In this nicely designed bilingual collection of poetry, Gregor Benton and Feng Chongyi bring our attention to the entanglement of Communist revolution and classical-style poetic writing in 20th-century China. It is only recently that we have witnessed a surge of scholarly interest in the persistence of the classical style in post-May Fourth Chinese cultural production and communication, particularly during the most anti-traditional period. The role of classical-style poetry in China's Communist movements is even less touched upon. Filling this gap and illustrating the “complex relationship between Communist revolution and Chinese cultural traditions” (p. 1), this new book features the classical-style poems written by Chen Duxiu (1879–1942; a main leader of the May Fourth New Culture Movement, a founder of the Chinese Communist Party, and a pioneer of Chinese Trotskyism), Zheng Chaolin (1901–1998; a veteran Communist and Trotskyist leader), Chen Yi (1901–1972; a military leader and marshal of the People's Liberation Army, famous for being a general-poet), and Mao Zedong (1893–1976; the paramount leader and icon of Chinese Communism). With the exception of Mao (whose poetry was already widely disseminated and translated in the heyday of Maoism and its “personality cult”), the Red poetry written by the other three revolutionaries in the classical style has been little known in the English-speaking world. In particular, the spotlight this book shines on Chen Duxiu and Zheng Chaolin adds to Benton's ongoing contribution towards preserving the history of Chinese Trotskyism. Putting the four Red poets on an equal footing, this book demonstrates the diversity of both politics and poetry in Chinese Communism. In Benton's own words: “Red poetry in the classical style exhibited a multiplicity of themes and forms” and should not be “reduced to a set of Maoist stereotypes” (p. 5). This volume thus further dismantles “Maocentrism in Chinese Communist historiography” (p. 3) and contributes to a wider view of Chinese revolutionary culture.
The interpretation of revolutionary classical-style poetry poses immense challenges to scholars and translators. First, as Benton points out in the “Introduction,” classical-style poetry “has always been a communal and collaborative activity” (p. 5), deeply rooted in the long tradition of poetic education (largely reserved for the class of literati-gentry in pre-modern China). Second, as much as it is communicative, classical-style poetic writing is intimate to the innermost feelings and individual selfhood of the revolutionary-poet. Third, while responding to the changing personal, social and political realities in modern China, classical-style poetry continuously mobilizes traditional norms, ancient codes and allegorical images, forming an intertextual “here-and-now” of rhymes, patterns and historical memories. Poets of the Chinese Revolution succeeds in offering a very appealing and accessible bilingual layout of the poems: every English translation is followed by the Chinese original poem facing its Pinyin-with-diacritics version (the tones here make a huge difference as they are crucial in the rhythms of the classical style). Moreover, all the poems are well annotated: brief introductions to individual poems provide historical and biographical contexts and general commentary, while line-based footnotes illuminate cultural references and allegorical meanings. For the reader's benefit, the translator also includes a chronology of Chinese history and a list of historical personalities mentioned in the poems.
The most valuable part of this volume is the poetic work of Zheng Chaolin, which comprises the longest section. Zheng the Trotskyite spent decades in prison under both the Nationalist regime and Maoist rule. Benton translates both his prison poems, written in the 1950s and 1960s, and his post-prison poems, written primarily in the 1980s. Some poems about his ruined life are profoundly sentimental and heart-wrenching to read. Others show his political will and reflection as a life-long dissenter while concealing his Trotskyist views of China's social changes. Taken as a whole, his poems form a powerful yet intimate testimony about the long historical sequence we know as China's revolutionary century. Engaging in a variety of classical forms, Zheng's poetry is richly encoded – even more so than Mao's – in references and images taken from history (both ancient and modern), literary canons (both Chinese and European), religions (both Eastern and Western), national landscapes (appearing both in dreams and on postal stamps), personal memories and socio-political realities. These classical-style poems have long fallen into the abyss of 20th-century Chinese politics and history. What Benton has accomplished here contributes to the restoration of a special yet forgotten poetic voice of revolutionary China. His commentaries and annotations of Zheng's poems are well informed, detailed and nuanced. Together with the translations and originals, they present this Trotskyist classical-style poet to a broader readership in English.
In general, Benton's translation is concise, effective and lucid. He insists on a line-by-line method, but does not force a word-by-word literalism. His literalness, in accordance with Arthur Waley's example, is about the images of the original. Considering the difficulties facing a translator of politically embedded, traditionally patterned and modern-spirited Chinese poetry, Benton has turned an impossible mission into an admirable output. He adventures into some less-known late works of Mao, and even tries his hand at rhyming translation. This collection of translations, I hope, will stimulate more interpretations and discussions of China's revolutionary classical-style poets – including, but not limited to, the four poets illuminated here – and their contested legacies.
