As regular readers know, I’ve spent the last seven years researching the history of Tibetan vegetarianism, first for my dissertation and then for a book. After all these years, I’m happy to announce that my book, Food of Sinful Demons: Meat, Vegetarianism, and the Limits of Buddhism in Tibet, is now available from Columbia University Press! You can follow this link to the CUP website for more info, including a table of contents, description, and so forth. If you want to order yourself a copy, use the code ‘Barsto’ to get 30% off.
Or you can click below to download the the introduction!
Barstow – Food of Sinful Demons [Introduction]
Finally, some promotional blurbs:
In this first in-depth study of the history of vegetarianism in Tibet, Geoffrey Barstow clearly shows that vegetarianism has always existed in Tibetan culture and was essentially motivated by compassion for the animals. Food of Sinful Demons is a welcome contribution to the important debate over the relationships between and among vegetarianism, health, and religion.
~Matthieu Ricard
A creative and nuanced exploration of an aspect of Tibetan religiosity that has heretofore remained largely in the dark. An important and exciting book.
~Andrew Quintman
A very welcome and entirely novel work on the place of vegetarianism in Tibet, Food of Sinful Demons will make a solid scholarly contribution to religious studies, Buddhist studies, and Tibetan studies. Covering a topic of broad interest in fields from ranging religion to animal rights, it offers something new for specialists but is also accessible to undergraduates as well as educated Buddhists trying to understand the role of vegetarianism and meat eating in Tibetan Buddhism.
~ Gray Tuttle
The Lost Yak 