"As an American ecocritic who has visited East Asia more than fifty times in the past twenty years, I am delighted to welcome this effort to introduce East Asian scholarship to Western readers. These fourteen voices represent one fascinating petal of the lotus flower of East Asian ecocriticism. I hope readers will take this volume as an invitation to continue learning about the diverse vernacular ecocritical perspectives in East Asia (and throughout the world). Good ideas should flow in many directions." - Scott Slovic, Professor, University of Idaho, USA and editor of ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment"This volume contributes to a reorienting of the transnational praxis of ecocriticism through a commingling of perspectives, theories, literary texts, and cultural phenomena. As a portent of even greater contributions in the future, these essays embody the best of an ethical ecocritical engagement." - Patrick D. Murphy, Professor and Chair, English, UCF, USA and author of Ecocritical Explorations in Literary and Cultural Studies and other works"Occidental activists and scholars will be surprised to discover how deeply East Asian thinkers have already gone in the field of ecocriticism. The environmental problems faced by Korea, Japan, and China are enormous. Writers and all other concerned people in these landscapes have seen it happening and are responding deeply and intelligently. This book is an eye-opener for all the rest of us." - Gary Snyder, Professor, UC Davis, USA"With original essays by speakers of Chinese, Hangul, Japanese and Taiwanese - who write compellingly in English - this collection reveals the specific geo-political and cultural situations that are shaping the aesthetics of the most revered and cutting-edge literatures being read by one-fourth of the world's population. These essays introduce the wild species thriving in the DMZ, a place studded with two million land mines, and explain the significance of the endangered pin
