A Forest of Names

A Forest of Names presents a never-before-seen form of poetic translation that is in turns a haunting indictment of political corruption, a healing tribute to people whose names have been erased, and a stunning meditation on how the roots of language suggest a new path forward. When an earthquake in China toppled schools, burying the children inside, the Chinese government brutally prevented parents from learning who died, how many, and why—and forbid revealing the names of the children. Following artist Ai Weiwei's gathering of their names, at risk to his own safety, poet and artist Ian Boyden provides poetic meditations on them. His image-driven investigations of the etymologies of the names provide a new kind of translation, one that bridges the origins of language and what those origins grow to evoke. This haunting, heart-breaking, and ultimately triumphant book questions what it means to be human in an age where memory is too often treated as a crime, and what happens when language must become unforgettable.