Chinese Poet Bei Dao to speak at the UO

Monday, October 18, 2004
Poetry Reading by Bei Dao
University of Oregon
Knight Library Browsing Room
7:00 pm
Free and open to the public

Tuesday, October 19, 2004
Lecture to Bei Dao: "Underground Literature in Late 60's China"
University of Oregon
Lillis Hall, Room 112
4:00 pm
Free and open to the public

Bei Dao, one of China’s foremost writers and poets, is known to many throughout the world as much for his dissident status as his poetry. He is seen as the figurehead of the first generation of poets in the People’s Republic of China to free itself from the orthodoxy of state-controlled literature. His conflict with the Communist Party began in the 1970s when he started a literary journal that included works that broke away from the prescribed style of Socialist Realism. In its place, Bei Dao and others, created a far more subjective, imagistic, and surreal poetry, heavily influenced by such European writers as Lorca, Alberti, and Eluard. Bei Dao was accused of helping to incite the student revolt in Tienanmen Square, and forced into exile in 1989. He now lives and teaches in the United States.

His awards and honors include the Aragana Poetry Prize from the International Festival of Poetry in Casablanca, Morocco, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. He has been a candidate several times for the Nobel Prize in Literature, and was elected an honorary member of The American Academy of Arts and Letters. At the request of Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish, he traveled to Palestine as part of a delegation for the International Parliament of Writers. Bei Dao was a Stanford Presidential lecturer and has taught at the University of California at Davis. He is currently the Mackey Poet in Residence at Beloit College, where he also served as the Lois Wilson Mackey '45 Distinguished Professor of Creative Writing.

These events are presented by Mountain Writers Series and the UO Center for Asian and Pacific Studies with support from the Regional Arts & Culture Council, the University of Oregon (Creative Writing Program, Asian Studies Program, and East Asian Languages and Literatures), Lewis & Clark College, Portland State University, Oregon Consortium for Asian Studies, Northwest China Council, and Stumptown Printers.