wikipedia | worldcat | academia |
Helen Wang is a UK-based translator and co-founder of Chinese Books for Young Readers (2016-). She works collaboratively with Paper Republic, the Leeds Centre for New Chinese Writing, World Kid Lit, and Global Literature in Libraries Initiative. She was active on Twitter: China Fiction Book Club, with Nicky Harman (2012-2025); Translated World (2013-2025).
Awards:
2017 Marsh Award for Literature in Translation for her translation of Bronze and Sunflower by Cao Wenxuan
2017 Chen Bochui Special Contribution Award, for translation and increasing visibility of Chinese children's books
2025 Shenzhen Reading Month's Translator of the Year
Other publications
The Music of Ink at the British Museum (edited volume featuring Yang Lian, Romesh Gunesekera, Denis Brown, Qu Lei Lei, Rohan de Saram, Zeng Laide and Wang Tao), Saffron Books, London, 2012. Info here
Is Gao Xingjian’s play Chezhan merely a blind worship of modern Western plays as the critic He Wen claims? How far can Chezhan be compared with Beckett’s Waiting for Godot?, Bulletin of the British Association for Chinese Studies, 1986, pp. 83-89. Available here
Interviews and short pieces
Interview, with Julie Sullivan, in Words and Pictures (SCBWI), 7 Oct 2018.
Interview, with Nanette McGuinness, in SCBWI, The Blog, 7 Sept 2017.
Interview, with Eric Abrahamsen, for Paper Republic, April 2016. in English and in Chinese
Interview, with Daniel Hahn, in Books for Keeps.
On "Bronze and Sunflower" in LARB China Blog, 13 April 2016
Translating Children's Books - a short piece for Books from Taiwan (2015)
Learning about Chinese children's books - interview with Zoe Toft for Playing by the Book, 27 April 2015
Bronze and Sunflower - Ann Morgan's Book of the Month, April 2015
Guest Interview: Helen Wang on Children's Book Translation, interviewed by Avery Fischer Udagawa for Cynthia Leitich Smith's "Cynsations" blog, 26 May 2015
Review by Nicky Harman of Bronze and Sunflower in Tribune 6 March 2015
| Small Town | by Li Jingrui | October 11, 2018 |
| Self-Portrait | by Zhang Xinxin | April 21, 2016 |
| Ying Yang Alley | by Fan Xiaoqing | April 14, 2016 |
| Sunshine in Winter | by Shi Kang tr. Michelle Deeter, Killiana Liu, Juliet Vine and Helen Wang | January 14, 2016 |
| A Second Pregnancy, 1980 | by Lu Min | November 03, 2015 |
| Xie Bomao R.I.P. | by Lu Min | October 29, 2015 |
| Crows | by Cao Wenxuan | September 24, 2015 |
| Missing | by Li Jingrui | August 06, 2015 |
The Paper Republic database exists for reference purposes only. We are not the publisher of these works, are not responsible for their contents, and cannot provide digital or paper copies.
By Helen Wang, April 15, '12
http://harvard.academia.edu/DavidYao/Blog
From David Yao's blog, 7 November 2011:
Dr. Bethune’s Children by Xue Yiwei
Dr. Bethune’s Children was described as a masterpiece that “would go down into history” by Shouhuo and Huacheng, two top Chinese literary magazines....
By Helen Wang, April 15, '12
http://www.bl.uk/whatson/events/event127226.html
Shi Cheng: City Stories from China - The official launch at the London Book Fair 2012
Featuring Han Dong, Xu Zechen, Julia Lovell and Nicky Harman
Wednesday 18th April, 6.30pm - 8pm
Conference Centre, British Library, 96 Euston Road, London, NW1 2DB
By Helen Wang, April 14, '12
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/apr/14/dragonworld-zhang-xinxin-story-china
The 5th (and last) of the 5 short stories published by The Guardian this week.
Dragonworld by Zhang Xinxin, translated by Helen Wang
Zhang Xinxin – accompanied by her teenage alter-ego Zhaishao – investigates the source of an invasion in Dragonworld, translated by Helen Wang
With podcast of the author reading this story in Chinese
By Helen Wang, April 13, '12
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/apr/13/curse-a-yi-story-china
The 4th of the 5 stories published by The Guardian this week.
