Today on the blog I’m looking at something completely
different to the standard literature in translation, yes I occasionally dabble
in poetry reviews, however this time I’m looking at a journal, “Lontar – The
Journal of Southeast Asian Speculative Fiction”.
Issue number five was released earlier this month, and given
my recent forays into Indonesian literature I thought a read and a review of
other writers from the Southeast Asian region could be in order, using the
publication as a starting point to learning a little more about writers on the
fringe and possibly exploring some of their other works in a little more detail
at some later stage.
Issue number five contains works by thirteen writers, five
short stories, six poets, one nonfiction piece and a single “sequential art”
(Graphic art) entry. The publication weighs in at 104 pages and opens with an
editorial talking about the male/female representation in their publication to
date, with women writers constituting 41% of the works published to date. An
interesting aside is that for their unsolicited submissions female writers make
up 46% up the works received so at least one journal out there is ensuring a
balanced approach!
The fiction kicks off with a short story “No Man Is” by
Singapore poet, fictionist, playwright, journalist and activist Ng Yi-Sheng. It
is the story of a young man who decides to become an island – literally. He
floats in the ocean attempting to find a place to remain, to grown, take root,
but like all islands he is plundered and corrupted. A tale of identity with an
environmental message this mixes folklore and fantasy to open a world of
thought about our connection to the land we walk on.
The non-fiction entry is “Let The Stupid Ones Die” by Massimo
Morello an Italian Thai journalist, who travels to the Thailand/Laos border and
lives with a Buddhist monk, a retreat of sorts. However instead of the usual
romantic tales we normally read about such journeys, we have the reality of
living simply, the tepid water, the dirty surroundings, the rats, and the fear
of living in the rainforest:
The positive aspect of this
experience, as on certain trips to the rainforest earlier in my life, is the
progressive disappearance of individual needs. A kind of psychophysical Occam’s
Razor. According to the 14th century Franciscan friar by the same
name, the simplest explanation to a problem is usually the correct one, so more
complex and less probable hypotheses can be eliminated. This reducing down to
the essentials applies to one’s lifestyle – if we eliminate everything but the
indispensable, the body no longer feels the need for anything else. According
to the venerable monk – and especially according to Buddha – this means closing
the six doors of suffering, i.e. the five senses plus the mind. The doors lead
to desire, which should be eliminated in order to be free from dukkha, or suffering. But if you begin
to analyse the Four Noble Truths at the heart of Dharma, Buddha law and
teaching, things get too complicated. Let’s just get back to the Razor.
This is a Westerner’s view of the East, and the East feeding
off of the Westerner’s view – an interesting take on what we normally see as a
romantic retreat with a Buddhist monk.
“The Woman In The Coffee Shop” is a poem by Christina Sng
from Singapore. A mysterious woman with a “neck like the pale white/inner bark
of a young tree” and her hair onyx “held only/by a single wooden chopstick”
avenges the writer’s mother’s death.
“Moulding” by Cambodian poet Sokunthary Svay explores the mysterious apsaras of Angkor, the communist bullets
and the foreign tourists all in a one page poem. The introduction taken from
‘Angkor:A Guide to the Angkor Monuments’ “...the apsaras always appear on the
stone in the same pose derived from that of a flying figure…standing isolated from
the world on a lotus blossom or flying in the open air, they are the divine symbols
of joy.”
The graphic comic by Benjamin Chee from Singapore is about
eating mushrooms in an apocalyptic future. Joel Donato Jacob from the
Philippines, who is a mountain climbing vegan and a member of the Phillipines’
longest standing literary organisation has two poems, “A Marriage of Hybrids”
which involves a wedding of a ‘Tikbalang’ a mythical monster with the head and
hind quarters of a horse and the torso of a man, who abducts and through
sorcery, marries young women. The other poem is “Lambanâ” about a spirit that
manifests as motes of light that lead forest travellers astray and into peril.
We also have Gord Sellar (Canada/South Korea) presenting a
short story “The Spurned Bride’s Tears, Centuries Old, In The Rain” based on
Indonesian ‘Wayang Kulit’ (shadow puppet theatre) and the play ‘Mahabharata’.
The story is reimagined in the future between a street kid and a wealthy woman.
Will karma force the scornful fate?
The contributions I have mentioned above are only a
smattering of what is on offer and the Southeast Asian culture is always to the
fore in each of the works, with a melting pot of different themes and folklore
(for example a South Korean writing about Indonesian shadow puppet themes!!!).
A useful work in that exposure to different writers and styles is available without
having to purchase a full work of theirs before finding out it is not your
thing. I will personally be looking out for a number of writers whose work was
featured in this publication.
Source. Personal copy.
No comments:
Post a Comment