World Literature from Taiwan Book Series
Taiwan is a vibrant, multi-ethnic archipelago with deep Austronesian roots. Its history is a complex tapestry woven from ancient indigenous origins, European colonial encounters, and successive eras of rule by the Qing Dynasty, Imperial Japan, and the Chinese Nationalist Party. Since emerging from martial law into a flourishing democracy, the islands have witnessed a vigorous cultural turn toward the local and the indigenous.
Today, Taiwan is a vital sanctuary for literary production, offering unparalleled freedom for Sinophone voices. Acting as a global literary hub, Taiwan offers a stage for writers from Hong Kong, China, and the worldwide diaspora. This series captures Taiwan’s integral role in world literature, looking beyond ethno-nationalist definitions. Intended for a general audience, our books constitute a dynamic forum for creative and critical voices, introducing the English-speaking world to the diverse literature and thought created in, related to, or influenced by Taiwan.
Forthcoming titles:
Isle of Movement: Migration and Shifting Ethnoscapes in Taiwan edited by Hsieh Hsin-Chin, Adina Zemanek
and Chang Ti-Han
Isle of All Beings: Changing Ecologies in Taiwan edited by Zhan Min-Xu, Chang Ti-Han and Hsieh Hsin-Chin
The Blue Hour by Mabel Chou
The Khitans’ Roses: Selected Poems of Hsi Muren by Hsi Muren (席慕容), translated by Tze-lan Deborah Sang
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- Poetry, World Literature, World Literature from China, World Literature from Taiwan
for now I am sitting here growing transparent
- by Yau Ching 游靜 Translated by Chenxin Jiang Finalist for the 2026 PEN Award for Poetry in Translation. Winner of the 2020 Words Without Borders and Academy of American Poetry translation contest for now I am sitting here growing transparent brings together some of Yau Ching’s most resonant poems in a bilingual mid-career retrospective that reveals a writer working…
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- Academic, Humanities and Social Sciences, World Literature from Southeast Asia, World Literature from Taiwan
Isle of All Beings: Changing Ecologies in Taiwan
- edited by Zhan Min-Xu, Chang Ti-Han and Hsieh Hsin-Chin Isle of All Beings: Changing Ecologies in Taiwan explores how natural disasters and ecological disturbances have shaped Taiwan's environments, societies, and cultural imagination. Bringing together scholarly essays and literary works, the volume examines earthquakes, mudslides, floods, droughts, and tsunamis, tracing how different forms of environmental disruption are experienced, represented, and understood in…
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- Academic, Humanities and Social Sciences, World Literature from Southeast Asia, World Literature from Taiwan
Isle of Movement: Migration and Shifting Ethnoscapes in Taiwan
- edited by Hsieh Hsin-Chin, Adina Zemanek and Chang Ti-Han Isle of Movement: Migration and Shifting Ethnoscapes in Taiwan explores how migration has continuously reshaped Taiwan's ethnic landscape and cultural identities across different historical periods. Bringing together literary works and scholarly essays, this anthology traces the movements of Japanese settlers and Taiwan-born Japanese, Mainlanders in military dependents' villages, Malaysian Chinese intellectuals…
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- Academic, Humanities and Social Sciences, World Literature from Southeast Asia, World Literature from Taiwan
Isle of the Austronesian: Indigeneity, World-Making and Taiwan
- edited by Chang Ti-Han and Hsieh Hsin-Chin Isle of the Austronesian: Indigeneity, World-Making and Taiwan brings together powerful literary and scholarly voices to explore the dynamic contours of Indigeneity in Taiwan. This anthology features poetry, stories, and essays that reflect on land, memory, identity, and ecological belongings. Highlighting perspectives often overlooked-queer, urban, and female Indigenous experiences-it showcases the richness and…
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- World Literature, World Literature from Europe, World Literature from Taiwan
The Blue Hour
- GBP 12.99
- by Mabel Chou On an Island shrouded in the Fog of Eternity, no one remembers their dreams-and no one has ever heard of history. Then Moony finds a forbidden book. Its pages describe humanity's wars and atrocities-a thing called the Second World War-but the final pages have been torn away. She will never know who won. Tucked inside is…
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- Poetry, World Literature, World Literature from Taiwan
Daughters
- by Ling Yü Translated by Nicholas Y. H. Wong Their swimming postures are unique Some foam at the mouth, some angle their feet to the sky But they don’t die In the dauntlessly crashing waves ------From Daughter W Ling Yü’s lyrical and rhythmic poetry invites readers into meditations on feminine roles, family values, and the delicate balance between individuals and society.…
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- World Literature, World Literature from Southeast Asia, World Literature from Taiwan
Tomato Avenue and Other Coming-of-Age Stories
- by Lien Mingwei Translated by Brandon Yen ‘Summer is coming to a close even before it begins. I’m all alone on Tomato Avenue, watching sunlight softly unfurling into a luminous, mysterious river which flows through the long, long thoroughfare, through children who are shedding tears. For a moment, I feel like a little boat, bound for an unknown destiny.’ Tomato…
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- World Literature, World Literature from Taiwan
A Platform with No Timetable
- Collection of Short Stories by Huang Chun-Ming Translated from the Chinese by Howard Goldblatt A Taiwanese businessman is forced to serve as a pimp for a group of seven Japanese men in his home village of Chiao-hsi. The formerly well-respected Ah-Le and his wife bear the weight of shame that his impotence has brought upon them. A young man drives…
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- Poetry, World Literature, World Literature from Taiwan
Bone Skin Flesh 骨皮肉
- by Yen Ai Lin 顏艾琳 Translated by Jenn Marie Nunes Bone Skin Flesh by Yen Ai-lin, first published in Chinese in 1997, now appears in a bilingual edition with its first English translations by Jenn Marie Nunes. A landmark in contemporary Taiwanese poetry, these poems revel in the feminine-its desires, violences, and contradictions-through language that is visceral, imagistic, and unrelenting.…
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- World Literature, World Literature from Taiwan
Raise the Bottles
- Collection of Short Stories by Huang Chun-Ming Translated from the Chinese by Howard Goldblatt From trains to classrooms to mountains, in this collection of short stories, Huang Chunming traverses across the Taiwan island to deliver his readers bewitching stories of love, loss, and family. Each story crafts a poignant snapshot depicting private minds in public spaces. A young man has…
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- World Literature, World Literature from Taiwan
The Tree Fort on Carnation Lane
- by Horace Ho Daniel Fang’s mid-thirties are marked by the birth of his daughter and the death of a childhood friend. His daughter’s birth and infancy reminds him of his own boyhood, his friend’s death of the good times he had with back in their old neighbourhood. They were the kids from the wrong side of the temple, kids…
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- World Literature, World Literature from Taiwan, Young-Adult
The Ventriloquist’s Daughter
- by Lin Man-Chiu Found in Translation Anthology 2015 After the tragic death of Liur's mother, her father, a thwarted artist working as a doctor in the family hospital, is overcome with grief. He goes to study in America, leaving six-year-old Liur in the care of her grandparents, promising to return with a special doll for her. But instead of…
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