Malaysian Poetry Idol

Some pictures from last night's poetry extravaganza at Wayang Kata IV at No Black Tie.

As usual the event was entertainingly compared by Jerome Kugan and Jasmine Low doing their famous double act.

Jerome also rolled up his sleeves and sang for us:

Jasmine read some of her poetry, and Shahrul Nizam read some pieces from his new collection If Only. (And was a lot less shy reading than I thought he'd be!)

Then the six poets competing for three places to go to the Singapore Writers' Festival in December:

Priya K.

Liyana Yusof

Bathsheba Zlikha Arsalan

Datuk Shan

Patricia Low

And ... oh my goodness, realised that I didn't get a photo of Divya KM Jiwa! My biggest apologies.

Members of the audience got to vote for their favourite. Daphne Lee, Pang Khee Teik, and I were the judges and we looked for those whose words had touched us most deeply. The standard overall was high (and I'm so happy to see how far these guys have come on, performing their work). A special commendation to Shan for making us laugh and Zlikha for her dazzling showmanship which involved several changes of clothing.

When the votes and our marks were tallied, the winners were Priya, Liyana and Divya. Well done, guys.

I missed some of the later stuff as I was hiding from all the cigarette smoke which was bringing back the hacking cough I thought I'd got rid of. But who was the woman with the truly astonishing singing voice? I want to buy her album! And who was the hip-hop poet? I want him for my readings later on!

Fallen Leaves

Young playwright Pat Low sent me information about her latest project, Fallen Leaves:

... a devised play exploring the memories, dreams and realities of people living with HIV/AIDS. Each story is written and performed by those who lived them, and we invite you to step into their world and into their lives through this mobile performance experience.

Fallen Leaves is a dreamscape where lives and stories swept to the fringes are collected gently as one. Their sounds chime with the stories of lives lived less ordinary.

Each performance will be followed by a post show talk with the company so that you can discover the process behind this production.

Full details on the Cloudbreak website.

The Young Ones

Would you believe our slam has made the papers yet again? This time it's mentioned in a very nicely written piece about our young performance poets by Syarifah Syaliza Alia in the Youth section of today's Star.

Syar interviews Sharanya (photo left, by Leon Wing), as well as Project OMG's Pat Low and Priya K (below) and Nicholas Wong.

I love Priya's can-do attitude, which is really Project OMG's whole attitude:

Anyone can hold a reading, even if I don’t like to admit it ... You just need the commitment, how much you’re willing to put into it.

Just do it lah, don't wait for permission.

And here's a quotable quote from Nic:

I think young writers nowadays are quite self-absorbed in their art ... They see it (their poetry) as a means of expressing themselves primarily and not see it as a collective responsibility to speak for others, to others.

If young guys like these represent the future of poetry in this country, then let's just say, it's in excellent hands.

Celebrating Voices

The second of Saturday's literary events was of course, "Readings" at Seksan's. And for me the event was all about ... what is an authentic Malaysian voice?

Yang-May Ooi read first, and poor thing had to compete a little against the rain. Thank goodness we're amplified now.

She decided to use her slot for an experiment. She had brought along a passage from the novel she is currently working on, Tianming Traviata, and she read the same piece written in two slightly different voices. The first very standard English, the second in identifiably Malaysian English. I enjoyed both versions, though the second sounded more natural to me and all but Eric Forbes seemed to agree when we took a vote afterwards.

I told Yang-May later that Shirley Lim had talked about having the same problem when she wrote Sister Swing, and it really is a big deal for local writers. (I do so badly want to write at length on this but haven't yet got round to it.)

Talking about capturing voice, Datuk Shan does a great job of getting Indian voices down to the page and playing with them for comic effect as in the story about Mrs. Sarjit Singh getting teased for her terrible mispronunciations.

Zhang Su Li read us several appetite-whetting short pieces from her travel book A Backpack and a Bit of Luck. I loved the first piece she read about the time she worked in an opticians in Britain and gave a lecture to an old man about the correct way to put on glasses - only to realise that he only had one hand having lost the other in the war. This being Britain, a cup of tea while he told his story put things right. Su Li managed a very creditable northern accent!

Patricia Low is a very talented young lady. My first encounter with her work was with The Oral Stage's Rojak, last year. Two of my favourite pieces were penned by her and she was one of the directors. I sadly missed TOS second production, 59 Minutes, so it was nice that Pat read us a monologue from it - a wonderfully funny satire about the building of a durian tower in a shopping mall. But as I say, Malaysia constantly satirises itself! The scary thing about the piece was that it all seemed just too possible!

I loved the natural way that the voice in the story moved between English and Malay ... this is the reality of voice in the local context, the constant dipping between languages. For convenience. For emphasis. For humour.

Haris Zalkapli (and now I have his name spelt right!) writes columns on pop culture and politics and the interface between. I knew nothing about him before the reading since I had enlisted Raja Ahmad's help in finding good Malay writers, and I am very happy to have "discovered" Haris. He's clearly a writer who has found his niche - his pieces are entertaining and the arguments nicely developed. He read two columns The Stones and the Great Firewall, about The Rolling Stones tour of China and A Lesson in Coolness about Condoleza Rice and other politicians employing pop culture as a campaigning tool.

