The Importance of Living is also known as the Art of Living, is one of the master works written by Lin Yutang in English, a renowned Chinese writer and translator during the period of the Republic of China. It is ranked as two major representative works of Lin Yutang along with "My Country and My People", both are written by Lin Yutang in English. The Importance Living describes all of the aspects of life of the Chinese in comparison with the Westerners. Including the life style, way of thinking, life habits, values, etc. It is crowned as "Life Bible" and called a "John Day Book". To live gracefully and meaningfully, the Book is a good reference. The text of the Book is the complete original text of the book published for the first time in 1937.

Lin Yutang (1895-1976), author of more than thirty-five books, was arguably the most distinguished Chinese American writer of the twentieth century. In Chinatown Family, he brings humor and wisdom to issues of culture, race, and religion as he tells the engrossing and heart-warming story of an immigrant, working-class Chinese American family that settled in New York City during the 1930s and 1940s. Tracing their sometimes troubled and sometimes rewarding journey, Lin paints a vivid portrait of the wonder and the woe of settling into a new land. In an era when interracial marriages were frowned upon and it was forbidden for working-class Chinese men to bring their families to America, this story shows how one family struggled to become new Americans by applying their Taoist philosophy to resist peacefully the discriminatory laws and racism they encountered. Beyond the quest for acceptance and economic success, Chinatown Family also probes deep into the heart of the immigration experience by presenting the perils of assimilation. The burgeoning tension between the desire for material wealth and the traditional Chinese belief in the primary importance of family poses the question: Is it possible to attain the American dream without damaging these primary ties? For each family member, the answer to this question turns out to be different. Through the varied paths that each character takes, the novel dramatizes the ways that Chinese immigrants have negotiated between the competing interests of economic opportunity and traditional values. C. Lok Chua is a professor of English at California State University in Fresno.

The texts chosen by Lin Yutang trace the development of Chinese art from the earliest literary reference in Confucius to the vital essays of Shih-t'ao and Shen Tsung-chi'en more than 20 centuries later. The selections cover every aspect of technique and subject matter, including the Six Canons of Chinese painting, while the scope of the book is widened further by the inclusion of important essays on collecting and connoisseurship, on the pricing and appraisal of paintings, and on calligraphy. In his introduction, Lin Yutang provides a comprehensive survey of his subject, and after each selection he furnishes the reader with a corresponding historical background, as well as information on the artist and school concerned, and explanation of any obscure passages in the original. This is the definitive single-volume sourcebook on its subject, and is completed by charts, a table of dynasties, a checklist of more than 200 artists, and a comprehensive index.