For English-language readers looking to read more Chinese works in translation, the question might arise of where to begin. Fortunately, there are several publications that include a special focus on contemporary Chinese literature.

Online, readers can find Chinese fiction through the Paper Republic, an online resource for Chinese literature in translation. The webpage contains links to individual translator and author biographies, as well as book descriptions and translation samples. There are also links to Pathlight, an English-language literary journal for contemporary Chinese literature in translation, as well as other periodicals. Browsing the website is relatively easy and would be a good start for readers unfamiliar with contemporary Chinese literature.

Asymptote is another excellent resource. It’s an online trimonthly journal, which features visual art together with many different forms of literature in translation. The website is organized with links to poetry, fiction, nonfiction, interviews and criticism, in addition to drama and an archive of past issues. Browsing the website is straightforward, and it is aesthetically pleasing, with most pieces accompanied by an author and translator introduction and an illustration, as well as, in the case of poetry, the original language in both printed and recorded form (in case you’d like to hear the way the original poem sounds).

For those with a taste for poetry, the beautiful Jintian poetry series published in book form by Zephyr Press is an excellent place to start. The text of the poems is presented in the original Chinese, with the English translation on the facing page. The books in the series focus on a Chinese poet, and include a foreword by the translator or translators, which gives information about the poet and his/her literary context. In the lovely I Can Almost See the Clouds of Dust, for instance, in addition to basic facts about poet, Yu Xiang’s life, we are given the translator, Fiona Sze-Lorrain’s, impressions of the quality and essence of Yu’s work.

Although Ken Liu’s forthcoming China Dreams will present contemporary Chinese science fiction stories in translation in an anthology format, it is not due out until 2016. As of now, there is no one-stop source for contemporary Chinese science fiction in translation. However, if interested in this genre, one can avail oneself of Liu’s excellent article of the same name in Clarkesworld magazine, which not only introduces Chinese science fiction to English-language readers but also includes a large selected bibliography of Chinese science fiction titles in translation, with links to their publication venues in most cases. Included in this list is the 2012 issue of Renditions, which presented both contemporary and earlier science fiction pieces in translation. Also included are works by Xia Jia, who describes her own work as ‘porridge science fiction.’ Her stories are affecting, and feature vivid, hyper-real imagery. In both ‘A Hundred Ghosts Parade Tonight’ and ‘Tongtong’s Summer,’ Xia Jia raises questions of what it means to be embodied in a technological society, and what constitutes ‘real’ experience, and gives a window into the psyche of China’s aging population and how technology might be used to assist in the care and self-efficacy of the elderly

One final resource for readers is the University of Oklahoma’s Chinese Literature Today. Their website offers a sample of the magazine’s contents; some of the articles are linked from the table of contents and give the reader a taste of the full text, available in print or digital form by subscription. I found the website relatively easy to navigate, and the content was diverse, including poetry, short fiction pieces, literary critiques and interviews with literary scholars. Much of the work is by well-established translators, and it is appended by the Chinese texts. This magazine should be useful to general readers and specialists alike with its excellent pieces, as well as its interesting critical content.

We are thrilled that that Absinthe, which has been devoted to European literature, is now bringing contemporary Chinese literature to its readers. We hope this space in which art speaks to art will be the beginning of a rich literary conversation.