Cold Mountain Poems

The best of Hanshan's beloved poems—among the earliest of Zen-style Buddhist poetry, beloved by the Beat Generation—here newly translated and organized thematically in a beautiful Pocket Poets hardcover

Often ranked among the most inspiring works of world literature, the poems of Hanshan (whose name means Cold Mountain), were traditionally thought to have been written at least twelve centuries ago on rock walls by a Buddhist monk living in the mountains of southeastern China. The best of his poems, collected here and organized by theme, reflect the sense of humor, deep love of solitude, and vivid descriptions of nature that have endeared these poems to generations of readers.

Everyman's Library pursues the highest production standards, printing on acid-free cream-colored paper, with full-cloth cases with two-color foil stamping, decorative endpapers, silk ribbon markers, European-style half-round spines, and a full-color illustrated jacket.

HANSHAN was traditionally thought to be a reclusive seventh-century Buddhist monk who lived on a mountain in southeast China, writing his poems on rock walls. More recently it has been argued that the poems attributed to him were probably written by two or more people and that they may date from the seventh or eighth to the early ninth century.

PETER HARRIS graduated from Oxford in classical Chinese and has a Ph.D. in Asian history from Monash. He lived and worked for many years in different parts of Asia including China, where he was representative of the Ford Foundation and a visiting professor at Nanjing University. He is now a Senior Fellow in the China Research Centre at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Other volumes he edited for Everyman's Library include The Travels of Marco Polo, The Art of War, Zen Poems, and Three Hundred Tang Poems.