Lee began by translating 33 poems by the Czech poet Antonin Bartusek after reading a Penguin edition of his poetry in English in the early 1970s. When he published his translations in the poetry journal Li in 1972, he wrote that “ foreign poems educate and nourish. ”
其實，早在 1970 年代閱讀一本英國企鵝版的《捷克詩選》後，他就開始翻譯其中捷克詩人巴茲謝克的 33 首詩，1972 年刊登在《笠》詩刊，「異國的詩提供學習，也帶來營養。」