Chou Meng-tieh (; 29 December 1921 – 1 May 2014) was a Taiwanese poet and writer. He lived in

Tamsui District Tamsui District (Hokkien POJ: ''Tām-chúi''; Hokkien Tâi-lô: ''Tām-tsuí''; Mandarin Pinyin: ''Dànshuǐ'') is a seaside district in New Taipei, Taiwan. It is named after the Tamsui River; the name means "fresh water". The town is popul ...

New Taipei City New Taipei City is a special municipality located in northern Taiwan. The city is home to an estimated population of 3,974,683 as of 2022, making it the most populous city of Taiwan, and also the second largest special municipality by area, b ...

Biography

He was born Chou Chi-shu in Xichuan County,

Henan Henan (; or ; ; alternatively Honan) is a landlocked province of China, in the central part of the country. Henan is often referred to as Zhongyuan or Zhongzhou (), which literally means "central plain" or "midland", although the name is al ...

in 1921. In 1948, Chou joined the China Youth Corps and was forced to drop out of school. He was sent to

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

following the defeat of Chiang Kai-shek's army in the

Chinese Civil War The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led government of the Republic of China and forces of the Chinese Communist Party, continuing intermittently since 1 August 1927 until 7 December 1949 with a Communist victory on m ...

, leaving his wife, two sons, and daughter behind in

Mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...

. He settled in

. Chou started writing in the '' Central Daily News'' and publishing poetry in 1952. He retired from the army in 1955. In 1959, he started selling books outside the

Cafe Astoria The Cafe Astoria () is the first Western-style bakery in Taiwan. It is located in the Zhongzheng District of Taipei, Taiwan, on Wuchang Street across from the City God Temple. History In October 1949, 18-year-old Archibald Chien became business ...

Taipei Taipei (), officially Taipei City, is the capital and a special municipality of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Located in Northern Taiwan, Taipei City is an enclave of the municipality of New Taipei City that sits about southwest of the ...

and published his first book of poetry entitled ''Lonely County''. Chou's book stall became a gathering spot for well-known writers, such as Huang Chun-ming,

Pai Hsien-yung Kenneth Hsien-yung Pai (; born July 11, 1937) is a Chinese writer from Taiwan who has been described as a "melancholy pioneer". He was born in Guilin, Guangxi at the cusp of the Second Sino-Japanese War. Pai's father was the Kuomintang (KMT) ge ...

, and Sanmao. Chou wrote often on the subjects of time, life, and death, and was influenced by Buddhism. In 1980, the American magazine ''Orientations'' praised him as the "Amoy Street Prophet". During the same year, he was forced to close his book stall in front of Cafe Astoria due to gastric ulcer surgery. He was the first recipient of the National Culture and Arts Foundation Literature Laureate Award in 1997. Chou died of pneumonia in New Taipei City on May 1, 2014 at the age of 92. His funeral was held twelve days later, with writers and politicians including

Chang Show-foong Chang Show-foong (; born 29 March 1941) is a Taiwanese environmentalist, writer, and politician. She was elected to the Legislative Yuan in 2012 and served until her resignation in March 2013. Education and literary career Chang is a native of ...

Lung Ying-tai Lung Ying-tai (; born 13 February 1952 in Kaohsiung) is a Taiwanese essayist and cultural critic. She occasionally writes under the pen name 'Hu Meili' (). Lung's poignant and critical essays contributed to the democratization of Taiwan and as t ...

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, and in attendance. A bilingual selection from Chou's poetry with English translations by Lloyd Haft, ''Zhou Mengdie: 41 Poems'', was published by Azoth Books (Taiwan) in 2022.

References

External links

''Frontier Taiwan: an anthology of modern Chinese poetry''
on

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Chou, Meng-tieh Taiwanese poets Republic of China poets 2014 deaths 1921 births Poets from Henan 20th-century poets Chinese Civil War refugees Military personnel of the Republic of China Taiwanese people from Henan Writers from Nanyang, Henan