This week, our writers bring you the latest news from Hong Kong, Sweden, and Malaysia. In Hong Kong, a commemoration of the 700th anniversary of Dante’s death and Voice & Verse Poetry Magazine talks are some of the live events that have started taking place again; in Sweden, Axel Lindén was awarded the Aftonbladet annual literary award; and in Malaysia, Catherine Menon’s debut novel, Fragile Monsters, has been released in English translation, while the Malaysian Poetry Writing Fortnight (MPWF) has been launched. Read on to find out more!
Charlie Ng, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Hong Kong
As the fourth wave of the COVID-19 outbreak slows in Hong Kong, cultural and literary activities have begun to return to live venues. Local bilingual poetry magazine Voice & Verse Poetry Magazine organised a poetry talk on the theme of wine, titled “If Our Poetry is Wine” on April 10 in Lai Chi Kok. Poet Chan Li-choi and translator Ko Chung-man were invited to share their views on poetry and wine. Participants could enjoy wine together with the guests to celebrate the inspirations endowed by Dionysus.
Hong Kong’s Dante Alighieri Society hosted three sessions of “Dante Alighieri Flash Readings” to commemorate the 700th anniversary of the death of the great Italian poet. Italian actress Nicole Garbellini and local actor Marc Ngan were invited to give lectures on Dante’s The Divine Comedy, covering the three cantiche: Paradiso, Purgatorio, and Inferno. The events took place at landmarks of the Central and Western District, and Causeway Bay to engage the public in the appreciation of the famous medieval poet.
From March 2 to April 14 artist Michael Leung’s exhibition “Publishing (To Find Each Other)” was open to the public at the Floating Projects in Wong Chuk Hang. The interdisciplinary exhibition explores the themes of publication and storytelling. Throughout March, Michael Leung also hosted sessions to discuss his experience of hybrid publishing with the audience. Workshops were held by the artist to produce zines with participants.
As well as face-to-face events, going online is still a popular way to stay connected with the public however. Local arts centre MILL6 Foundation is organising an online discussion forum, “Poetic Emergences: Organisation through Textile and Code,” to explore cross-boundary aspects of textile and weaving, including technology, art-making, and social mediation.
Eva Wissting, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Sweden
Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet has announced that its annual literary award will go to Axel Lindén this year. Lindén’s first book, Fårdagboken, was published in 2017 and translated into English by Frank Perry as Counting Sheep: Reflections and Observations of a Swedish Shepherd in 2018 (Atria Books). It was followed up in 2020 by Tillstånd, with the English title Every Other Pine, Every Other Fir. The jury’s motivation is that Lindén’s authorship “takes on the largest questions of our time by turning away from the center and all literary salons, towards the rural areas, the animals, the forest, and the self-doubt.”
Another Swedish literary prize in the news this week is Radio Sweden’s Short Story Prize. Five writers have been nominated: Karin Smirnoff, whose praised debut novel, My Brother, was recently published in Anna Paterson’s English translation by Pushkin Press; playwright and writer Gustav Tegby; poet and yoiker Simon Issát Marainen; director and screenwriter Björn Runge; and writer and gender studies scholar Margareta Lindholm. Readings of the short stories are available online and any listener can cast their vote by April 18.
Another institution known for its literary awards in Sweden is the Swedish Academy, whose newest member is writer and journalist Ingrid Carlberg. She takes over chair number five after linguist, literary historian, and translator Göran Malmqvist. Carlberg is best known for her biographies of the Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg and of Alfred Nobel, but she has also published multiple children’s and YA novels. In her new role at the Academy, Carlberg hopes to contribute to encouraging more people to read and write, as well as guarding the nuanced and reflective in the public discourse. With her own experience in nonfiction she hopes to emphasize the importance of fact-based narratives at this particular time.
Kwan Ann Tan, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Malaysia
April welcomes National Poetry Writing Month, an event where poets come together to try and write a poem each day for thirty days. Building on popular initiatives from our E/SEA neighbours that nurture poetic voices like SingPoWriMo and KongPoWriMo, Shameera Lin Nair and Kwan Ann Tan have created the Malaysian Poetry Writing Fortnight (MPWF), which aims to give Malaysian poets a place to share and grow their work, while simultaneously offering those who don’t want to write the change to read the amazing range of poetic voices we have locally.
While it is undeniable that there is a lineage of great Malaysian poets—Muhammad Haji Salleh, Ee Tiang Hong, Shirley Geok-Lin Lim, and Usman Awang come to mind immediately—as well as a strong base of contemporary spoken word poets, the endeavours of our current generation are not formed around any kind of solid community. Many are mainly focused on getting published in journals or magazines based in the US, the UK, or even Canada and Australia. MPWF hopes to encourage the development of a more varied contemporary literary scene and ultimately revitalise the ways in which we think about Malaysian poetry. Additionally, this a pilot project which will hopefully springboard into a full-fledged Malaysian Poetry Writing Month next year!
Turning to prose and narrative fiction, Catherine Menon’s debut novel, Fragile Monsters, has been released with Penguin UK. Set in rural Malaysia, the novel deals with family history, trauma, and reconciling with the past. In an interview with the Guardian, Menon says that she chose to try and “represent the emotional truth” of Malaysian history, coming together to represent a multigenerational, international narrative.
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