Poets of the Chinese Revolution

by Gregor Benton (Editor), Feng Chongyi (Editor), Chen Duxiu (Contribution by), Chen Yi (Contribution by), Mao Zedong (Contribution by)

Overview

How poetry and revolution meshed in Red China

The Chinese Revolution, which fought its way to power seventy years ago, was a complex and protracted event in which groups and individuals with different hopes and expectations for the Revolution competed, although in the end Mao came to rule over the others. Its veterans included many poets, four of whom feature in this anthology. All wrote in the classical style, but their poetry was no less diverse than their politics. Chen Duxiu, led China’s early cultural awakening before founding the Communist Party in 1921. Mao led the Party to power in 1949. Zheng Chaolin, Chen Duxiu’s disciple and, like him, a convert to Trotskyism, spent thirty-four years in jail, first under the Nationalists and then under their Maoist nemeses. The guerrilla leader Chen Yi wrote flamboyant and descriptive poems in mountain bivouacs or the heat of battle.

Poetry has played a different role in China, and in Chinese Revolution, from in the West—it is collective and collaborative. But in life, the four poets in this collection were entangled in opposition and even bitter hostility towards one another. Together, the four poets illustrate the complicated relationship between Communist revolution and Chinese cultural tradition.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781788734714
Publisher:	Verso Books
Publication date:	07/16/2019
Sold by:	Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Format:	eBook
Pages:	320
File size:	18 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Gregor Benton is emeritus professor of Chinese history at Cardiff University. He has published many books on China and other subjects. His principal research areas are modern Chinese history, dissent under communism, and Chinese diaspora. His Mountain Fires: The Red Army’s Three-Year War in South China, 1934–1938 won several awards, including the Association of Asian Studies’ prize for the Best Book on Modern China. His translation of Mei Zhi’s F: Hu Feng’s Prison Years won the English Pen Award.

Chongyi Feng is Associate Professor at the University of Technology, Sydney, and adjunct Professor of History at China's Nankai University. His research focuses on intellectual and political development in modern and contemporary China, including the growth of rights consciousness and democratic forces. He has been named as one of China’s top hundred public intellectuals by several Chinese websites.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements xi

