade hydropower projects is among the highest in the world.” The world’s largest hydropower project is planned and under construction, including 27 cascading hydropower stations, 13 hydropower stations in the upper reaches alone, which are considered to be “cash cows” for state-owned enterprises such as the China Huaneng Group! This “cash cow” reminds me that a few years ago I met a Sichuan man who became very rich by building a hydropower station in Chatreng County, Kardze Prefecture. He had a huge estate shaded by fruit trees, rows of luxury cars and luxury yachts, a cellar full of red and white wine and so on, and he also had thangkas and Buddha statues taken from Tibetan monasteries, and various mountain delicacies brought from Tibetan villages in the countryside, filled the dining room like in a restaurant. In fact, the hydropower station was his inexhaustible money-making machine.

Many years ago, Chinese environmentalists warned that the numerous cascade hydropower stations in the Drichu River basin that were “moving massively into the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau” were a “danger hanging over our heads” because this was where “the most developed geological disasters were in China and even in the world.” Since 2000, the world’s largest and most dense Drichu River Hydropower Group has been built on such a river.” In fact, in recent years, there have been many disasters near reservoirs and power stations along the Jinsha River, causing landslides and river interruptions, which have left people in dire straits. For example, in October 2018, a landslide occurred on the main stream of the Jinsha River and blocked the river. Monasteries and villages suffered. The torrent caused threats and losses to people’s lives and property, but in reports by Chinese state media, it once again became a hymn praising the authorities for emergency rescue and disaster relief.

I am sad that we may not be able to change the fate of the monasteries and villages that will be swallowed up by these hydroelectric power plants, given the depressing situation. From the videos and pictures found on the internet, you can see how beautiful the scenery where Wontoe Monastery is located, how beautiful the scenes of hundreds of monks studying buddhism in the Monastery, practicing dance, and playing basketball in their free time, and China’s water conservancy expert brutally said that this is a “sparsely populated and barren area… These barren places will be choked with silt.” His colonial mentality is obvious!

So, how have these monks and people who focus on dharma practice and rely on the spiritual life of the monastery suffered in recent days? During the Tibetan New Year, Wontoe Monastery was originally holding a very important gathering of the Ngor group of the Sakya sect, which would bless countless devotees on the 15th day of the month. However, before the religious gathering had even ended, the monastery was empty. Hundreds of monks and hundreds of villagers nearby were beaten, arrested, interrogated, and required to sign to obey any instructions from the authorities. They simply wanted to keep the ancient monastery. If we finally have to compromise on relocation, the ancient monastery with the Hundred Column Hall and a large area of ancient murals will be destroyed, and the monastery after the relocation will be separate from the village, and gradually there will be no source of monastics, and the monastery will soon be dead from the inside…

As locals have appealed for: It is indeed a tragic situation that the rich cultural heritage of Tibetan villages and their monasteries are threatened by Chinese government development projects. The displacement of locals and the loss of historical artifacts is worrying. In this context, the international community needs to raise awareness of the situation in Tibet and advocate for the protection of cultural diversity and the human rights of indigenous Tibetans.

In addition, we sincerely hope that lamas will use their vast influence in the world to protect the homes of thousands of devoted followers. I’ve seen photos online of the 43rd Head of the Sakya sect, regarded as a father by the Dege people, and Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche, who is supported by many Chinese followers, including celebrities, who have visited Wontoe Monastery, a place of great significance for the Sakya sect. Therefore it is worth understanding the value of this spiritual treasure house and its cultural heritage that deserves to be preserved in the world.

Originally published in July 2002 on a Sichuan Province official website, this article highlights the historical and cultural significance of the site, now facing imminent threat due to a nearby dam construction. The photos reveal stunning artistic quality, showcasing the murals at risk.

The murals, possibly dating back to the 17th century or earlier, are uniquely preserved with natural plant and mineral based pigments. The mural walls appear to be in a good condition and could be saved.

Thank you to writer and filmmaker Jamyang Phuntsok for translating this article from Tibetan. Please scroll to the bottom to read the translator’s notes.

“Sacred Murals from the Ming-period¹ discovered in Wontoe Monastery in Dege”

By reporters: Kunchok Dorje, Tsultrim Sangpo and Dolma Tsetan

(Translated from Tibetan by Jamyang Phuntsok)

Recently, during an interview in Dege, the county’s religious affairs head Samten told reporters about some sacred murals still in existence in Wontoe Monastery of Wontoe township. After hearing this, the reporters went to photograph and report on the murals.

Situated 73km away from the county and on the banks of the Drichu river, Wontoe Monastery is located in Chungthang-gang village of Wontoe township. Belonging to the Sakya sect of Tibetan Buddhism, the monastery was permitted to reopen in 1983 by the Dege County People’s Government.

According to ‘History of the Tibetan Buddhist Monasteries in Kardze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture²’ compiled by Kardze Prefecture Tibetan Studies Centre, the monastery was initially a Bonpo monastery which was later converted to Nyingma and given the name ‘Temple Pierced by An Arrow³’. In 1276, Drögon Chögyal Phagpa, on his way back to Sakya from China, brought the monastery under the Sakya sect. The foundations for the assembly hall and adjoining buildings were laid with the patronage of the Dege King Jampa Phuntsok⁴. During the Cultural Revolution, the monastery seems to have escaped destruction.

The monastery has several old buildings consisting of an assembly hall, a chapel and a deity’s room. They house numerous invaluable murals. Khenrab Wangchuk, the monastery’s abbot, showed the reporters into the ancient Tara chapel, the oldest room. It was filled with the murals of the Shakyamuni Buddha, the Amitabha Buddha, the five dhyani Buddhas, the Vajradhara Buddha, the Green Tara, the Sixteen Arhats and the various deities of the Mahavairocana mandala. Vast in their subject matter, the artistic splendour of these works was apparent.

The murals have been highly regarded by experts such as Kunchok Tenzin, a famous thangka artist and professor at Sichuan University, the folk thangka collector Norbu and also by well known artists such as Ogyen Choephel, Yonten Tsering and Wangchen. They have also appealed to the concerned religious and cultural departments for the murals’ preservation and further research into their history and artistic value.

According to Kunchok Tenzin, based on the proportions of the deity figures, quality of pigments used and style of the paintings, the murals were likely painted during the 14th or 15th century. Most experts concur with this conclusion. Yonten Tsering and Wangchen, after extensive on site research, have concluded that they are the most significant Buddhist murals to be found in the region. According to them, the murals are also a good representative of the artistic development in Kham during the Ming period and an important source material for the study of Tibetan art.

Translator’s Notes

1. This attribution seems highly revisionistic. There is no record of either the monastery or the region having any links or relations with the Ming court during the period in question. However, the tenth Dege King Tenpa Tsering (1678-1738), did enter into formal relations with the Qing Empire.
2. <<དཀར་མཛེས་བོད་རིགས་རང་སྐྱོང་ཁུལ་བོད་བརྒྱུད་ནང་བསྟན་གྱི་དགོན་པའི་ལོ་རྒྱུས།>>
3. “ལྷ་ཁང་མདའ་བསྣུན་མ་” in Tibetan. It is said that the old temple was in a dilapidated state and that the Sakya throneholder Tashi Rinchen shot an arrow to preserve it from ruin.
4. Jampa Phuntsok (late 16th century), the first throneholder of the Dege Kingdom. It was during his reign that Dege, while the neighbouring Kingdom of Beri was under attack from Gushri Khan’s Mongol troops, was able to annex many territories including Wontoe by siding with the victorious Khan.