The Beauty of Chinese Yixing Teapots: And the Finer Arts of Tea Drinking

by Lim Kean Siew

Genres: Tea

154 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 2001

Reviews

[Pamela Hamon]

I would classify this as a coffee table type book. The introduction section of the book provided context for tea pottery in the overall scope of lineages of different artisans. This middle section of this book includes dozens of beautiful photographs of various yixing teapots. The third section of the book - "the finer art of tea drinking" - was a series of personal vignettes on using different teapots with different types of tea. While they were called "tests" or "experiments," I saw no indication of scientific methods applied. For Westerners trying to piece together the cultural context of tea, I would still recommend a look at this book. Just apply some skepticism and care with your take-away.

[Will]

The photos are beautiful, and even though the book is quite expensive (supposedly because it was banned by the Malaysian government), it may be worth having for those. However, I think the author's "scientific" process for determining how to match teapot and tea is kooky (at best).