Don Mee Choi is a

Korean-American Korean Americans () are Americans of full or partial Korean ethnic descent. While the broader term Overseas Korean in America () may refer to all ethnic Koreans residing in the United States, the specific designation of Korean American impli ...

poet and translator.

Life

Don Mee Choi was born in

Seoul Seoul, officially Seoul Special Metropolitan City, is the capital city, capital and largest city of South Korea. The broader Seoul Metropolitan Area, encompassing Seoul, Gyeonggi Province and Incheon, emerged as the world's List of cities b ...

, South Korea, educated in the United States, and now lives in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

, Germany. Choi's works of documentary poetry draw on family history as well as archival material to interrogate "the overlapping histories of Korea and the U.S." In addition to her own poetry, she is a prolific translator of modern Korean women poets, including several books by

Kim Hyesoon Kim Hyesoon (; born 26 October 1955) is a South Korean poet. She was the first woman poet to receive the Kim Su-yeong Literature Award, Midang Literary Award, Contemporary Poetry Award, and Daesan Literary Awards. She has also received the Gri ...

Awards

* 2011:

Whiting Award The Whiting Award is an American award presented annually to ten emerging writers in fiction, nonfiction, poetry and drama Drama is the specific Mode (literature), mode of fiction Mimesis, represented in performance: a Play (theatre), play, ...

* 2012:

Lucien Stryk Asian Translation Prize The Lucien Stryk Asian Translation Prize is a prize that recognizes the best translation into English of book-length texts of Asian poetry or Zen Buddhism. It was established by an anonymous donor in 2010, and is named for Lucien Stryk, the America ...

for ''All the Garbage of the World, Unite!'' by Kim Hyesoon * 2016:

Lannan Literary Fellowship The Lannan Literary Awards are a series of awards and literary fellowships given out in various fields by the Lannan Foundation. Established in 1989, the awards are meant "to honor both established and emerging writers whose work is of exceptional ...

Award * 2019:

Griffin Poetry Prize The Griffin Poetry Prize is a Canadian poetry award. It was founded in 2000 by businessman and philanthropist Scott Griffin. Before 2022, two separate awards went to one Canadian and one international poet who writes in the English language. I ...

Award for translation of ''Autobiography of Death'' from the Korean written by Kim Hyesoon * 2020:

National Book Award for Poetry The National Book Award for Poetry is one of five annual National Book Awards, which are given by the National Book Foundation to recognize outstanding literary work by US citizens. They are awards "by writers to writers".

for ''DMZ Colony'' * 2021:

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Grant (money), grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon Guggenheim, Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon indiv ...

Poetry * 2021:

MacArthur Fellows Program The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and colloquially called the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the MacArthur Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to typically between 20 and ...

*2021:

Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820 by King George IV to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 800 Fellows, elect ...

International Writer

Works

Books

* ''The Morning News is Exciting'',

Action Books Action books is an independent press housed at the English Department at University of Notre Dame. The editors are Johannes Göransson and Joyelle McSweeney. The press publishes form-breaking and hybrid work with a focus on texts in translation ...

, 2010, * ''Petite Manifesto'', Vagabond Press, 2014 (chapbook) * ''Freely Frayed,ᄏ=q, & Race=Nation,'' Wave Books, 2014 (chapbook) * ''Sky Translation'', Goodmorning Menagerie A Chapbook Press, n.d. (chapbook) * ''Hardly War'',

Wave Books Wave Books (established 2005) is an American independent press focusing on the publication of poetry, with a focus on innovative, contemporary poetry and poetry in translation. Books published by Wave have been finalists for and winners of the Pu ...

, 2016 * ''

DMZ Colony ''DMZ Colony'' is a 2020 poetry collection by Korean Americans, Korean American poet and translator Don Mee Choi, published by Wave Books. Centered around the Korean War, the book combines poetry with other forms of media, such as photographs, dra ...

'', Wave Books, 2020 * ''Mirror Nation'', Wave Books, (Publication date 4/2/24)

Translations

* ''Mommy Must Be a Fountain of Feathers'' by Kim Hyesoon, Action Books, 2005 * ''Anxiety of Words: Contemporary Poetry by Korean Women'',

Zephyr Press Chicago Review Press, or CRP, is a U.S. book publisher and an independent company founded in 1973. Chicago Review Press publishes approximately 60 new titles yearly under eight imprints: Chicago Review Press, Lawrence Hill Books, Academy Chicago, ...

, 2006 * ''All the Garbage of the World, Unite!'' by Kim Hyesoon, Action Books, 2011 * ''Sorrowtoothpaste Mirrorcream'' by Kim Hyesoon,

, 2014 * ''I'm OK, I'm Pig!'' by Kim Hyesoon,

Bloodaxe Books Bloodaxe Books is a British publishing house specializing in poetry. History Bloodaxe Books was founded in 1978 in Newcastle upon Tyne by Neil Astley, who is still editor and managing director. Bloodaxe moved its editorial office to Northumbe ...

, 2014 * ''Autobiography of Death'' by Kim Hyesoon, Bloodaxe Books, 2018 (winner of the 2019

) * ''Ahn Hak-sŏp #4'' by Ahn Hak-sŏp and Don Mee Choi, The Green Violin, 2018 (chapbook) * '' Yi Sang: Selected Works'' by

Yi Sang Kim Haegyŏng (; September 23, 1910 – April 17, 1937), also known by his art name Yi Sang (), was a writer and poet who lived in Korea under Japanese rule. Although he was a poet, he did not receive specialized education in Korean language or ...

, ed. Don Mee Choi,

, 2020

Anthology

*Yasuhiro Yotsumoto Ming Di Don Mee Choi, Shuntaro Tanikawa, Hyesoon Kim, ''Trilingual Renshi'', Vagabond Press, 2015,

References

External links

* Kathleen Rooney
Hardly War,' by Don Mee Choi"
(review), ''The New York Times'', April 22, 2016.
Profile at the Whiting Foundation
21st-century American poets Living people Year of birth missing (living people) MacArthur Fellows 21st-century Korean poets 21st-century American translators Korean translators National Book Award winners California Institute of the Arts alumni {{US-poet-stub