iz arhive leonarda cohena:

Dear Leonard Cohen:

I am Fan Hongsheng, the editor with Yilin Press, China, who wrote to you last time 
asking you questions about your book BEAUTIFUL LOSERS. Do you mind writing a letter 
(instead of a preface) to Chinese readers of your book which is to appear in several months? 
If you have some good reviews of BEAUTIFUL LOSERS, would you mind sending some to us? 

Sincerely yours,
Fan Hongsheng
Nanjing, China

A NOTE TO THE READER 

Dear Reader,

Thank you for coming to this book. It is an honor, and a surprise, to have the frenzied 
thoughts of my youth expressed in Chinese characters. I sincerely appreciate the efforts 
of the translator and the publishers in bringing this curious work to your attention. I hope 
you will find it useful or amusing. 

When I was young, my friends and I read and admired the old Chinese poets. Our ideas of love 
and friendship, of wine and distance, of poetry itself, were much affected by those ancient 
songs. Much later, during the years when I practiced as a Zen monk under the guidance of my 
teacher Kyozan Joshu Roshi, the thrilling sermons of Lin Chi (Rinzai) were studied every day. 
So you can understand, Dear Reader, how privileged I feel to be able to graze, even for a 
moment, and with such meager credentials, on the outskirts of your tradition. 

This is a difficult book, even in English, if it is taken too seriously. May I suggest that 
you skip over the parts you don't like? Dip into it here and there. Perhaps there will be a 
passage, or even a page, that resonates with your curiosity. After a while, if you are 
sufficiently bored or unemployed, you may want to read it from cover to cover. In any case, 
I thank you for your interest in this odd collection of jazz riffs, pop-art jokes, religious 
kitsch and muffled prayer ć an interest which indicates, to my thinking, a rather reckless, 
though very touching, generosity on your part. 

Beautiful Losers was written outside, on a table set among the rocks, weeds and daisies, 
behind my house on Hydra, an island in the Aegean Sea. I lived there many years ago. It was a 
blazing hot summer. I never covered my head. What you have in your hands is more of a sunstroke 
than a book. 

Dear Reader, please forgive me if I have wasted your time. 

Los Angeles, February 27, 2000

Leonard Cohen



Dear Leonard Cohen:

Thank you very much for your efforts. Your NOTE TO THE READERS is received. It is a interesting 
piece to Chinese readers, I think. Thank you indeed for your efforts. If you have something you 
need to tell me or if you have some requests, please do not hesitate to let me know.

Yours,
Fan Hongsheng