Mabel Lee.

About Mabel Lee

Mabel Lee is an Australian translator, best-known for her English renditions of fiction and essays by Nobel Prize-winning author Gao Xingjian. A third-generation Chinese-Australian born in Warialda, she taught Chinese literature and Asian studies at the University of Sydney, where she is now an Adjunct Professor. An Honorary Fellow of the Australian Society for Asian Humanities, she is among Australia's leading authorities on Chinese cultural affairs. Lee had already begun translation of the poems of Chinese writer, Yang Lian when she met Gao Xingjian, in Paris in 1991. After that meeting, Lee offered to translate Soul Mountain, a project which took seven years, and an additional two to find a publisher for the book in Australia. Following publication, Gao Xingjian became the first Chinese-language writer to win a Nobel Prize in Literature.