Wang Wei in the West. Reception and Representation of an Oriental Literary Image

What do contemporary Western readers know about Wang Wei, an eighth-century Chinese landscape and pastoral poet? How has his image changed in and linked with the receiving culturalsocial- historical context over the past one hundred years? This paper aims to sketch out the history of the reception and representation of Wang Wei, one of the most translated Chinese poets in the English-speaking countries, Britain and North America in particular. The argument is that Wang Wei’s poetry, which involves the imagery of landscape and spirituality, fits into the revolution of English literary Modernism and the development of cultural politics in the twentieth century. After a brief introduction to Wang Wei’s life and poetry, I will discuss how literary, cultural and social norms in the target system have affected the way Wang Wei and his poetry is translated and represented in English since the beginning of the twentieth century. The translation and research focus, even of the same poem, shifts within different social contexts and historical periods.