Lewis, Mark Edward, The Construction of Space in Early China: Albany: State University of New York Press, 2006, 498 pages

Lewis makes the point early on that, even though all things existed through division, it was not possible to create unification simply by linking the partsthe ultimate elimination of division as the culmination of the process of unification would have entailed universal dissolution. [...]not only was the project of a universal state bounded by the presence of a celestial realm that in all but the most fervent imperial fantasies lay beyond the emperors authority, but it also remained divided within and against itself (5). [...]bones also defined the body as an element of the kin group. Custom means the way in which creatures with blood live through imitation of these features. [...]the different sounds of languages and songs or the distinct forms of drummed dances and movements are sometimes straight and sometimes crooked, sometimes excellent and sometimes perverse. The necessity for retuning is a powerful one in the Chinese tradition, and can be seen in the very descriptions of ritual action in the Liji, as well as in the ritual movement of the early kings around the classical spatial/temporal template of the five marchmountsindeed, in the Review of The Construction of Space in Early China 115 dynamics of board games and grids, which Lewis examines at length.