gods are all around, almost visible.

may we meet again someday
in the white river of stars
overhead

a peach blossom
sails past
on the current
there are worlds
beyond this one

hard for us to meet
harder still to part

ages to come
will warm themselves
at your verses
but it's
a cold, silent world
you left behind.

This book is a sort of ‘classic’ in the field of translated Chinese poetry, from what I gather. And some of the poems really seem to capture the stillness and natural purity, along with images of war and separation, of the time. In the Preface, the translator, David Young, explains that he wanted to make a book of ancient Chinese poems that reads like poetry in English (as opposed to the more scholarly translations prevalent in his time), and I’d say he largely succeeds.

The poems are light, airy and mysterious, and they’re easy to read and put vivid images in your mind while leaving you surprised by the profound emotions they express. I found myself especially entranced by the work of Wang Wei and Li Po. The former because of his detailed observations of and passion for the pristine nature world, which in a way left me envying the simplicity of his life of contemplating and writing about nature (I also wondered what the landscapes he was describing in the 8th century look like now, in the uber-polluted and crowded People’s Republic of China). Li Po’s verses, on the other hand, also contain crisp pictures of nature but are shorter and wittier, and involve drunkenness (see “Drinking in Moonlight” or “Waking Up Drunk on a Spring Day”) and more references to people (usually saying goodbye to them) – they’re both poignant and revelatory. According to the Introduction about the third writer, Tu Fu, he was ‘China’s greatest poet’, although you wouldn’t necessarily know that from the translated versions of his poems (as the author points out himself). That’s not to say his poems aren’t moving and fascinating; they are, but they don’t strike me as being quite as hard-hitting as Li Po’s or as transcendent as Wang Wei’s. The verses of the final two poets in the volume (Li Ho and Li Shang-Yin) seem more obscure and ornamented to me, and therefore less direct and powerful in their depictions of the natural world and emotions, but they’re still intriguing.

The only question about reading works like this in translation (which the author again points out himself, in the Preface), is that it’s hard to know for sure if the English versions are a wholly accurate depiction of the originals, as they were written in a spare style that’s apparently a trademark of Mandarin poetry (for example, Young mentions that a literal translation of one of Wang Wei’s lines is “stream sound swallow dangerous rocks”, which he renders as “then a little stream/gurgling/among gigantic rocks”). Also some of the original meaning apparently came from structural parallels and juxtapositions that are hard to duplicate, as well as from allusions that were common to readers at the time. Be that as it may, the translated versions are enjoyable in their own right and have the capacity to bring you back to a simpler, more profound and harmonious epoch.

This is an excellent representation of five famous Chinese poets: Wang Wei, Li Po, Tu Fu, Li Ho, Li Shang-Yin. None of these poets specialize in haiku, this is real Chinese poetry beautifully translated. A wonderful introduction to these five great artists.

Some of the most eloquent, moving, and beautiful poetry I've ever read.

"Todo lo que amas de la literatura japonesa es en realidad chino"... ¿Cuántos años me llevará entender lo que él dijo al pasar?
Vengan aquí, lectores de Murasaki, Kawabata, Yosano... y tal vez la última: Kawakami. Vengan y lean a estos poetas que escribieron hace 1300 años y que también son cercanos hoy.
Edición muy amable y comentada de poemas clásicos, algunos ya leídos en otras antologías y con los cuales me sorprendo y soy feliz cada vez.


WALKING IN MOUNTAINS IN THE RAIN (Wang Wei)

In this quick cloudburst
air thickens, the sky comes down

dark mountains
flashes of lightning

out at sea new clouds
have just started to form
and this small brook I straddle
is a river in flood somewhere

rags and blankets of mist
hang on these slopes and cliffs

then the clouds open and vanish
rain patters off
and moonlight silvers
that whole reach of river
foothills to ocean

and even from this black mountain
I can hear boatmen singing.



