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Gary Snyder (middle) in Reed College
College and Graduate
School Phase

Gary Snyder started to study East
Asian cultures after he entered
Reed College in 1947. As a young
student in anthropology and
literature, he took East Asian
History courses and widely read
about Chinese and Japanese
cultures. He was guided into Asian
Arts by Ernest Fenollosa’s Epochs
of Chinese and Japanese Art; he was
also greatly in uenced by Ezra
Pound’s and Arther Waley’s
translations of Chinese poetry and
philosophical masterpieces.

Gary also developed an appreciation
for the use of pen and brush. He
studied under Lloyd Reynolds who
was “a remarkable calligrapher in
the Renaissance Italic mode.” And
he also studied with his Chinese-
American classmate who is a brush
calligrapher. These early exposure
to calligraphy built a foundation for
Gary to further study on Chinese
landscape in his later life.