This was the second time that Eileen Lui has read at "Readings". Her stories have appeared in Silverfish collections, including the book I edited, Collateral Damage. She read a moving piece about a friendship ... which should have been more than a friendship ... about the best friends who became "better friends", but never quite made the transition to becoming lovers.

Thank goodness not everyone is like this couple, or Eileen would be out of a day-job!

Was very happy to see poet Wong Phui Nam in the audience and I think he was very pleased to see so many people interested in writing. I have invited him to read next time!

Many thanks (and you know the litany by now!) all who read and all who turned up to support them. To Seksan for the space. To La Bodega for the lovely wines. To Reza for help with the sound. To all who helped get set up and to Zedeck for washing glasses. Sorry I was so bossy.

I've decided not to hold "Readings" next month as the KL Litfest is on at the end of March and it's better that everyone supports that. But watch this space for April announcements.

February "Readings"

Would be grateful if you could pass on the news of our next "Readings".

Here's the info:

“Readings”

Our series of monthly readings continue next Saturday with the aim of encouraging new writing talent.
Time: 3.30pm
Date: 24th February 2006
Place: 67, Lorong Tempinis Satu, Lucky Garden, Bangsar (for directions check www.seksan.com)
Readers for this Saturday include:
Yang-May Ooi
Eileen Lui
Datuk SHANmugalingam
Haris Zulkfili
Pat Low
(and one more still to be confirmed reader)

"Readings" is the birth-child of Bernice Chauly, lovingly fostered by Sharon Bakar. We are grateful to Seksan for sponsorship.

Admission free and everyone very welcome. Please pass on the invitation to anyone else you think might be interested.

I feel like I'm chasing my tail at the moment trying to round up enough good readers to keep the crowd well entertained. Thanks, Raja Ahmad for helping me: he is getting back to me soon with the name one of another of his Suara-Suara protogees!

Still haven't managed to sort of the wine sponsorship so will be chasing up my friends in La Bodega as soon as CNY is over. We will have bottles there one way or another.

Novelist Yang-May Ooi will be out first guest (with Sharanya Manivannan) for this Breakfast with the Litbloggers thing in the new branch of MPH in Bangsar Village 11a.m. - 1 p.m. so we will be moving from one event to the other with just a little lunch in-between. It should be a good literary Saturday.

Rojak Revisited

Fiona and I went to see The Oral Stage's Rojak on Sunday with Fiona Wan at KLPac, principally to cheer on one of our own. (Both Priya and Fiona did my writing class.) But I always suffer pangs of guilt that I don't make enough effort to see local productions, particularly when some of the freshest local writing finds its way onto stage. As happened too with this collection of shorts and monologues.

Rojak was an excellent name for the production, because there was such a variety of stories and styles. Sanjiv Gnaneswaran's Who Wants to be a Malaysian? was a hilarious skit in the Instant Cafe Theatre mould - a multiple choice test for all those who want to become citizens. Sample question: What do malaysian's use least when they're on the road: a) their indicators b)their helmets c)their seatbelts d) their brains.

Rauf Fadzillah's The Damnation Recital was most surreal and dark - the characters trapped in a kind of hell. I'm not sure I "got" it, but the staging was compelling. I loved the moment when his main character laughed at the audience telling them that he had taken something from us all, something we didn't have anymore - fifteeen minutes of our lives.

My favourite piece was Me Speak No French written by Doreen Loo and performed by Emily Yoon - a very clever monologue on the difficulties of hosting an elegant dinner party. I suppose I enjoyed it most because I can identify with it. I've also ended up with a beautifully laid table, a gourmet dinner in the oven - and no guests.

Two very good pieces by Patricia Low could have been stronger with a little more dramatic tension. Print was an extended conversation between two guys sitting at a roadside mamak stall. Low has an excellent ear for dialogue, and you got the impression that you could have been a fly on the table at a real stall. But there was no climax in the scene until the two guys got hit by a passing car. (Quite realistic in the Malaysian context!) But all drama needs conflict or it sags.

Low's A Very Happy Story showed how life would be in the perfect family with no discord. Kids who have their mind set firmly on their studies and don't talk back, parents who are constantly kind and considerate. Of course it all becomes surreal and even a little frightening! (Have these guys been lobotomised?!) But I was expecting something to happen and shatter the dream - and it needed to happen. As Lagos Egri says:

Conflict is the heartbeat of all writing.

Priya appeared in her own Romanticization, looking desperately sick, arm in sling, on a hospital bed and was soon involved in a conversation with a "nurse" who seemed to be another part of herself, reminding her of all the abuse and exploitation at the hands of the different men in her life and the way women are often in denial about what happens to them.

Fiona and I were pondering everything we had seen in the car on the way home. There was a fair bit we hadn't quite understood (What do you think that represented? Was it supposed to be -?). But we both agreed we'd been thoroughly entertained and there was an awful lot of emerging talent on that stage.

Rauf and Priya looking ghoulish in the lobby afterwards!