dai wangshu：life & poetry of a ch. modernist

This comprehensive study, Dai Wangshu: The Life and Poetry of a Chinese Modernist, is one of the most illuminating books on twentieth-century Chinese poetry to have been published in years. It goes beyond the narrow scope and approach of earlier works. A carefully researched and informed work, it supersedes all the other English works on the subject.

Dai Wangshu (1905-1950) was a Chinese literary figure of immense importance. His ideas on poetry, literature and politics and the West were original and challenging. He attempted to bring the wealth of twentieth century European literature, and Western ideas on literature's place in politics, home to his compatriots. To this end he translated and wrote on Gide, Supervielle, Jammes, Baudelaire, Lorca, Yesenin and Mayakovsky, to name but a few. But above all he was an innovative poet. To all these many facets of the poet and his life this pioneering work brings new insights.

Students and scholars of modern Chinese literature will find the work an inspired attempt to relate Chinese poetry to its European counterparts, whilst those interested in comparative literature and modern history will be similarly impressed by the light shed on the interaction between Chinese and European twentieth-century cultures.