WAKING UP DRUNK ON A SPRING DAY (Li Po)

Life is a huge dream
why work so hard?

all day long I drink
lying outside the front door

awakening
looking up through the trees
in the garden

and one bird singing in the flowers

bird, what season is this?
"Spring! I'm a mango bird
and the spring wind makes me sing."

now I grow sad
very sad

so I have some more wine
and I sing
out loud
until the bright moon
rises

what was I upset about?
I can't remember



MAGIC STRINGS I (Li Ho)

The sun slips down
behind the western mountains
hills to the east vanish
the wind is driving horses through the clouds

the painted lute
and reed flute
play soft
rapid notes

a brocade skirt
rustles through
October dust

breeze flutters the cassia leaves
seeds fall

a blue fox
weeps blood
for her dead mate

riding the golden-tailed
dragons painted on ancient
walls, the rain god leaps
into the pools of autumn

a hundred year old owl
changes into
a forest demon

laughter!
green fire in the nest!

I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/11564516

Solid intro. Great heart.

The translator of these five Chinese poets from the Tang dynasty period writes about the act of translation in his intro. It seems to be an inexact art, with much left to the translators imagination. That said, I want to give props firstly to David Young, translator. However accurate or inaccurate these works are, they are nothing but stunning. Sadness and appreciation are chief among the sentiments conveyed, and this is done beautifully.

Li Po my man!

A short but beautiful little collection of translations. David Young is a great translator, always capturing the spirit of the poems he translates.

......

You ask when I'll be back —
I wish I knew!

night rain on Pa Mountain overflows the autumn ponds

when will we trim the candle wick under our own west window?

I'll be telling you this story
night rain will be falling.

Li Shang-Yin

This is a very nice collection of Tang dynasty poetry.

I've read other similar books that I thought would make a good introduction to the era and the poets, but I think this may be the best of them. David Young, the translator, is himself a poet, which is not always the case, and I think it shows. Not only does he give the English versions a smoothness, an evenness of tone, that is often lacking, he does an excellent job in the introduction describing how he arrived at his translations, what sort of compromises he was making. I found myself in agreement with his approach both as he described it and as it was demonstrated in the poetry. A strictly faithful translation, transcribing the terse, elliptical language common in most poetry of the time, is almost incomprehensible in English; a highly Anglicized version (especially with rhyme--shudder) loses any hint of the original. I like the middle ground Young has found. In addition, he writes very useful introductions to each of the five poets, and they add to the pleasure of reading these.

Many of these poems are found in other collections, and when I look at some of them closely, I find that I like these better. They read more naturally and, to my mind, have greater impact. As a simple example, the first line in one poem is translated in another book as

You ask how long before I come. Still no date is set.

Young renders the line as

You ask when I'll be back--
I wish I knew!

The first sounds too much like a business letter to me; Young's version sounds--and looks--like poetry. The distinction is not always that stark, but that is the trend.

As to the literature itself, I am partial to Tang poetry. Much of it, especially the ones I understand, read like western Romantic poetry from the 19th century (which is a good thing, IMO). Natural settings and nature imagery; human emotion; an occasional interest in common folk; a focus on art and the creative process... all attributes that I have enjoyed in western poetry and work for me as a reader. It makes these poems, and this collection in particular, accessible.

Unrelated, but key to my reaction: the book, in many places, is annotated. It clearly came from a student taking notes in class, and it was fun to see what the conversation was. Reminded me of a very long time ago. I highly recommend a student-annotated copy if you can it. :)

Good stuff. Recommended.

Every now and then one discovers something entirely new to himself that resonates, e.g., a work of music, an author, etc. This book of ancient Chinese poetry was such a find for me.

The poems of Wang Wei, Li Po, and Tu Fu, in particular, resonated with my love of nature. I think they were particularly poignant in view of the fact that I am currently reading an anthrology of American environmental writings; Wang Wei, although writing around 700 C.E. would have fit into this anthology well. He might well have been the first environmentalist.

This poetry is about simple everyday occurrences in life that I think most people today can respond to. The poems are short vignettes that one can spend a pleasant afternoon thinking about, and relating to, the emotions expressed.

Great find! If you like the poetry of Robert Frost you will love these.