Walter Benjamin called translation "The Third Language", because a translation is neither the same as the original, nor the same as the normal foreign-language of other texts, for it is something unique, something set apart from either, just as bronze forged from copper and tin overcomes the brittleness of copper and the softness of tin to become both hard and pliable, as if it has become a new element. In this volume, Chinese poets and English-language poets come together to translate each other's work. The Chinese poets involved are: Jiang Tao, Leng Shuang, Tang Xiaodu, Wang Xaoni, Xiao Kaiyu, Xi Chuan, Yan Li, Yang Lian, Yang Xiaobin, Yu Jian, Zang Di, Zhai Yongming, Zhang Wei and Zhou Zan, while the Western representatives are: Nicholas Admussen, Tony Barnstone, Polly Clark, Jennifer Crawford, Antony Dunn, W.N. Herbert, Sean O'Brien, Pascale Petit, Fiona Sampson, Arthur Sze, George Szirtes and Joshua Weiner.
