MCLC: Shi Zhi translation collection

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: kirk (denton.2 at osu.edu)
Subject: Shi Zhi translation collection
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At long last, a book-length volume of translations of the poetry of Shi
Zhi is now available.

http://www.oupress.com/ECommerce/Book/Detail/1610/winter%20sun

The University of Oklahoma Press is proud to announce the first volume of
the Chinese Literature Today Book Seres: Winter Sun: Poetry of Shi Zhi,
translated by Jonathan Stalling. Shi Zhi (Guo Lusheng) has been a major
force in Chinese poetry since 1968, when several of his poems were
circulated as secret handwritten manuscripts in the midst of China¹s
Cultural Revolution. He gave voice to the aspirations of dispirited youth,
and although once relegated to obscurity, he is today celebrated as one of
China¹s most important cultural influences, having spawned the modern
Chinese poetry revolution of the 1980s. This bilingual collection of Shi
Zhi¹s most significant poems, featuring an afterword by the poet himself,
is the first book-length publication of his work in English.
Born in 1948, at the height of the Chinese Civil War, Shi Zhi joined the
People¹s Liberation Army at the age of twenty-three. Discharged early, he
entered into a period of severe depression and spent much of the next
three decades living in mental hospitals under harsh conditions. Taking
the pen name of Shi Zhi, meaning ³index finger,² to evoke the image of
people pointing at his back, he continued to write poetry through these
tumultuous years. The voice of this besieged poet, burdened with exile and
illness, captured the spirit of his generation and now inspires young
readers. By presenting Shi Zhi¹s poems in chronological order, Winter Sun
allows readers to appreciate the evolution of his poetry from his earliest
work to his most recent poems. Translated by Jonathan Stalling, and with
an introduction by leading poetry critic Zhang Qinghua, this landmark
collection ensures that Shi Zhi¹s poetry‹so important to Chinese readers
during the most challenging of times‹ will engage the hearts and minds of
new readers the world over for years to come.

Jonathan Stalling is Assistant Professor of English at the University of
Oklahoma. The author of numerous publications, he is also a cofounder and
an editor of Chinese Literature Today magazine. Zhang Qinghua is Professor
of Modern and Contemporary Chinese Literature at Beijing Normal
University. He is the author of numerous books of literary criticism and
is an editor of Chinese Literature Today magazine.