August 3, 2008
By Jan Gardner

...With the Beijing Olympics beginning on Friday, dozens of books about China are fighting for position in the marketplace. Two about language deserve special mention.

In the lavishly illustrated "China: Empire of Living Symbols" (Da Capo), Cecilia Lindqvist, a scholar of China since the 1950s, provides an introduction to Chinese characters and a sweeping tour of the nation's history and culture. First published in 1989, it had been out of print until this spring.

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