We Are Beatniks!

Dear Mr. Raman has his latest installment of his litmag up, and a couple of pieces will look familiar to readers of this blog 'cos I donated 'em.

He writes about Amir Mohmamad (left) writing again, with a new column in the NST (certainly the best reason to buy the paper!).

But look at this paragraph and examine the sheer bitchery of Mr. Raman's comment:

What I like about Amir Muhammad is that he does not think it's necessary to do the 'reading' circuit. He simply writes. He does not see the need to pout and pose like a leftover 70's New York City beatnik, reading stuff he wrote ten years ago. And he hasn't threatened to write his definitive novel for the past fifteen years. Nor does he attempt to write 'poetry'.

Beatniks? He means us, of course. Hopeless cases like Bernice and Ruhayat X and Raja Ahmad and Kam Raslan and Fahmi Fadzil and Zedeck Siew and Dina Zaman and Sharanya etc. etc. And me.

Pose and Pout???? Aiyoh!

I think I irked him last time I was in the shop and he started his - you-people-never-complete-novels spiel by telling him that one of his Silverfish writers has his novel finished, it's really good, and he is hoping to publish overseas. (Not to mention that another is on the UEA course and is bound to have a manuscript tucked about her person somewhere, while others are beavering away on writing projects.)

If you want to know what's really going on and who is getting good work written, I said, you should come along to the readings and just talk to people. Touché!

But of course he won't. Not even when the readings are held a few steps away from his shop.

(I shall say nothing of the way he talked loudly through the readings at Maya Gallery that night.)

Now Mr. Raman can be relied on to step on toes and that's much of the fun of reading his website and fair criticism is good for us all ... but who needs the spiteful of spirit?

I can't think that it can be too good for business either when you rely very much on the goodwill of others ...

Talking about the readings - nothing has been happening for a while apart from KLue's events. Bernice says that Sek Sen's place has now become so popular for arts events of all kinds that it's hard to find a free slot. And she has been busy with other projects including a photography exhibition.

But it does need to happen.

Related Posts:

More about the readings here.

Litt-erary Appreciation (Or How Many Puns Can I Get Out of This Guy's Name?)

It wasn't that I hadn't heard of Toby Litt - there he was, smartly groomed and besuited, looking out from pages of a Sunday Times magazine I'd hoarded in my drawer with its article ("The Write Young Things") on the writers Granta magazine had chosen as it's best of 2003. Other chosens included Monica Ali, Zadie Smith, A L Kennedy, David Mitchell and Pete Ho Davis.

I just hadn't read a single thing he'd written till this wake-up call: the video-conference with the writer organised by the British Council as the latest event in its 'Meet the UK Author' series which I was to chair. I then had to do a mad dash round local bookshops to find at least some of his work so that I could have my own mini-Littfest. I managed five books in two weeks which ain't bad going. He's written seven altogether - and as Joanne Thorpe of British Council cleverly noticed, the titles follow in alphabetical order. Litt aims to have all 26 letters of the alphabet covered during his writing career. (He jokes that a word often associated with his prolific output is "churned".) Leon Wing who came along for the session had read all - just as he had read everything Beryl Bainbridge had written at the previous session. It was so good to have him along.

I began with his second collection of short fiction, Exhibitionism, an interesting collection, though some of the stories I felt were stronger than others. The more surreal pieces (Dreamgirls, The Waters) reminded me of Murukami, but the story I liked best was the one about the psychologically cojoined lesbian lovers in Mimi (Both of Her) and Me (Hardly There at All). Then there's the quaintly titled On the Etiquette of Eye-Contact During Oral Sex which I suppose is the story everyone will turn to first. It's amusing, but as in his story about the porn industry written in the form of a shooting script, - sometimes the idea behind the story turns out to be wittier than the story itself.

The first novel I picked up Finding Myself, a sort of Virginia Wolf meets chick lit (thanks to Litt's remarkable ventriloquism) meets Big Brother, proved to be amusing, but pretty soon the joke wore thin and I must confess that I packed it in well before the end, more than anything because the narrative voice got right up my nose.

Litt's first novel Beatniks described as a British road movie proved a quick and enjoyable read. The book was intended as a tribute to Keroac and came out on the 40th anniversary of the publication of On the Road. The book was pacey, well-plotted and I liked the three main characters very much. Litt also writes sex well and if you don't know what yabyum is, do read the book and find out! Litt has written a screenplay for the film and perhaps one day it will come to production.

Please don't read Deadkidsongs, Litt's third novel about four little boys who form a gang, unless you have a very strong stomach. It certainly makes you want to ask what kind of warped imagination comes up with a story as violent as this? (No-one actually asked it, and Litt looked so poised and so damn ... normal on screen.) I actually read much of it in the back of taxis and nearly caused an accident a couple of times when I screamed out loud.

I felt the book must owe something to Lord of the Flies, but it was a link that Litt really didn't want to make. How I'd have loved to have argued this point with him further! (If only there were a virtual bar to adjourn too ... that, and not being able to get your copies autographed are the drawbacks of this technology!)

Ghost Story is Litt's most recent work, a deeply personal book which asks what happens after the worst thing has happened? The worst thing in this case is miscarriage, and the first part of the book tells in harrowing detail how Litt and his partner Leigh lost three babies. (Their story has a happy ending though as they finally have had the much longed for baby.) The main part of the book is a fictional account of a couple coming to terms with the loss of their second child. It is beautifully written, and there were whole passages I went back to reread for the sheer beauty of the language. Litt uses psychic distance in a unique way to draw the reader gradually further and further into the minds of the main characters, absorbing their grief and inability to get past it. The ending is ... perfect.

Leon asked such insightful questions - particularly about Ghost Story which blew him away, that Litt paid him the biggest compliment I think any writer can pay: "I've found my ideal reader ... and he lives in Malaysia."