Judges at the 3rd Pearl River International Poetry Festival in Guangzhou on Sept. 15 to Sept.16 recognized the work of George O'Connell and Diana Shi, both of UIC, with the 2007 China Journey Prize. The award, presented biennially to a foreign poet living in China, acknowledges their efforts over recent years in bridging contemporary Chinese and western poetry. Shi and O'Connell are presently co-editing and co-translating the 2008 China Issue of Atlanta Review, introducing numerous contemporary Chinese poets to American and English-speaking readers. They are also composing and co-translating an anthology of contemporary Chinese poetry for publication in the U.S.
Introduction to the Award Winners
George O’Connell grew up outside Chicago, holds degrees from the University of Wisconsin, Madison; the University of Illinois, Urbana; and the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop. His honors include the Pablo Neruda Award in Poetry from Nimrod International Journal, Atlanta Review’s International Grand Prize in Poetry, Bellingham Review’s 49th Parallel Award, an Individual Artist’s Fellowship from the Nebraska Arts Council, and many Pushcart Prize nominations. Winner of the 2003 Marlboro Review Prize in Poetry, he has been Poet-In-Residence at the Saltonstall Foundation for the Arts, Ithaca, NY; the Art Institute of Chicago’s Ox Bow Colony; and The Ragdale Foundation, Lake Forest, IL. Author of Getting the Range, which won the Soundpost Prize, and The Force of Ice, he has recent poems in Mississippi Review Prize Stories and Poems of the Year, The Paterson Literary Review, Zone 3, The Comstock Review, Southern Poetry Review, and Marlboro Review. His translation from contemporary Chinese poetry appeared in the Winter ‘06 issue of Circumference. He has taught creative writing and literature at numerous U.S. colleges and universities, most recently Hamilton College in New York. The 2005-6 U.S. Fulbright Scholar in American Literature & Creative Writing at Peking University in Beijing, China, he is presently Prof. of Literature & Creative Writing at United International College in Zhuhai, China, where he’s also engaged with his next poetry collection, The Six Yellows of Wheat. Currently assembling an anthology of contemporary Chinese poetry for U.S. publication, he and literary translator Diana Shi will also co-edit Atlanta Review’s 2008 China Issue. His translations with Ms. Shi were recently recognized by The China Journey Award at the 3rd Pearl River International Poetry Festival.
Literary translator Diana Shi has presented her Mandarin translations from contemporary American poetry, as well as contemporary Chinese poetry, at various universities around China, including Tsinghua, Shantou, and Sichuan. Her recent work has appeared in the international poetry journals Circumference and La Jornada, and is forthcoming in the Univ. of Iowa International Writing Program’s anniversary issue of Words Without Borders. Presently a translator and assistant to the Creative Writing/Creative Arts program at United International College in Zhuhai, she is also gathering and translating contemporary Chinese poetry for an anthology to be published in the U.S. With George O’Connell, she is co-editing the 2008 China Edition of Atlanta Review.
