Xin Qiji 辛奇疾 (1140–1207) was born in North China in the city of Jinan 濟南. North China had been invaded and conquered several decades earlier by a semi-nomadic people known as Jurchens, and the Song dynasty court was forced to relocate to Hangzhou 杭州, south of the Yangzi. As a young man, Xin Qiji led an army of ten thousand fellow Northerners in fighting the Jurchens. His exploits have become legendary, and he is easily the most heroic Chinese poet who ever lived. When he was 21, he finally traveled south with his army and was welcomed by the Song emperor Gaozong 高宗. He was hoping to enlist the Song court in fighting the Jurchens, but the rulers of what was now called the Southern Song dynasty were more interested in continuing the indulgent way of life that had led to their loss of North China. Xin was eventually forced into early retirement at the age of forty-one and spent the last twenty-six years of his life living in the mountainous area of Jiangxi 江西 province near the town of Shangrao 上饒 and writing poems, especially lyric poems, poems composed to melodies—melodies, however, that have been lost. The following is a small selection from the 120 translations (of his 630 lyric poems) I will be publishing with Copper Canyon at a date yet to be determined.
