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January 21, 2006
Notes from the Singapore Writers Festival 2005
Jerome Kugan reoprts from the festival what it means to be an Asian and what it means to be a writer Asian.
And, anyway, what does it mean to be an ‘Asian writer’? Whose/which Asia are we talking about here? The Asia that stands as the Exotic Other to the Occidental Imagination (fantasy), or the Asia that is lived through the spectre of the Asian whose Other is an Occidental concept of Asianness (banana insecurity/double fantasy). Most of us who live in Asia don’t even consider ourselves Asians until we find ourselves in a context that demands us to identify ourselves as such (a freakshow in the literary circus...What would it mean to a writer based in Malaysia or Singapore? Here we are, trying to point out the fact that we are a people constantly in flux, have always been so, and will continue to be. Goddammit, globalisation happens in the backwaters of the Third World too. And yet boxes await us.
Thai writer Rattawut Lapcharoensap almost rectified the situation by relating his experience as a writer living in between two worlds, not only geographically and culturally, but morally. Yet he did not – could not – deny the contention that perhaps what made his collection of short stories Sightseeing an American literary success was partly because he is seen in the American lit scene as a cultural (or more accurately, ethnic) anomaly.
Almost the same can be said of Wei Hui whose Asian chic lit style came across strongly in her anecdotes and exuberant if bimbo-ish personality. Here is an example of an Asian writer who unashamedly mines the exotic Asian factor for her books; practically throwing the explosive sex and Zen swill at the heathens. Good for her that she can do it and still look fabulous (what more can one ask for?). But alas, the testimonials left a metallic taste in my mouth (a lot more, it seems).
read it here.
Posted by Soniah Kamal at January 21, 2006 10:15 AM
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Posted by: Anonymous at January 21, 2006 10:15 AM
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