With delicacy and precision, the major Chinese poet Xiao Hai conjures shadows to explore philosophical questions of illusion and reality, history and time, art and language. Composed of several hundred interconnected poems, Xiao’s collection is, in his words, “a dynamic, creative, and open system of experience.” Deftly translated by Zhu Yu, Song of Shadows brings Wordsworth and Whitman into artful conversation with classical Chinese culture. Available as a bilingual eBook with text in Mandarin and English, this edition is a must-read for lovers of international literature, Chinese speakers learning English, and English speakers learning Mandarin
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Xiao Hai (1965-) was born in Hai'an, in China's Jiangsu Province. At the prestigious Nanjing University, he co-founded and edited the poetry magazine They with other young poets, a publication that has fostered a number of important figures in contemporary Chinese literature such as Han Dong, Yu Jian, and Su Tong. He has authored over a dozen works of Chinese history and poetry collections, including Bending to Weed until Afternoon, Villages and Fields, and Song of Shadows. He has published widely in such influential poetry magazines as Shi Kan, Xing Xing, Qing Chun, and Jintian (edited by Bei Dao). Known as a humble poet of discrete sensibilities, he has earned widespread recognition in his home country. His prizes include the Writer's Poetry Award and two Zi Jin Mountain Literature Awards, and he was the Tian Wen Poet of 2012. His poetry has been translated into English, French, Japanese, Spanish, and Romanian. He lives in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province.
Zhu Yu is a lecturer in the English department at Capital Normal University, Beijing. She received her PhD in English literature from Peking University in 2010 and was a Fulbright visiting student in the English department of Yale University from 2007 to 2008. Her research interests include British Romanticism and contemporary poetry. She has published essays on William Wordsworth and Seamus Heaney in many academic journals. She has translated into Chinese selected poems from Seamus Heaney's Human Chain and Seamus Heaney 2001-2010 (forthcoming).
作者简介：
小海（1965――）是中国当代的优秀诗人，本名涂海燕，出生于江苏海安，毕业于南京大学中文系，著有诗集《必须弯腰拔草到午后》、《村庄与田园》、《北凌河》、《大秦帝国》（诗剧）、《影子之歌》（长诗）；对话录《依兰·斯塔文斯与小海：关于文学的对话》。作为《他们》创始人和代表诗人之一，主编过《＜他们＞十年诗歌选》。除了诗歌写作之外，他也参与编撰过地方史志类著作10多部。他的诗歌登上《北京文学》1998年中国当代文学作品排行榜，获得过《作家》杂志2000年诗歌奖，江苏省第2届、第4届紫金山文学奖，2012年度“天问诗人奖”。小海现居苏州。
译者简介：
朱玉，首都师范大学英文系讲师，毕业于北京大学英语系，耶鲁大学福布莱特中美联合培养博士生，主要研究领域包括英国浪漫主义传统与现当代诗歌。
