Humans have a basic capacity for freedom.
There’s no difference between then and now. or 21st century America,” Mitchell says in his backyard facing the mountains, “people suffer and find a way into freedom. An altar near the doorway holds a photo, not of an Indian guru or historical figure but of Mitchell’s wife.Ĭould any life really be this peaceful? Could this be the epicenter of the New Age? In the empty, white studio, a simple table with a thin laptop faces an enormous window outside, there is a path and a tree that resembles a Zen sculpture. The home Mitchell shares with his wife is luxurious, warm and spacious. Or can you? Mitchell might say you could, if you live in harmony with the way things are. You can’t have it all is the message implicit in these critiques. Nonetheless, Mitchell has been criticized for his irreverent adaptations and translations, for his New Age style and his way of turning sacred texts into spiritual manuals for everyday living. I just love to play with the Taoist masters. He’s the clown of the Absolute, the apotheosis of incredulity, Coyote among the bodhisattvas.”Īsked to elaborate, he says: “I have no pretensions to scholarship. In his commentaries, Mitchell sets out to emulate the irreverent tone of Chuang-tzu: “If Lao-tzu is a smile,” he writes, “Chuang-tzu is a belly-laugh. Mitchell chose 64 chapters, each including a text and commentary. $25.95), consists of adaptations from the work of two ancient Chinese scholars: Chuang-tzu, a Laotzu disciple, and Tzu-ssu, Confucius’ grandson. Mitchell’s new book, “The Second Book of the Tao” (Penguin Press: 202 pp. At the border, a guard asked him to write down his teachings. Legend has it that the 80-year-old, frustrated by his fellow man’s inability to follow the path of natural goodness and harmony, left China for Tibet. The original “Tao Te Ching” was written by Laotzu in the 6th century B.C. He is so in love with his wife and occasional co-author, Byron Katie, that references to her are inextricably woven into every aspect of his world. Today, he lives in Ojai, in a rambling, pristine house nestled in the hills, surrounded by gardens, pools and fountains.
The New York Times ran a story on the front page of the business section after Harper & Row bought the book at auction with the headline: “Translation of Ancient Tao Text Brings $130,000.” Asked what he would do with the advance, Mitchell humbly told an interviewer he was hoping to find a workplace with heat. His 1988 translation has sold more than half a million copies. The Tao is Mitchell’s deep well, his Ganges. “If I’m a scholar, I’m an amateur,” says Stephen Mitchell, the soft-spoken translator of Rainer Maria Rilke and the book of Job as well as “Gilgamesh,” the “Bhagavad Gita” and his all-time favorite, the “Tao Te Ching” - “that marvel of lucidity and grace, the classic manual on the art of living.”
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