Thank you so much to Sarah Brooks and the Samovar/Strange Horizons team for publishing my translation of Dai Wangshu’s poem “Night Moths”! You can read my English translation and the original poem in Chinese on Samovar’s website.
I also did an interview with Samovar about my thoughts on Dai Wangshu, translation, and what I’m working on.
Here is a short excerpt of the interview:
Can you tell us how you got started in translation?
As someone who thinks of myself primarily as a writer, I first became interested in translation three years ago when I started working on a novel inspired by the tropes of wuxia (martial arts fantasy) fiction in English. This led me down a deep research rabbit hole about past translations of wuxia stories and classical Chinese poetry. I soon became fascinated with the idea of translators as folks who bridge different languages, literary traditions, and cultures. As a writer who is bilingual but only writes in English, I often find myself navigating code-switching in similar ways, on the page or in daily life, so I find translating often informs my writing, and vice versa.
Thank you also to Quick Sip Reviews for writing a review of the translated poem. I really appreciate that reviewers are out there reviewing translated works of fiction and poetry!