The Curse by A Yi, translated by Julia Lovell. The loss of a chicken brings simmering village tensions to the boil in this story from A Yi, translated by Julia Lovell
By Helen Wang, April 13, '12
The Independent Foreign Fiction Prize 2012 - current news items
The Guardian, 12 April 2012: Independent foreign fiction prize shortlist announced - Chinese novel about Aids scandal up against Umberto Eco for £10,000 prize
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/apr/12/independent-foreign-fiction-prize-2012-shortlist?newsfeed=true
The Independent, 13 April 2012: 'Independent' Foreign Fiction Prize shortlist: A whole world in their words
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/features/independent-foreign-fiction-prize-shortlist-a-whole-world-in-their-words-7640234.html
By Helen Wang, April 12, '12
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/apr/12/galloping-horses-xu-zechen-short-story
The 3rd of the 5 stories published by The Guardian this week.
Galloping Horses by Xu Zechen, translated by Helen Wang.
Soybean dreams of riding one of the horses which gallop along the road in front of the melon shack in this story by Xu Zechen...
By Helen Wang, April 11, '12
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2012/apr/11/china-epublishing-revolution-freedom?intcmp=239
China's e-publishing revolution puts writers on a fast track to freedom article by Nicky Harman.
A new phenomenon in China – fiction published exclusively online – is giving young writers the opportunity to get their work read quickly and free from censorship
By Helen Wang, April 11, '12
CMR Special Issue: Key Concepts in Understanding the Chinese (posted by "gchen" gchen@etal.uri.edu on H-ASIA@H-NET.MSU.EDU)
Special Issue: Key Concepts in Understanding the Chinese
China Media Research, Volume 7, Number 4, 2011
http://www.chinamediaresearch.net/
By Helen Wang, April 11, '12
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/apr/11/old-man-xinjiang-xue-mo-story
This is the 2nd of the 5 short stories in The Guardian this week.
Editor's intro: Old Man Xinjiang by Xue Mo, translated by Nicky Harman. It's time for Old Man Xinjiang to head home, but not before he's been to see 'her'. Xue Mo reflects on the ebb and flow of life in the Chinese countryside in this story translated by Nicky Harman
By Helen Wang, April 11, '12
Chinese Literature - A Very Short Introduction, by Sabina Knight, Oxford University Press, 3 Feb 2012 - 137 pages
Publisher's intro: Perhaps nowhere else has literature been as conscious a collective endeavor as in China, and China's survival over three thousand years may owe more to its literary traditions than to its political history. This Very Short Introduction tells the story of Chinese literature from antiquity to the present, focusing on the key role literary culture played in supporting social and political concerns...
By Helen Wang, April 9, '12
I've tried to put together a list of the prize-winners and prize-winning titles for the Bing Xin Children's Literature Prize ( 冰心儿童文学奖). I've put it up under Resources for Translators. If anyone can improve upon this list, please do so!
By Helen Wang, April 8, '12
http://globetoglobe.shakespearesglobe.com/
Globe to Globe
Richard III - National Theatre of China (28-29 April 2012) - in Mandarin
Titus Andronicus - Tang Shu-wing Theatre Studio (3-4 May 2012) - in Cantonese
By Helen Wang, April 7, '12
http://hkupress.org/Common/Reader/Products/ShowProduct.jsp?Pid=1&Version=0&Cid=16&Charset=iso-8859-1&page=-1&key=9789888083527
Humour in Chinese Life and Letters – Classical and Traditional Approaches, ed. by Jocelyn Chey and Jessica Milner Davis, Hong Kong University Press, 2011.
By Helen Wang, April 6, '12
http://www.globaltimes.cn/NEWS/tabid/99/ID/703463/The-art-of-translation.aspx [via MCLC - kirk (denton.2@osu.edu) - Subject: new doc on translators]
'The art of translation' by Lu Qianwen, Global Times, 5 April 2012:
'A new documentary series profiling China's 30 most influential translators premiered in Beijing in late March. The documentary series, A Life-long Pursuit, focuses on China's older generation of translation specialists and highlights their impact on the world and Chinese culture.
By Helen Wang, April 4, '12
http://zackerium.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/review-bridge-of-birds-novel-of-ancient.html
Almost every day there is news of a novel set in China, either a new publication or a re-discovery. Although such titles are not 'Chinese literature in translation', they do throw some light on that question of 'what do readers like?' Here's the latest (it was written in the 80s)...
Barry Hughart's Bridge of Birds: A Novel of an Ancient China That Never Was (The Chronicles of Master Li and Number Ten Ox)
