Poems of Li Po in English

Li Po (Chinese, 701-762 AD) wrote dream poems depicting spiritual journeys, sometimes making his countrymen forget their problems in unthinking garity, and for such joyful escapism was criticized by his peers and later, Communists. He was explicitly anti-Confucian in his thought and behavior, expressing his admiration for the man of impulse over moral and intellectual qualities (such as patient literary scholarship) most admired in the Confucian ttradition. In his youth, he lived for a time as a sworded wandering gallant. Here the poems are read from Arthur Cooper’s translations.