Jonathan Hart reviews Bei Dao‘s 北島 The Rose of Time: New and Selected Poems (New Directions), edited by Eliot Weinberger, speaking “about these translations as if they were poems in English on which the reputation of the poet stands in the English-speaking world.”

He concludes that “Bei Dao’s poetry translates well in its bold imagery and implicit and oblique politics, using nature in a symbolism of indirection that is as subtle as it is apparent,” but he only mentions poems translated by Bonnie McDougall (Bei Dao’s early work) and by Weinberger (Bei Dao’s more recent work), not mentioning the poems translated by David Hinton.

For another recent collection of Bei Dao’s poetry in English, see also Endure (Black Widow Press), translated by Clayton Eshleman and me.