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Don Mee Choi

ドン・ミー・チョイ

Choi Donmi

Profile

Gender
Female
Born
1962-01-01 （Seoul, South Korea）
Nationality
American
Languages
English, Korean
Residence History
Seoul (birthplace) → United States (education and early career) → Berlin, Germany (residence)

Career

Occupations
Poet, Translator
Active Years
1984-
Influenced By
Kim Hyesoon (influence via translation and collaboration)

Education

California Institute of the Arts
School of Art / Visual Arts / Performance
Degree: BFA ('84); MFA ('86)
Period: 1980s
Year of Graduation: 1986
Country: United States
Received BFA (1984) and MFA (1986)

Awards

Whiting Award
2011
Organization: Whiting Foundation
Result: 受賞
Lucien Stryk Asian Translation Prize
2012
Work: All the Garbage of the World, Unite!
Organization: Lucien Stryk Asian Translation Prize
Result: 受賞
Lannan Literary Fellowship
2016
Organization: Lannan Foundation
Result: 受賞
Griffin Poetry Prize
2019
Work: Autobiography of Death (by Kim Hyesoon; translated by Don Mee Choi)
Category: 翻訳
Organization: Griffin Poetry Prize Foundation
Result: 受賞
National Book Award for Poetry
2020
Work: DMZ Colony
Category: 詩
Organization: National Book Foundation
Result: 受賞
Guggenheim Fellowship
2021
Category: 詩
Organization: John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation
Result: 受賞
MacArthur Fellows Program
2021
Organization: MacArthur Foundation
Result: 受賞
Royal Society of Literature International Writer
2021
Organization: Royal Society of Literature
Result: 選出
PEN Heaney Prize (shortlisted)
2025
Work: Mirror Nation
Organization: PEN Heaney Prize
Result: ショートリスト入り

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

The Morning News is Exciting

2010 Poetry

An early collection featuring fragmentary and experimental poems.

linguistic experimentationfragments of daily life

Petite Manifesto

2014 Poetry (chapbook)

A chapbook containing experimental poems.

politicspersonal memory

Freely Frayed, ᄏ=q, & Race=Nation

2014 Poetry (chapbook)

Pieces addressing race, nationhood, and language in fragmentary texts.

racenationlanguage

Hardly War

2016 Poetry

A poetry collection with documentary elements exploring overlaps of history and personal history.

warmemoryfamily history

DMZ Colony

2020 Poetry

A layered poetry work addressing the history of the Korean peninsula and diasporic family history, employing archival material and documentary poetics.

diasporacolonial historymemory and archives

Mirror Nation

2024 Poetry

A recent collection that interrogates history and self through motifs of mirroring and repetition.

mirroringhistory and selfrepetition

Bibliography

  • The Morning News is Exciting (2010)
  • Petite Manifesto (2014)
  • Freely Frayed, ᄏ=q, & Race=Nation (2014)
  • Hardly War (2016)
  • DMZ Colony (2020)
  • Mirror Nation (2024)

Translations of Works

  • DMZ Colony (English)

Style & Themes

Literary Style
documentary poetryfragmentary and experimental language useuse of archival materials
Recurring Motifs
memorywar and colonizationfamily historydiaspora

Legacy

Don Mee Choi is an internationally recognized poet and translator working across poetic and translational practices. Her documentary use of archival materials and family history reconsiders intersecting histories of the Korean peninsula and the U.S. She has received major awards and is regarded as an important voice in contemporary poetry.

Academic Societies

  • Royal Society of Literature (selected as an International Writer)

Quotes

  • Poetry that interrogates "the overlapping histories of Korea and the U.S."
    Source: Wikipedia (summary) (2020)

Trivia

  • Born in Korea, educated in the U.S., currently based in Berlin, Germany.
  • Known for translations of Kim Hyesoon; won the Griffin Poetry Prize for translation.
  • Awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2021.