The August Sleepwalker [Hardcover]

Beidao (Author), Bei DAO (Author), Bonnie S. McDougall (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1990 | ISBN-10: 0811211312 | ISBN-13: 978-0811211314

First published in the US in 1990, the year after the uprising of Chinese students at Tiananmen Square, The August Sleepwalker collects all the early poetry of Bei Dao, China's premier poet, now living in exile. The August Sleepwalker is an extremely popular book (30,000 copies sold in China in one month) which was quickly banned by the Chinese government. The collection includes all of the poems Bei Dao published between 1970 and 1986. Bei Dao has lived in exile since the Tiananmen Incident. He is widely esteemed as one of contemporary China's most significant writers. His work is experimental, and subjective, while remaining passionately engaged in the individual's response to a disordered world.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

One of China's most famous poets, and now living in exile, Dao (Zhao Zhenkai) has been ably translated in these 91 poems. Many are love poems; others freeze a beautiful or touching landscape; some capture a fleeting image; a few evoke the horror of a political murder. Only a place name or word in three or four poems reveals that they are by a Chinese author, but knowing the backdrop of political repression adds a particular poignancy to this fine work.
- Kitty Chen Dean, Nassau Coll., Garden City, N.Y.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

Accomplices
All
Another Legend
The Answer
The Art Of Poetry
The Artist's Life
The August Sleepwalker
The Bank
Blanks
Boat Ticket
Bodhisattva
The Boundary
A Bouquet
Chords
Comet
A Country Night
Cruel Hope: 1.
Cruel Hope: 1.
Cruel Hope: 10.
Cruel Hope: 11.
Cruel Hope: 13.
Cruel Hope: 14.
Cruel Hope: 15.
Cruel Hope: 16.
Cruel Hope: 17.
Cruel Hope: 18.
Cruel Hope: 19.
Cruel Hope: 2.
Cruel Hope: 20.
Cruel Hope: 21.
Cruel Hope: 3.
Cruel Hope: 4.
Cruel Hope: 5.
Cruel Hope: 6.
Cruel Hope: 7.
Cruel Hope: 8.
Cruel Hope: 9.
A Day
Daydream: 1.
Daydream: 10.
Daydream: 11.
Daydream: 12.
Daydream: 13.
Daydream: 14.
Daydream: 15.
Daydream: 16.
Daydream: 17.
Daydream: 18.
Daydream: 19.
Daydream: 2.
Daydream: 20.
Daydream: 21.
Daydream: 22.
Daydream: 23.
Daydream: 3.
Daydream: 4.
Daydream: 5.
Daydream: 6.
Daydream: 7.
Daydream: 8.
Daydream: 9.
Deathwatch Night
Declaration; For Yu Luoke
Dirge
Don't Ask Our Ages
Doubtful Things
Dusk: Dingjiatan
The Echo
Electric Shock
An End Or A Beginning
Expectation
The Fable
For Many Years
Habit
Harbour Dreams
Head For Winter
Hello, Baihua Mountain
The Host
I Go Into The Rain Mist
In A Decade
In The Dawn's Bronze Mirror
The Island: 1.
The Island: 2.
The Island: 3.
The Island: 4.
The Island: 5.
The Island: 6.
The Island: 7.
The Island: 8.
It Has Always Been So...
Language
Let's Go
Lost
Love Story
Maple Leaves And Seven Stars
My Transparent Grief
Night: Themes And Variations
Nightmare
Notes From The City Of The Sun
Notes In The Rain
The Old Temple
On Every Morning Sun
On Tradition
One Step
The Orange Is Ripe
Orphans
A Perpetual Stranger...
Portrait Of A Young Poet
Rainbow Flower
Rainy Night
Rancour Turns A Drop Of Water Muddy...
Random Thoughts
Recollection
The Red Sailboat
Resume
Sequel To A Legend
A Single Room
Sleep, Valley
Smiles, Snowflakes, Tears
The Snowline
Song Of Migrating Birds
Sos
Space
Starting From Yesterday
Strangers
Street Corner
Stretch Out Your Hands To Me
Temptation
Through The Melody Of Your Breathing
A Toast
Tomorrow, No
True
Underground Station
The Unfamiliar Beach: 1.
The Unfamiliar Beach: 2.
The Unfamiliar Beach: 3.
The Unfamiliar Beach: 4.
The Unfamiliar Beach: 5.
The Unfamiliar Beach: 6.
The Unfamiliar Beach: 7.
The Way Back
The Window On The Cliff
The Witness
Yes, Yesterday
You Said
You Wait For Me In The Rain
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder® --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 140 pages
• Publisher: New Directions Publishing Corporation (May 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0811211312
• ISBN-13: 978-0811211314
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.7 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,824,367 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A poet of both nature and the human world, December 5, 2005

By 

Michael J. Mazza - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The August Sleepwalker (Paperback)

"The August Sleepwalker," by Bei Dao, has been translated into English by Bonnie S. McDougall. She also contributes an introduction and a preface. McDougall notes that Bei Dao is the pen name of Zhao Zhenkai, who was born in Beijing in 1949. McDougall adds that he was one of China's "underground poets of the seventies," and that he was "in involuntary exile abroad" at the time she wrote her preface (1989). I found this to be a compelling volume of poetry. Bei Dao's work is often quite sad and haunting, and at times very passionate and beautiful. Particularly interesting is his use of parallel structures in his poems. He uses a rich variety of different parallel forms; this structural diversity brings a continual freshness and vitality to the book as a whole.

Bei Dao makes frequent use of nature imagery--a mountain range, a snowflake, lightning, wild geese, the "rustle of wind through the grass," etc. At times his work has a haiku-like quality. But he also uses very concrete phenomena from the human world in his poems: a lavatory wall, the wail of a fire engine, "a silent cigarette." His voice in some poems sounds like that of an iconoclastic prophet--a tragic outsider who remains engaged with humanity and who challenges us to look at the world with a fresh new perspective. His imagery is often quite startling; consider such lines as "a baked fish dreaming of the sea" and "piles of endlessly bickering books."

Some standout poems in the collection are as follows. "Hello, Baihua Mountain": an invigorating poem with great nature imagery. "You Said": interesting use of dialogue within one of his parallel structures. "The Artist's Life": beginning with the line "Go and buy a radish," this poem has a satiric, even absurdist flavor. "Resume": another poem with a strong satiric flavor. "Language": a critique of language and rational thought. "Smiles, Snowflakes, Tears": evoking a sense of wonder and beauty, this poem reminded me of Pablo Neruda's "Book of Questions." But my favorite poem in the collecton is definitely "The Orange is Ripe." With a particularly well-crafted parallel structure, this poem appeals to both the senses and the emotions.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars difficult but great, September 8, 2003

By 

J from NY (New York) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The August Sleepwalker (Paperback)

dao's poetry may be difficult for the reader of conventional poetry to comprehend at first, but any sustained concentration on his verse reveals what he is really doing: rather than creating poetic stories or boring political drivel, he is creating images and sensations of the imagination, things that can only 'be' because of the word. if one were to categorize him permanently, which i would be hesitant to do, he would fall into the surrealist camp. he is a poet of the inner world rather the outer. there is a pessimism in his poems that some will find repulsive, others attractive. great stuff