Erin M. Cline, "The Analects: A Guide" (Oxford UP, 2021)
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What is the opening introduction and sponsor message for this episode?
Hi everyone, this is Marshall Poe. I'm the founder of the New Books Network, and I'm also a historian. I used to be a history professor, and I love maps, so I'm especially happy to tell you that this episode is sponsored by What's Your Map, which was the winner of the Best Education Podcast at the 2025 British Podcast Awards. What's Your Map is hosted by historian and prize-winning author Professor Jerry Broughton. In each episode, he invites a guest to share a map close to their heart and unfurl the ideas, inspirations, and stories behind it. I can tell you I've listened and it's fascinating. The podcast is in its sixth series and is enjoyed by audiences around the globe. You can explore all the maps in the podcast online.
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Welcome to New Books in Philosophy, a channel on the New Books Network. I'm Malcolm Keating, and today we'll be talking to Erin Klein, author of The Analects, A Guide, published in 2021 by Oxford University Press. Welcome to New Books in Philosophy, Erin.
Thank you. I'm glad to be here.
Yeah, glad to have you. So your book focuses on the Analects of Kongzi, also known by his Latinized name as Confucius, who is perhaps the most well-known Chinese philosopher, at least in what we call the West. So let's start out talking about the Analects. What is your book's argument about the Analects in summary? And why did you think it was an important book to write?
Well, let's see. My main argument in the book is that the Analects is a text that can fit into lots of different categories and can be studied in lots of different ways. Particularly when we are working with really different academies, different categories in the academy today. So it can be studied as a philosophical text, as a religious text, studied as literature. I think it's studied beautifully in East Asian studies departments as well. So we have a lot of disciplinary approaches that can be helpful for shedding light on the text. One element of the text that has been neglected in its study throughout its history, especially once it began to be translated into Western languages, is the taking the Analects as a religious text and looking closely at its religious elements and the spiritual dimensions of what it means to live a good life.
So I'm looking specifically at the Analects as a sacred text and arguing that it's important to study the dimensions of the text that are properly regarded under the category as religious and sacred and spiritual. And that enhances our understanding of the text and that it actually is necessary for us to understand the text fully.
Great. And how did you come to be interested in Chinese philosophy and Confucianism and the Analects in particular?
Well, I started out as a music major in college and I went and had a chance to study abroad in China as an undergraduate. And I ended up studying abroad in China purely kind of as an accident. I was trying to fulfill course requirements, core requirements toward my degree. Ended up taking a philosophy course just to check one of those boxes and loved the class. It was the hardest class I'd ever taken, but it was actually
a
comparative philosophy class. And so we looked at Islamic philosophy, Japanese philosophy, Chinese philosophy. And then the professor who taught the course was actually organizing study abroad trips to some of those places. And so I ended up doing my study abroad experience in China. And it was once I saw the degree to which Chinese philosophy informs people,
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the opening introduction and sponsor message for this episode?
0:00–7:46
2
What is Erin Cline’s main argument about the Analects in her book?
7:46–15:07
3
How did Cline become interested in Chinese philosophy and the Analects?
15:07–23:25
4
Why does Cline treat the Analects as a sacred text as well as a philosophical one?
23:25–29:41
5
How does the Analects illustrate the relationship between philosophy and religion?
29:41–37:30
6
What is the interpretive controversy surrounding the concept of Tian (Heaven) in the Analects?
37:30–45:54
7
How did the Analects achieve its historical composition and canonization?
45:54–55:08
8
What does the story of Nanza reveal about women’s roles in early Confucian texts?
55:08–1:04:04
Speakers
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