21st Century Chinese Poetry

THE JOURNAL OF 21st Century Chinese Poetry 《廿一世纪中国诗歌》is an independent journal committed to showcasing the best of contemporary Chinese poetry. We exist to discover and celebrate poetry and the Chinese poets who write them with the largest possible Anglophone audience.

In the early twentieth century, The May Fourth Movement (1917-1921) launched an era where vernacular Chinese was for the first time accepted as a legitimate poetic voice. This was followed by an outpouring of verse written in 'plain speech' by people from all walks of life in contrast to the classical, elitist poetic forms of imperial China.

A century has now passed since these 'new' poetic voices emerged. Vernacular poetry has continued to blossom in poetry journals and in cyberspace.

The editor and translators at 21st Century Chinese Poetry are committed to translating poets from across China who would otherwise remain virtually unknown to Western audiences.

This website is maintained and funded entirely by the editor as a labour of love. Please send all enquiries, suggestions and corrections regarding 21st Century Chinese Poetry to Meifu Wang at:

editor@modernchinesepoetry.com

Founder and Editor
Meifu Wang

A TASTE OF CONTEMPORARY CHINESE POETRY

From 2012 to 2015, our team worked with a group of Chinese poets in China to introduce contemporary Chinese poetry to the wider world. We translated the works of 66 contemporary Chinese poets into English and broadcast them on this website and in print (ISSN 2166-3688).

From 2018 to 2022, we further collaborated with China's Poetry Journal (诗刊) to bring a selection of their monthly publication to world-wide readers. Poetry Journal (Beijing, China）was founded in 1957, with an emphasis on the publication of contemporary Chinese poetry as well as classical poetry by living poets. It is the widest-circulated poetry journal in China.

Circulating more than sixty years, the journal has brought together and introduced a great number of poets, reflecting many of the sweeping changes that the country has witnessed over that period.

A REPOSE

Since summer of 2023, Meifu has turned her focus to her own poetry and to poetry from other parts of the world. Please continue to visit this website and read the poems we translated over the years. Meifu is also in the process of updating the old numbers of 21st Century Chinese Poetry (No.1 - No. 15) and add them to "POEMS 2000-2015" on this website.

You can read some of Meifu's poems here: Go to Meifu's Poems

POEM OF THE DAY 一天一首诗

MY LOVE-HATE RELATIONSHIP WITH MT. QINLING

by Nan Shutang

The reason why I hate this mountain
is because it blocks my view, posing to be
the end of the world. Still, it serves
as a jail door that keeps away the people and things
that I love to hate but dare not.
I take it all out on Mt. Qinling,
so when I hate you, and you, and you, once, twice, and thrice,
I gradually build up a mountain of hatred.
Surely one of Qinling’s peaks is the outcome of my work.
Hear the rainless thunder from the mountains,
hear its echoes spreading hatred.
At the same time I love this mountain for mysterious reasons —
the way the birds sing, the way the peach flowers bloom
speak for my ardent love for the mountain;
the rugged boulders and the hardy grass around my father’s grave
also explain the tenacity of my affection,
which I write down as a list of words and arrange them with a secret formula
(the way a pharmacist designs a prescription),
and feed them to the spring breeze or autumn wind.
The mountain is said to be growing at two centimeters a year.
Does that growth come partly from the power of my love?
Nowadays I am more even-tempered,
with little love or hatred in the heart,
and the mountain seems to treat me the same way,
listening to me calmly
without showing any happiness or sadness.
Now I can sit comfortably with the mountain
and strike up a conversation.
But if the mountain could give back my past love and hatred,
I would use the love to backfill the cavities
undermined by the old hatred, so that we will have
a gentler terrain that's worthy of our trust
between pinnacles and nadirs.

Translated by Meifu Wang, Michael Soper, Peter Micic & Johan Ramaekers

This poem was originally written in Chinese and published in Poetry Journal (Beijing, China); its English translation first appeared on this website and simultaneously in China via WeChat (微信).

We encourage you to read this poem as an exercise of slow reading.

Nan Shutang 南书堂

b. 1965

Nan Shutang was born in the City of Shangluo in Shaanxi Province in northwestern China, gateway to the old Silk Road. He has published four poetry collections: Living by the River, The Wanderer, Purple Alfalfa, and Gathering Herbs. Many poems have appeared in literary magazines across China. Nan Shutang is a member of Chinese Writers’ Association. He works for Shangluo City's Bureau of Culture, Press, and Broadcasting.

南书堂，陕西商洛人，中国作家协会会员，陕西省文学院签约作家。出版有《临河而居》《漫步者》《紫苜蓿》《采芝歌》等诗集，并先后在《诗刊》、《光明日报》、《星星》、《诗潮》、《诗选刊》、《延河》、《飞天》等近百家文学刊物发表大量诗歌作品。出版诗集两部，《临河而居》获陕西首届（2013）年度文学奖诗歌奖。

Nan Shutang's poems can be read here: My Love-Hate Relationship with Mt. Qinling.