Everything about Bei Dao totally explained
» Bei Dao ("Northern Island") is another name for Zhifu Island.
Bei Dao (born
August 2 1949) is the pseudonym of
Chinese poet Zhao Zhenkai (趙振開). He was born in
Beijing, his pseudonym was chosen because he came from the north and because of his preference for solitude. Bei Dao is the most notable representative of the
Misty Poets, a group of
Chinese poets who reacted against the restrictions of the
Cultural Revolution.
As a teenager, Bei Dao was a member of the
Red Guards, the enthusiastic followers of
Mao Zedong who enforced the dictates of the Cultural Revolution, often through violent means. He had misgivings about the Revolution and was "re-educated" as a construction worker the next eleven years.
Bei Dao and
Mang Ke founded the magazine
Jintian ("Today"), the central publication of the Misty Poets which was published from
1978 until
1980, when it was banned. The work of the Misty Poets and Bei Dao in particular were an inspiration to pro-democracy movements in
China. Most notable was his poem
"Huida" ("The Answer") which was written during the
1976 Tiananmen demonstrations in which he participated. The poem was taken up as a defiant anthem of the pro-democracy movement and appeared on posters during the
Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. During the 1989 protests and subsequent shootings, Bei Dao was at a literary conference in
Berlin and wasn't allowed to return to China. (Three other leading Misty Poets,
Gu Cheng,
Duo Duo, and
Yang Lian, were also exiled). His then wife, Shao Fei, and their daughter were not allowed to leave China to join him for another six years.
Since 1987, Bei Dao has lived and taught in England, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Holland, France, and the United States. His work has been translated into twenty-five languages, including five poetry volumes in English along with the collection of stories Waves (1990) and the essay collections
Blue House (2000) and
Midnight's Gate (2005). Bei Dao continued his work in exile.
He has won numerous awards, including Tucholsky Prize from Swedish PEN, International Poetry Argana Award from the House of Poetry in
Morocco and the
PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award. He is an honorary member of the
American Academy of Arts and Letters.
Jintian was resurrected in
Stockholm in
1990 as a forum for expatriate Chinese writers. He has taught and lectured at a number of schools, most recently the
University of Notre Dame in
Indiana, as well as the
University of Alabama in
Tuscaloosa and
Beloit College in
Wisconsin. He has been repeatedly nominated for the
Nobel Prize in Literature.
Works
Poetry
Short stories
Waves. Trans. Bonnie S. McDougall & Susette Ternent Cooke (New Directions, 1990)Further Information
Get more info on 'Bei Dao'.
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