MCLC: Li Befeng reading (1)

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: Martin Winter <dujuan99 at gmail.com>
Subject: Li Bifeng reading (1)
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Source: Martin Winter's blog (5/28/13):
http://erguotou.wordpress.com/2013/05/28/reading-for-li-bifeng/ and
http://erguotou.wordpress.com/2013/05/28/li-bifeng/

What is Chinese literature about? What is art about, in any medium, time or
place? The reading for the imprisoned underground poet and activist Li
Bifeng on June 3rd, 2013 in Vienna
(http://penclub.at/events/worldwide-reading-fur-li-bifeng/) will include
works by a diverse range of authors. Li Bifeng has become known through his
association with Liao Yiwu, the exiled poet and documentary writer, now in
Berlin. On his own, judging from his available work and his literary impact
in China, even in dissident circles, Li Bifeng would not have become
famous.
This doesn't mean he is not worth reading. But he has had little
opportunity
to find an audience, and not everything that is available online now is as
compelling as Liao Yiwu's signature poem Massacre, or any other famous
piece
of writing in Chinese. Actually, none of the works by Li Bifeng I have read
up to now sound very dissident at all. They are "just art", so to speak. He
could have published them, as a different person.

I am currently translating a long poem by Li Bifeng into English
(http://erguotou.wordpress.com/%E6%9D%8E%E5%BF%85%E8%B1%90-li-bifeng-englis
h/),
and have translated several small texts into German. Two of these will
appear in the literary journal Wienzeile this summer in bilingual fashion.
The artist Sara Bernal is supporting the reading on June 3rd with
paintings.

What other texts will be read at Vienna University on June 3rd?

On May 3rd, 2013, we had a very interesting workshop and discussion at
Vienna University's East Asia Institute, on literature in Korea, China and
Japan. It was initiated by Lena Springer, who invited Zhang Chengjue,
expert
on the year 1957 and the so-called Anti-Rightists-Campaign in China. Zhang
and Springer were inspired by Lu Xun expert Qian Liqun from Peking
University, who called for research on the late 1950s in China across
disciplines. The workshop in Vienna was about censorship, political
changes,
publishing conditions and (self-)perceptions of artistic quality. Professor
Schirmer told us about a debate in South Korea more than 20 years ago. A
big-wig critic who became culture minister later published an essay,
lamenting the lame state of Korean literature. A poet responded and said he
had poems that could not be published, and his friends also had literature
that could not be published because it would be considered dangerous,
unstable, unsettling. 不穩。The critic said he didn't understand. Surely
good
art would be independent of politics and would only need imagination and
talent? Not so, the poet replied. Art is potentially unsettling, if it is
powerful art at all. The critic didn't get it again. Sounded very much like
Prof. Kubin and his friends in China. Also like Taiwan 30 years ago, of
course.

Besides works by Li Bifeng, the reading for Li Bifeng in Vienna will
include
texts by Li Khin-huann (Taiwan), Shih Ming-te and Shih Ming-cheng (Taiwan),
famous fiction writer Liu Zhenyun (Henan, Beijing), the female migrant
worker poet Zheng Xiaoqiong (Dongguan), famous iconoclastic poet Yi Sha
(Xi'an) and last but not least Zhao Siyun, whose poem for June 5th was
introduced by Michael Day on the MCLC list in 2010.

Martin