Translation and the Poetry Traditions of China and Tibet
Mansfield Freeman Center for East Asian Studies, Seminar Room
Wesleyan University. 343 Washington Terrace. Middletown, CT 06549
Thursday, February 7, 4:30 pm
Public talk by Ian Boyden
“Flames of My Homeland: Translating the Poetry of Tsering Woeser”
Tsering Woeser has emerged as one of the most prolific Tibetan writers and one of the most followed Tibetan voices in the world. Her writing takes a deep plunge into the contemporary realities of Tibet, bearing witness to the pervasive and systematic assault on all facets of Tibetan culture over the last 60 years. In 2019, Ian Boyden was awarded a NEA Literature Translation Fellowship to translate Woeser’s collected poems. In this talk, Boyden will discuss the complexities of Woeser’s poetry as forms of social and political criticism, reflections on Buddhist religious practice, and self-reflective explorations of a Sinophone Tibetan woman living in the dual Tibetan and Chinese cultural worlds.