Yang Lian was one of the original Misty Poets who reacted against the strictures of the Cultural Revolution. Born in Switzerland, the son of a diplomat, he grew up in Beijing and began writing when he was sent to the countryside in the 1970s. On his return co-founded the influential literary magazine Jintian (Today – now published in exile in Scandinavia). His work was criticised in China in 1983 and formally banned in 1989. He has lived in exile since 1989, when he organised memorial services for the dead of Tiananmen while in New Zealand. After spells in Australia, Germany and the USA, he settled in London. Translations of his poetry include three collections with Bloodaxe, Where the Sea Stands Still (1999), a Poetry Book Society Recommended Translation, Concentric Circles (2005), and Lee Valley Poems (2009), as well as Riding Pisces: Poems from Five Collections (Shearman, 2008), a compilation of earlier work.