“The outstanding English poets have been acutely concerned with the…” — Witter Bynner

“The outstanding English poets have been acutely concerned with the happiness of their fellow men and have given themselves warmly to public causes in which they believed.”

Connecting enduring poetry with sympathy and engagement in human affairs · Essay, Poetry and Culture, introduction to The Jade Mountain (1929)

Witter Bynner

About Witter Bynner

10 August 1881–1 June 1968

Harold Witter Bynner, who published almost always as Witter Bynner and was known to friends as “Hal,” was born on 10 August 1881 in Brooklyn, New York, and died on 1 June 1968 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. His long career carried him through several distinct literary eras: the cultivated, metrically formal verse of the…

More by Witter Bynner

Poems by Witter Bynner

More remarks by Witter Bynner

“At the risk of criticism, I have made certain reasonable compromises.”

Frankly acknowledging the practical choices required when translating across cultures · Essay, Poetry and Culture, introduction to The Jade Mountain (1929)

“Whenever possible, I have avoided phraseology which, natural and familiar in Chinese, would be exotic or quaint in English.”

Explaining his preference for natural English rather than artificial exoticism · Essay, Poetry and Culture, introduction to The Jade Mountain (1929)

“For our taste, used as we are to the operatic in poetry, the substance of Chinese poems seems often mild or even trivial.”

Contrasting Western dramatic expectations with the restraint of Chinese verse · Essay, Poetry and Culture, introduction to The Jade Mountain (1929)

Art
Poetry

Pronunciation

Also Known As

Definition

Detailed Definition

Example

Additional Notes

Related Terms

Witter Bynner — a remark

About Witter Bynner

Poems by Witter Bynner

More remarks by Witter Bynner