The New Directions Anthology of Classical Chinese Poetry

Founded in 1936, New Directions soon established itself as the foremost American publisher of international modernism; placing itself at the service of verbal revolution and providing a home for writers rejected by more conservative publishers, including the writers featured here, all of whom have long been associated with New Directions. This anthology contains some 200 poems, and essays and bibliographies on the translated poets. It is the first survey of Chinese poetry to consider its huge influence on American poetry; from early modernists Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams, to the Anarcho-Beat poets of a later generation, Kenneth Rexroth and Gary Snyder. It is also one of the first to consider the process of translation by presenting different versions of the same poems.