How and Why to Learn Classical Chinese
Recently, a friend asked me how to go about teaching himself classical Chinese. He works for the U.S. State Department and speaks Mandarin very well, but now he wants to […]
Translation
Publication: Guanxiu’s Mountain-Dwelling Poems
My translation of the twenty-four “Mountain-Dwelling Poems” 山居詩 of the poet-monk Guanxiu 貫休 (832–913) has just been published by Tang Studies. It includes a fairly extensive introduction, as well as an […]
Religious Poetry Workshop
Tomorrow marks the start of the Princeton Workshop on Chinese Religious Poetry, organized by myself and Jason Protass. Despite what the poster says, all are welcome to come, even without […]
Paul Rouzer’s Translation of Hanshan (Cold Mountain)
The Hanshan 寒山 (Cold Mountain) poems are among the most celebrated Chinese verses in the West. Some of them were famously translated by Gary Snyder in 1958, after he had studied […]
Publication: Jia Dao’s Rhythm
I recently published an essay on an experimental method of translating classical Chinese poetry, namely by using a form of English quantitative verse. See the abstract below or click here […]
Interview with Calvin College
A person from the PR office of my undergraduate institution, Calvin College, recently interviewed me about what I’m doing now, nine years after graduating. Click here, or on the picture […]
Call for Papers: Workshop on Chinese Religious Poetry
For the past few months, I have been co-organizing a workshop with Jason Protass (Brown University) on the intersections between poetry and religion in China. It will take place at […]
Stephen Owen’s Translation of the Complete Works of Du Fu
De Gruyter has recently published Stephen Owen’s The Poetry of Du Fu, a translation of the complete works of (perhaps) China’s greatest poet. This marks a major step forward for […]
Dynamic Equivocation: Selections from Zhuangzi
So I occasionally write experimental literature under pen names, and one of my translations, a hyper-Americanized version of the Daoist classic Zhuangzi, was recently published by the fine literary […]
Experiments in Translating Classical Chinese Poetry
This Tuesday, I will be presenting a series of rhythmic translations of poems by the Tang dynasty poet Jia Dao 賈島 (779–843) at AAS-in-Asia in Taipei.. It will be a panel […]