Green is the mountains of Bergen, blue is the sea of Shanghai
Like gently picking wildflowers
Collecting poems from that place

This book is a collection of poems by a total of 14 poets, seven of whom are based in Bergen, Norway, and seven of whom are based in Shanghai, China.

The binding design, in which the words seem to permeate the body of the book, is a rare achievement. This book was created by a Chinese couple living in Norway, and I can't help but take my hat off to the talent and printing and binding skills that went into creating such a book.

The title "Poetry of Mountains and Seas" comes from the names of two cities. Bergen is located on the west coast of Norway and is known as a city rich in nature, surrounded by seven mountains. Meanwhile, Shanghai is one of the world's largest coastal port cities, towering over the sea. These two cities have something in common. Since ancient times, their ports have flourished as gateways for culture and finance with the outside world. They are also mecca for contemporary poetry, nurturing many poets. The project's planners, husband and wife Ben and Eley, who are themselves originally from Shanghai, noticed this commonality and launched an unprecedented project to connect these two cities, located at the eastern and western ends of the Eurasian continent, through poetry.

All poems in this book are bilingual, written in both Norwegian and Chinese. The translator is Ben (Ning Meng), an architect from Shanghai who lives in Norway. Ben has translated many Scandinavian works into Chinese over the past 10 years, including The Beatles, which was nominated for the Lu Xun Literary Prize in the Best Translation category in 2014, and the Swedish novel Alone. This book was his first attempt at back-translating from his native Chinese into Norwegian. Since it is difficult to completely reproduce the atmosphere and rhythm of the original text in translation, he also made an effort to include the original text and the translation side by side for readers who are knowledgeable in both languages. As a result, the book has been well received by readers in both countries.

The cover design was done by Chinese designer Pan Yanrong, who has won the Leipzig Best Book Design from All Over the World awards multiple times. The main text is bound with alternating green and blue colored paper. The green represents the mountains of Bergen and the blue the sea of Shanghai, and the color of the paper serves as an index, as the poet's attributes can be determined by the color of the paper. The intentionally torn part of the paper makes you want to stroke it with your fingertips. Its organic form is poetic, as if it were a living organism with a will of its own. Pan has this to say about this book: "Poetry of Mountains and Seas" is a collection of poems published for cultural exchange between the two cities of Bergen and Shanghai. In keeping with the temperament of each city, the mountains represent Bergen and the sea represents Shanghai. The design concept was developed based on the contents, and the structure is such that the green seen at the top represents mountains, the blue seen at the bottom represents water, and the boundary between the two colors that appears in the middle represents the horizon. All the text is printed in spot colors, allowing you to enjoy a consistent worldview throughout the book. The edges of the paper for the top part are specially treated to make it fluffy and eliminate straight lines, because we wanted to express the characteristic of poetry, which is to convey the "movement" of the heart through words. Particular care was taken in the selection of paper, and as a result, its lightness and texture have succeeded in enhancing the artistic quality of the object. In the case of this book, the structure and composition are both based on a very clear and rational logic, so the details are carefully designed to appeal to the emotional part of the book through sight and touch, so that the framework does not stand out. This book is not only a pleasure to read, but also a high-quality object that you will want to keep close at hand.

Fredrik Hagen, a Norwegian poet born in the 1990s, asks the reader in the preface: "Is there a correlation between poetry and the place where it was born?" He hopes that the reader will find the answer, or at least some clues, as they read through this collection of poems. There are two possible extreme answers to his question. One is that poetry is nothing more than a linguistic expression that springs from the human heart, without any influence from the place where it was written. Because of this, poetry is always universal and is not influenced by localities such as China or Norway. The other is that "place," including locality and environment, always plays a decisive role in poetry, and that a particular locality fundamentally determines not only "how" a poem is written, but also the poet's motivation, subject, and purpose for writing.

In the preface to her book "Reading the Heart of Poetry," poet Noriko Ibaraki wrote, "Good poetry has the power to free people's hearts. It also gently invites feelings of affection for all living things. Poetry in any country is the flower of the language of that country." In other words, the answer to Hagen's question seems to be that "a particular region fundamentally determines the motive, subject, and purpose of a poet's writing." It would be unreasonable to say that the place where a poem was born has no influence on its content. The fact that there are life forms that can only be born in a certain sea, flowers that can only grow in a certain land, and a poem that can only be written in a certain town can also be considered part of the workings of nature.

Winner of the Gold Award at the 2021 Norwegian Most Beautiful Book Awards.


Participating poets:
<Norway>
Tomas Espedal. 1961
Cecilie Løvei. 1951
Kristian Hæggernes. 1951
Henning H. Bergsvågs. 1974
Tora Sanden Døskeland. 1992
Katrine Heiberg. 1992
Fredrik Hagen. 1991

<Shanghai>
Xu Fucheng. 1970
Coast. 1965
Wang Chong. 1962
Hu Sang. 1981
1979
Bao Huiyi. 1985
Qin Sansheng. 1991

Kinakaal Forlag

Kinakaal is a publishing label of the China-Norway cultural exchange organization Northing. Its aim is to create new opportunities for dialogue between East Asian and Norwegian artists and to expand the possibilities of communication in various aspects of culture. Kinakaal means "Chinese cabbage" in Norwegian. Chinese cabbage is the most common vegetable in both Norway and China, and they thought it was a suitable icon that intuitively connects Norwegians and Chinese people. And Northing named the publishing house Kinakaal with the hope of discovering the hidden fragile connections between the two far-flung cultures.
https://www.northing.no/kinakaal-forlag

Kinakaal wishes to facilitate direct contact and cooperation between East-Asian and Norwegian artists and designers through book and design projects. With Kinakaal (Chinese cabbage), Northing wishes to open up new opportunities for conversations and collaborations between East-Asia and Norway, to explore various cultural dimensions, such as visual, independent, and academic culture, as well as less known cultural expressions.