Chronology of Dynasties xii

List of Poets and Emperors Quoted or Mentioned in the Poems xiii

Note on the Translation xvii

Note on Transcription xix

Introduction 1

Chen Duxiu

Introduction 15

1 Lament for Wang Xiyan 21

2 Inscription on a Painting of Saigo Nanshu Hunting 22

3 Indignation at the Habits of the Day 23

4 A Poem Written for Wang Huibo on the Occasion of His Journey to the East 25

5 Lament for He Meishi 26

6 The Fourth of Ten Poems 27

7 Before Lingyin Temple 28

8 A Visit to Taoguang 29

9 A Visit to Hupao 30

10 Ode to the Crane 31

11 Stirred Emotions (First of Twenty Poems) 32

12 Tears alongside Luxury and Debauchery (Fourteenth of Fifty-Six Poems) 33

13 Tears alongside Luxury and Debauchery (Fifty-Sixth of Fifty-Six Poems) 34

14 To Shen Yinmo (Fourth of Four Poems) 35

15 Recollections of Guangzhou in the Spring 36

Zheng Chaolin

Introduction 39

1 Poet in Space 46

2 Buried Alive 48

3 Stamps (1) 50

4 Dr Faust 54

5 How the Mighty Fall 58

6 My Native Place 62

7 Fading Beauty 68

8 Quo Vadis? 68

9 My Tiny Cell 74

10 Training Monkeys 75

11 Commemorating Li Yu 77

12 Boat Tour 80

13 Blind Man on a Blind Horse 83

14 The Earth Turns 86

15 Dreamtime 88

16 Suzhou Gardens (1) 91

17 Suzhou Gardens (2) 93

18 Our Grandchildren's Grandchildren 94

19 Duckweed 96

20 The Seasons 98

21 When Yin Attains Its Limit 100

22 The Host 102

23 Loneliness 105

24 Where Is the Warmth? 108

25 A Revolution without Breaks or Interruptions 109

26 My Career 112

27 Meeting Liu Jingzhen 114

28 Christmas 116

29 Moonrise 118

30 To My Wife and Child 121

31 My Son's Death 123

32 A Handsome Place 125

33 Forever Dissident 127

34 Human Bustle 129

35 Magpie Bridge 130

36 Guttering Candles 131

37 The Waxing and the Waning Moon 132

38 Wartime Sojourn in Anhui 133

39 Memorial to Ding 140

40 Two Birthday Poems 144

41 Sending Off the Stove God 148

42 But for His Unyielding Character 154

43 Buddha's Birthday 158

44 Autumn Thoughts 159

45 Autumn Night 161

46 A Poem for New Year's Day 162

47 Qingming 163

48 Intoning History (Three of Six Poems) 164

49 Memories of Deep Autumn (Six of Fourteen Poems) 167

50 Stamps (2) 169

Post-Prison Poems

51 Boat Trip 172

52 A Playful Four-Line Poem Echoing Yang Muzhi 174

53 In Imitation of Yang Muzhi 176

54 Bide Not Your Time 177

55 A New Guest on Deep Lane 179

56 The Firewood Cutter and the Taoyuan Spring 181

57 Gong Zizhen Railed at Wrongs 185

58 The Waking of the Insects 186

59 Requesting Criticism from Comrade Xie Shan 188

60 Reflections on a Tour of the Historic Site of the Buersaiweike [Bolshevik] Editorial Department 190

61 An Assemblage of Gong Zizhen's Poetry for Self-Consolation 192

62 Landscape Painting 193

63 A Response to Rong Sun 194

64 Response to Mr Chen Jingxian's Gift of a Poem 195

65 A Reply to Comrade Xie Shan 197

Chen Yi

Introduction 203

1 In Mourning for Comrades Ruan Xiaoxian and He Chang 210

2 Climbing Dayu Mountain 211

3 Bivouacking 212

4 Guerrilla Fighting in Gannan 214

5 On My Thirty-Fifth Birthday 218

6 Three Stanzas Written at Meiling 219

7 To Friends 221

8 Lines Improvised While Coming Down the Mountains on the Occasion of the Second United Front between the Guomindang and the Communists 223

9 Arriving in Gaochun for the First Time during the Eastern Expedition 225

10 Ten Years 227

11 Reunion with Comrades of the Eighth Route Army Sent South, Some of Whom I Have Not Seen for More Than Ten Years 232

Mao Zedong

Introduction 235

1 Changsha 242

2 The Long March 244

3 Snow 246

4 The People's Liberation Army Captures Naming 249

5 Reply to Mr Liu Yazi 251

6 Reply to Mr Liu Yazi 252

7 Beidaihe 254

8 Swimming 256

9 Reply to Li Shuyi 258

10 Farewell to the God of Plague (1) 260

11 Farewell to the God of Plague (2) 262

12 Shaoshan Revisited 264

13 Climbing Lushan 266

14 Trotsky Visits the Far East (Reflections on Reading the Press) 267

15 An Inscription on a Photograph of Militia Women 269

16 Reply to a Friend 270

17 An Inscription on a Picture Taken by Comrade Li Jin of the Fairy Cave on Lushan 272

18 Reply to Comrade Guo Moruo 273

19 Ode to the Plum Blossom 275

20 Winter Clouds 277

21 Reply to Comrade Guo Moruo 278

22 On Reading History 281

23 Climbing the Jinggang Mountains Again 283

24 Two Birds: A Dialogue 285

25 The Desire for Action 287

26 Inspection 288

27 Presented to Guo [Moruo] the Elder after Reading On Feudalism 290

Editorial Reviews

While poetry for sure has, as T.S. Eliot noticed, a stubborn relationship to nationalism, the list of revolutionaries who are also poets is long and robust. This book collects the work of four Chinese poet-revolutionaries Chen Duxiu, Zheng Chaolin, Chen Yi, and Mao Zedong. All of them were using poetry’s long traditional formalism and conventions so as to wrestle with and better understand the upheavals of the Communist revolution. The complications of their work have for too long been overlooked in the endless debates about poetry and politics that define our contemporary moment. There is much that is crucial in these beautifully done translations.”
—Juliana Spahr

“Interpreting revolution broadly and translating poetry generously, this volume introduces and deepens the seemingly heretical idea that political radicalism and cultural traditions can sustain a productive historical dialogue. Each of the four ‘red’ poets draws on classical forms and imageries to produce utterly new senses and sensations of China and political possibility through the twentieth century. Achieving the almost miraculous, Benton’s translations are faithful, rhythmic, and idiomatic in all the ways one would hope of a poetry collection. A pure pleasure, and a pure inspiration.”
—Rebecca E. Karl, New York University

“Gregor Benton and Feng Chongyi’s edited collection of translations of the poetry of the Chinese Revolution offers a fascinating glimpse into an understudied body of what the editors call ‘Red poetry in the classical style.’ Invoking forms of cultural authority long associated with the practice of governance, these poems translate the lived experience of political upheaval, disappointment, and despair into classical poetic idioms in an era when such traditions were subject to increasingly intensive criticism. As a result, these poems present a radically unfamiliar lyric history of the Chinese revolution. Accompanied by lively editorial contextualization, a generous annotated selection of the poetry of Zheng Chaolin, in particular, is a revelation—offering measured but pointed political commentary on everything from rapidly shifting political circumstances inside China, to Soviet science fiction novels and Henryk Sienkiewicz’s Quo Vadis. In Benton and Chongyi’s hands, an intimate, impressionistic, and extraordinarily affecting biography emerges of this neglected dissident poet who spent much of his life in prison for a singular commitment to a ‘revolution without breaks or interruptions.’”
—Christopher S. Chen, UC Santa Cruz

“This is an outstandingly original work that offers penetrating insight into the many-sided relationship between making revolution and writing poetry in the Chinese classical tradition. The translations are wonderfully sensitive. Each poem is superbly contextualised and meticulously annotated. A truly great work.”
—Stephen A. Smith, University of Oxford, author of Red Petrograd: Revolution in the Factories, 1917–1918 and editor of The Oxford Handbook of the History of Communism

“A brilliantly presented collection … deeply moving.”
—John Gittings, Los Angeles Review of Books

“Benton’s translation is concise, effective and lucid.”
—China Quarterly

From the Publisher