Green Mountain
Poems by Yang Jian
Translated and with an Introduction by Fiona Sze-Lorrain
Foreword by Christopher Merrill
Published by MerwinAsia, 2020; Distributed by the University of Hawai‘i Press
154 pages; hardcover and paperback
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Green Mountain compiles a representative selection of lyrical poems by contemporary Chinese poet and painter Yang Jian, also a Buddhist, in Fiona Sze-Lorrain’s elegant translation. Exploring history, faith, memory, nature, and the various transient complexities of human existence, these poems seek a pure form of simplicity in thought and style, reminiscent of meditative beauty and Asian ink-wash painting aesthetics.
Yang Jian is the rarest of contemporary Chinese poets who takes on the excesses of modernization and materialism. In his signature style of economy and imagery, which Fiona Sze-Lorrain has rendered in English with precision, Yang creates a poetic landscape of hermit living which is as enthralling as it is illusory. —Dian Li, Professor of modern Chinese literature at the University of Arizona
Fiona Sze-Lorrain’s translation captures the spare essence of Yang Jian’s poetry in all its honesty and in its deep expression of his own Buddhist faith. This beautiful translation offers the reader a rich and delicate portrait of the poet’s world in all its complexity. Sze-Lorrain’s profound knowledge of Yang Jian’s language, as well as her sensitivity to his imagery, enables her to provide a vivid portrait of both his spiritual and mundane life. —Morris Rossabi, author of A History of China, Distinguished Professor at the City University of New York and Adjunct Professor at Columbia University
Fiona Sze-Lorrain’s translations meticulously present Yang Jian’s sickly, serene landscapes, where feeling resists sentimentality and witness resists idolatry. She leads us through rain, dust, and decay with bracing directness, inviting us to hear the “archaic beauty” of the poet’s voice and glimpse a vision “as vivid as devastation.” —Jennifer Zoble, Clinical Assistant Professor at New York University and Co-Editor of InTranslation (The Brooklyn Rail)
Lauded as one of the most important contemporary Chinese poets, Yang Jian was born in Anhui province in 1967. He paints in ink and leads a Buddhist life in Ma’anshan.
Fiona Sze-Lorrain‘s latest poetry collection is Rain in Plural (Princeton, 2020). Also a zheng harpist and translator, she has been a Abigail R. Cohen Fellow at the Columbia Institute for Ideas and Imagination in Paris.
Christopher Merrill has authored twelve books of poetry and nonfiction, including Self-Portrait with Dogwood (Trinity, 2017). He directs the IWP at the University of Iowa.