Yann Lovelock

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Yann Lovelock BEM (born 11 February 1939) is an English writer and translator who later became a Buddhist interfaith worker.

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Literary career

Yann Lovelock was born in Birmingham on 11 February 1939. His career as a poet, editor and reviewer began while he was studying at St Edmund Hall, Oxford. [1] For the most part his writing appeared from small presses and in little magazines. He was associated in particular with Peter Mortimer's Iron, Nick Toczek's The Little Word Machine, and Ian Robinson's Oasis, all of which he helped edit. [2] In Europe he served as vice-chair of Freundkreis Poesie Europe (Frankfurt am Main, 1977–97) and was English editor of its literary annual. [3] As a critic and translator, his main specialisation was in the poetry of the Low Countries and he was commissioned to write a study of modern Dutch poetry in translation, The Line Forward (1984). Among Dutch-language poets he helped edit and translate have been Guido Gezelle, Anton van Wilderode, Hugo Claus, Willem Roggeman, Stefaan van den Bremt and H.C. ten Berge. His allied interest was in modernist poetry in Belgian Romance dialects, of which he edited and translated two anthologies, The Colour of the Weather (1980) and In the Pupil's Mirror (1997). In 1995 he was elected a corresponding member of the Belgian "dialect academy", La Société de Langue et de Littérature Wallonnes. [4] During the 1970s he was commissioned by UNESCO to co-translate several works from Eastern languages. Later translations have included selections from Marianne Larsen (Denmark), Gilles Cyr (Quebec) and Serge Pey (France).

Buddhist and interfaith involvement

The other side of Lovelock's life centred on his involvement with Buddhism. Between 1982 and 2005 he was responsible for the educational outreach and interfaith work of Birmingham Buddhist Vihara; afterwards he served as Secretary to Birmingham Maha Vihara. [5] With Ajahn Khemadhammo, he co-founded the Buddhist Prison Chaplaincy Organisation in 1984 and served as its Co-ordinator until 1995. [6] Since 2002 his national involvement in multi-faith activities has included serving on the executives of the National Association of Standing Advisory Councils on Religious Education and of The Inter Faith Network; as interfaith co-ordinator for the Network of Buddhist Organisations; and as Buddhist vice-chair of the Council of Dharmic Faiths. At regional level he was vice-chair of the West Midlands Faiths Forum and served as alternate faith member on the West Midlands Regional Assembly. In 2012 he was awarded the British Empire Medal for his services to community cohesion and inter-faith relations in the West Midlands. [7] Between 2012-2014, Lovelock was part of the editorial team of The Encyclopedia of Buddhist Arts at the Fo Guang Shan main monastery in Taiwan. There he had special responsibility for the four volumes devoted to sculpture, [8] and in April 2019 took part in the encyclopedia's academic presentation during the "Expressions of the Dharma" conference at Hsi Lai Temple, Los Angeles. [9]

Bibliography

General

Poetry

Translations

Others

"In the Interstices of Indra's Net: a setting for the poetry of George Oppen", pp. 71–83.
"Introduction", pp. 13–20
"Afterword – The Tao of Bert Schierbeek", pp. 81–86
"Translating the Untranslatable", pp. 188–213.
"Pearce Thru His Places", pp. 42–50
"Furor Apollonis: an occupational disease", pp. 130–52
"Postface – Fixing the Fractions", pp. 97–105
"Bluejeans & Gown": The Beat scene in Oxford, 1959–62, pp. 477–492.
"Do vête, do nwâr: Movements of renewal in Belgian dialect poetry in the 19th and 20th centuries", pp. 266–279.
”The Wheel of Generation: some notes on the spread of the doctrine of reincarnation”, pp. 153–167
"A l’autre côté du tunnel le TGV ralentit : de la traduction des dialectes belges", pp. 307–316
"The Origin and Symbolism of a Buddhist Pagoda", pp. 150–154

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References

  1. St Edmund Hall Writers Directory
  2. Wolfgang Görtschacher, "Contemporary views of the little magazine scene", Poetry Salzburg, Austria, ISBN   978-3-901993-06-0. "Eyeless in Gaza, Legless in Ratstadt", pp. 623–645.
  3. Karl-Heinz Knauff, Unterwegs in Europa, Via Regia 17, 1994.
  4. "Publications sélectives", SLLW.
  5. BBMV site
  6. Boekbesprekingen.nl
  7. BBC News, 16 June 2012.
  8. EBA Editorial Team
  9. Institute for the Study of Humanistic Buddhism

Poems online: