{"id":3668,"date":"2017-04-07T09:30:05","date_gmt":"2017-04-07T01:30:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=3668"},"modified":"2017-04-23T15:42:06","modified_gmt":"2017-04-23T07:42:06","slug":"jesse-glass-on-burton-watson-1925-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=3668","title":{"rendered":"Jesse Glass on Burton Watson (1925 \u2013 2017)"},"content":{"rendered":"

In honor of Burton Watson\u2019s passing, <\/span>I am collecting statements and memories from friends and fans, to be posted as they come in. The following remembrance is by Jesse Glass, adapted from his entry in<\/em> S<\/a><\/b>alutations;<\/a><\/b> a Festschrift for Burton Watson<\/a> <\/b><\/b>(Ahadada \/ Ekleksographia, 2015), which he edited with Philip Williams:<\/em><\/p>\n

When I made my exit from America I threw a party: poets, painters, cabaret singers, gallery owners, teachers, philosophers of the street, strangers and passersby looking for a bargain, everyone was welcome. Somehow I had managed to shake free from everything and everyone I thought I loved, reduced my worldly goods to a suitcase and a few boxes in friends\u2019 attics, and it was time to make my way to Japan the very next morning. But first we\u2019d have a party: I\u2019d play a record on my little black plastic machine, then give it away, and by the end of the night I gave the record player away too; I made sure my suits, my hats, my ties, some paintings, a Haitian deity in repousse steel, went walking out the door. My 1928 Underwood typewriter grew unsteady legs too after we\u2019d typed dozens of drunken, communal, but surprisingly dry-eyed verses. I remember we\u2019d all staggered down to the Milwaukee river an hour or two before sunrise, laughing at the lights reflected lights, at the trees and at the few cold stars left in the sky. I was poorer and happier than I had been in a long time and I was not afraid. I kept referring in my mind to the one book I did not give away but would take with me on the plane, and keep with me through the coming years in countryside Japan, in south China, in Korea and in Japan again: the book told me of trees that were useless, and best that way, and of a butcher who never needed to sharpen his knife, and of a giant bird and a vast fish that divided the waters of the deep beyond the skill of anyone to catch, and a skull existing in a perpetual dream of autumn, and of an unbearably ugly man who for some reason proved so attractive that everyone wanted to be near him and even princesses would fight to be his mistress, and of butterflies dreaming they were philosophers and philosophers dreaming they were butterflies. These stories nourished and consoled me then as they do even now. After many years, when I finally met the gentleman who gave me those precious stories, wrestling them expertly from the ancient Chinese into memorable English, I showed him the dog-eared, coffee-stained, annotated, and deeply decrepit pages and he wrote on the fly-leaf of Chuang Tzu; Basic Writings: \u201c October 22, 2005\/ For Jesse Glass, \/ In appreciation of a well-read copy, Burton\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n

Due to the incredible generosity of Burton Watson with his gifts we all have been given a key to the intellectual riches of a part of the world that is just as crucial to the collective future of humanity as it is to its past. The stories, the poems, the teachings of great sages and the epic histories that Burton Watson has given us, both directly in his superb translations from the Chinese and the Japanese, and indirectly through his role as teacher and exemplar to dozens of other scholars, translators, poets, writers, and artists, continue to unpack their treasures. No, Burton, the appreciation, the pleasure, has been ours as well. Please accept this small gift from us, sensei.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Contact me if you would like to add your own remembrance.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In honor of Burton Watson\u2019s passing, I am collecting statements and memories from friends and fans, to be posted as they come in. The following remembrance is by Jesse Glass, adapted from his entry in Salutations; a Festschrift for Burton … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1774],"tags":[436,1781,1784,1637,453],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8srwF-Xa","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3256,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=3256","url_meta":{"origin":3668,"position":0},"title":"Salutations; a Festschrift for Burton Watson","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"August 3, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Announcing, from\u00a0Ahadada \/ Ekleksographia, Salutations; a Festschrift for Burton Watson. Edited by Jesse Glass and Philip Williams, this collection of essays, articles, and poems about Chinese and Japanese literature and culture celebrates the illustrious scholarly career of Burton Watson, whose range of excellent literary translations into English from Japanese and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Links"","block_context":{"text":"Links","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3698,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=3698","url_meta":{"origin":3668,"position":1},"title":"Chloe Garcia Roberts on Burton Watson (1925 \u2013 2017)","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"April 18, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"In honor of Burton Watson\u2019s passing, I am collecting statements and memories from friends and fans, to be posted as they come in. The following comment is from poet and translator Chloe Garcia Roberts: Burton Watson\u2019s translations were the weft of my education. His voice spanning the entirety of my\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Burton Watson remembrance"","block_context":{"text":"Burton Watson remembrance","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=1774"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3678,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=3678","url_meta":{"origin":3668,"position":2},"title":"Jonathan Chaves on Burton Watson (1925 \u2013 2017)","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"April 11, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"In honor of Burton Watson\u2019s passing, I am collecting statements and memories from friends and fans, to be posted as they come in. The following remembrance is from Jonathan Chaves, professor of Chinese at George Washington University: I am deeply saddened by the death of Burton Watson. He has been\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Burton Watson remembrance"","block_context":{"text":"Burton Watson remembrance","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=1774"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3665,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=3665","url_meta":{"origin":3668,"position":3},"title":"Victor Mair on Burton Watson (1925 \u2013 2017)","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"April 5, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"In honor of Burton Watson's passing, I am collecting statements and memories from friends and fans, to be posted as they come in. The following remembrance is from Victor Mair, professor of Chinese at University of Pennsylvania: Sometime around the mid-70s, I had the great, good fortune to be invited\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Burton Watson remembrance"","block_context":{"text":"Burton Watson remembrance","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=1774"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3712,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=3712","url_meta":{"origin":3668,"position":4},"title":"Columbia UP’s Jennifer Crewe on Burton Watson","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"May 1, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"At the Columbia University Press blog, associate provost and press director Jennifer Crewe, has published her remembrance in honor of Burton Watson, with whose \"passing the world has lost one of its greatest translators.\" She writes: I once heard a story, perhaps apocryphal, told to me by someone who visited\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Burton Watson remembrance"","block_context":{"text":"Burton Watson remembrance","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=1774"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3701,"url":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?p=3701","url_meta":{"origin":3668,"position":5},"title":"Hazard & Wallwork’s Cold Mountain Documentary","author":"Lucas Klein","date":"April 20, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"In honor of Burton Watson\u2019s passing, I am collecting statements and memories from friends and fans, to be posted as they come in. In line with such remembrances, I am posting the documentary Cold Mountain: Han Shan, directed by Deb Wallwork and Mike Hazard, a film portrait of the Tang\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Burton Watson remembrance"","block_context":{"text":"Burton Watson remembrance","link":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/?cat=1774"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/img.youtube.com\/vi\/R3OWTwGdGmo\/0.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3668"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3668"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3668\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3729,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3668\/revisions\/3729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xichuanpoetry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}