Li Po is generally considered to be one of the most important poets of Chinese history. Writing in an age ripe with poetic talent, including Tu Fu and Wang Wei, Li Po stood out among his peers. As Burton Watson writes in his introduction to the poet in The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, "It was some centuries before the true worth of Tu Fu's work was acknowledged, but Li Po's poetry seems to have gained immediate recognition." Watson goes on to observe, "Li Po's distinction lies in the fact that he brought an unparalleled grace and eloquence to his treatment of traditional themes, a flow and grandeur that lifts his work far above the level of mere imitations of the past."

While he has been famous in China all along, Li Po was practically unknown in America until the twentieth century. There were a few...