Cathay: Ezra Pound's Orient (Penguin Specials)

The English literati were fascinated by China at the turn of the century. London was a breeding ground for the avant-garde and modernist writers like Eliot, Yeats and Pound became infatuated—but only Pound set out to re-invent, re-connect and eventually "rethink the nature of an English poem." Published in 1915, Pound’s translations were popular and highly controversial. His bold interpretations of Chinese form, wording and metric often bore little resemblance to the original. Cathay set the stage for a new approach to poetry and eventually for a newfound East in the West.