We are thrilled to share a new blog post on the Boston Translation Blog featuring the work of Yichen Zhou, a 2026 graduate of our BA program in Japanese Literature.
In her essay and translation collection, “ A Cuckoo Stopped By: Shiki’s Poems to Sōseki,” Yichen leverages her bilingual expertise in both Chinese and Japanese to explore the poetic dialogue between Masaoka Shiki and Natsume Sōseki, two giant figures of modern Japanese literature. Drawing from their correspondence, Yichen translated a selection of Shiki’s traditional kanshi (classical Chinese poems) and modern haiku into English, pairing them with insightful literary commentary. Her work highlights how these two friends drew upon ancient Chinese poetic conventions to navigate modern friendship and reshape modern Japanese poetry.
This project originated in Professor J. Keith Vincent’s LJ 360 Haiku course in Spring 2026 and was further refined over the summer.
Read Yichen’s translations and commentary on the Boston Translation Blog. Congratulations, Yichen!