7TH EDITION ★ 27 FEBRUARY - 29 MARCH 2026
★ GHENT ★
Poetry
Chinese Poetry in Motion
KANTL
Friday 22 March 2024
Is there such a thing as typical Chinese poetry? And if so, how do Belgian poets with a Chinese background relate to Chinese poetry and culture?
Translator Silvia Marijnissen will present the work of some Chinese/Taiwanese poets, including Chen Yuhong, Yinni and Yu Kwang-chung, and touch base through conversation with Chinese-Belgian poets Emerald Liu, Kika W.L. Van Robays, Hoyyiw Ho en Lili Vanden Wijngaert. Tilke Wouters will moderate the evening. Come listen to their poems and join the conversation!
In collaboration with Poëziecentrum & Auw La UGent.
The work of Taiwanese poet Yinni (°1970) is averse to conventions. Her shocking observations show a difficult relationship with the world. The characters she presents are often maladjusted or feel lost in a world whose 'rules' elude them. Poetry is a means of survival: “Before I started writing poetry I was just a wandering corpse.”
Yu Kwang-chung (1928–2017) was a well-known writer of poetry, essays and translations in Taiwan, Hong Kong and China. He was a classicist who wanted to continue the essence of traditional Chinese poetry in modern form. Poëziecentrum published a selection of his poetry called: "De nachtwaker" (The nightwatch).
The Taiwanese Chen Yuhong (°1952) published her poetry debut relatively late (in 1996), but has become one of the country's most renowned poets. As a translator, she has also published work of Sappho, Louise Glück, Margaret Atwood, Carol Ann Duffy, Ann Carson and Elisabeth Bishop. Yuhong herself writes timeless poems full of stillness, light, water, moon, love and hope. Poëziecentrum published a selection of her poetry called: 'The sun shrivels into a dwarf'.
Silvia Marijnissen (1970) is a translator of Chinese-language literature. She translated novels by Nobel Prize winner Mo Yan and Eileen Chang, modern poetry by many poets from China and Taiwan, and classical landscape poetry. Together with Anne Sytske Keijser and Mark Leenhouts, she translated the 18th-century classic De droom van de rode kamer (The dream of the red mansion), for which they received the Filter translation prize.
Hoyyiw Ho (°2001) captures her thoughts through writing. In her poetry, she seeks a balance between science and art, digging up her Hong Kong roots, or disentangling her daily brain knots.She is also pursuing a master's degree in Civil Engineering at Ghent University. DWB published a poem of hers as part of Babylon's interuniversity prize.
Emerald Liu is a Sino-Belgian writer whose work has previously appeared in Far-Near, Drawing Matter, and The Millions. Her poetry was featured in Where Else: An International Hong Kong Poetry Anthology, Capsule Stories, and the low countries. In 2022 she was invited to join the writers residency in Paris by deBuren and Pan Asian Sories by PAC. Currently she is poetry editor at Kluger Hans. Her writing centres around creating an open dialogue between different cultures within each piece. You can find Emerald on social media via @E.A.Liu.
Kika W. L. Van Robays 文詠玲 (they/them) is a writer from Belgium and Hong Kong. Kika writes about their mixed heritage, mental health, about music and blueness. They are one of the founding members of Slam-T (spoken word & slam poetry platform) and a PhD Candidate in Cultural Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Kika is the author of Let the Mourning Come (2022) and has been published in Capsule Stories, Anti-Heroin Chic, Where Else: An International Hong Kong Poetry Anthology (Verve Poetry Press, 2023) and others. You can find Kika on Twitter and Instagram @kikawinling and on kikawinling.wordpress.com.
Tilke Wouters (°1995) is a project-based jack-of-all-trades: a DEI expert, with experience in policy development and guidance on diversity and inclusion in organizations, an expert by experience in the field of LGBTQIA+, disability and mental health, a slam poetry artist and spoken word organizer, a zine maker about social topics, a moderator, host, MC of events or panel discussions and a teacher in expertise domains in the form of lectures, training, workshops, E-learning and playful learning. You can find Tilke at www.tilkewouters.be.
Lili Vanden Wijngaert is a sinologist and researched the workers' poetry of Zheng Xiaoqiong 郑小琼 in her master's thesis. She is active as a copywriter, translator and writer. In her poetry she explores, among other things, her Chinese background, interpersonal connections and the relationship between people and nature.