The Magic Whip
Expect print media features and radio interviews: Wang Ping received a great deal of attention and gave many interviews for her nonfiction book Aching for Beauty: Footbinding in China. These poems expand upon those themes and we expect it will recieve similar attention. Wang Ping's poem inspired by a Chinese ritual to call home the souls of the dead was printed on the front page of the 9/11/02 Minneapolis Star Tribune's Variety section, commemorating the lives of those lost on September 11, 2001.
Wang Ping was born in Shanghai and grew up on a small island in the East China Sea. After three years spent farming in a mountain village commune, she attended Beijing University. In 1985 she left China to study in the United States, earning her PhD from New York University. She is the acclaimed author of the short story collection American Visa, the novel Foreign Devil, two poetry collections: Of Flesh & Spirit and The Magic Whip, and the cultural study Aching for Beauty: Footbinding in China.
