He was obliged to write clandestinely, never imagining he would have readers. -Duo Duo began to write poetry in the early 1970s when the Cultural Revolution was still in full swing. Duo Duo left China for a reading tour of England June 4th 1989, the morning after the Tiananmen massacre that he had witnessed. He continued to write throughout the 1980s, publishing in samizdat publications, and then more openly as the authorities relaxed their grip. The context of China, Duo Duo’s lived experience, is necessarily present in the poet’s imaginary, but it is diffused in a world-view that embraces all of modern humanity’s dilemmas, our increasing separation from nature, and our alienation from one another. Duo Duo’s poetic vision embraces a historical and political vision that is much more diverse, more global than that circumscribed by the confines of the last third of China’s twentieth century. Before leaving China, Duo Duo worked as a journalist. The exile, like the hybrid and other "in between" subjects, writes of China with the benefit of critical distance, but also writes with an exceptional perspective of wherever he finds himself. Generally associated with the other menglong (ambiguist) poets, such as Bei Dao and Yang Lian. His writing has been widely translated and published throughout the world, including two small selections of his work—in English—published in the UK and Canada. Gregory Lee currently lives in France and teaches at l’Universit
2007. Duo Duo currently lives and teaches in the Netherlands.