Siam in Mind

by David K. Wyatt

This slim volume takes the reader on a fascinating stroll through Thailand's intellectual history -- the thoughts of the people of Siam, and the products of their thought, through history. It is a series of informal sketches, gleaned over years of historical research and stored away for rumination and reflection by one of the foremost historians of Thailand. Wyatt muses about these pieces of history, revealing some of the creative thinking that has been going on in the minds of ordinary and nameless people as well as great and well-known thinkers in Siam for the past thirteen hundred years.

A variety of new thought -- political, religious, and artistic -- has arisen in all sorts of contexts: warfare, trade, administration, and farming, to name a few. Collected here is a valuable historical sampling of these new ideas from the many different regions of what we think of today as Thailand.

The author touches upon political and religious thought, but also upon such "artistic" thought as that demonstrated in novels, paintings, and historical writing. It includes both people whom we might think of as conservative and royalist and those who usually are thought of as non-conforming.

Genres: History

126 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

David K. Wyatt was an American historian and author who studied Thailand. He taught at Cornell University from 1969-2002, where he became the Chair of the Cornell University Department of History. His book Thailand: A Short History has become the chief authority on Thai history in the English language.

Reviews

[Smiley · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5-star

I first enjoyed reading his Thailand: A Short History (Silkworm Books 2004) as scribbled 'admiringly readable' on the last page around the middle of last year. As a professor at Cornell University, he has long been eminent as a scholar who studied and wrote about Thailand and this mentioned book accepted as a standard text on Thai history (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_K...).

This is obviously not a text, something serious among academics or historians keen on anything Siamese; rather, its potpourri-like contents cover 24 chapters ranging from 2 pages (chapters 1, 24) to 6 pages (chapters 3, 5, 6) in which the reader would find reading them relatively manageable. All chapters have been narrated, intended to look at all kinds of thought in the past 13oo years (p. 2)
supported by various rare black-and-white illustrated plates to suggest Siamese "intellectual history" defined as "the thought of the people of Siam, and the product of their thought, through history." (back cover)

To continue . . .

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great overview of Thai intellectual history that can serve as an introduction to the topic. Each chapter tackles a different thing, but connections are often made.

[Al Johnson · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is hard to write of Thailand (Siam) and stay true to their spirit of perception of the world while maintaining a Western form. David Wyatt does an admirable job of framing the old tales of Siam that reveal the genesis of their character and perceptions for the Western readers. Fascinating and entertaining, it at times did seem to be disheveled and the reader has to work a bit to put context to some of the chapters, but for anyone who is interested in getting to the beginning of the "Siamese Mind" for modern Thais, this is a good book to get. Short and segmented it is an easy book to take on travels to Thailand as well.