Revealing Fatimah's Secrets

... it was my experience of Maznoor and her family, and all the stories she told me (of her childhood, of her family, of her various houses and kampungs), that gave me the format for Fatimah’s Kampung ... A million little details eventually, and very slowly, came together: trips with Maznoor in Borneo forests and on the back roads around Selangor and Perak; visits to family graves; walks with my Batu Pahat brother-in-law into the forest of Gunung Soga and around Johor kampungs; explorations of building sites with my little niece Hanna; a visit to a keramat, a family wedding, my sister-in-law’s kitchen garden. Eventually, I found that I was celebrating Maznoor’s family, celebrating all I loved about Malaysia, and paraphrasing my old lectures in a more presentable way, all at the same time.

Fatimah's Kampung author, Iain Buchanan, is interviewed by Daphne Lee in Starmag today and also talks about how the book was created. You realise just what an incredible project and painstaking labour of love the book was.

Buchanan's Maznoor wife sums it all up beautifully :

We have no children but Fatimah’s Kampung is a deep and touching tribute to a loving life together. It took eight years to see the light of day but it will last to the end of our days and beyond.

Jeffers, Sheldon in NST

The New Straits Times today features a Q&A with illustrator Oliver Jeffers (left) who is in town for the British Council's Animating Literature: Words and Beyond conference. (For more on the conference visit Daphne's blog.)

And there is also an interview with author Jeremy Sheldon who ran some of the recent British Council City of stories workshops, who says that he first started writing as a bored teenager, confined to his dorm at Eton for rebellious behaviour. He says too that he got his love of story-telling from his mother who is Hong Kong Chinese.

About the workshops :

Sheldon said working with aspiring writers and having the opportunity to study their written work is similar to getting a “window into their hearts and minds”, an experience that still astonishes him every single time. ... His role said Sheldon is to function as the “external eye” and to show these aspiring writers not just the things they are already doing very well, but also to point out the few elements they may be missing.

The best piece of writing advice he received from his own teachers? :

... quite simply “write every day” ... Writing requires practice and writing daily, even if it’s only a little bit, can make a difference to aspiring writers. You need to keep working out what a colleague of mine calls the writing muscle. You can’t actually touch it or see it working but you know it exists.

Jeffers' Paper Caper at Kino

Here's news of another literary event you might like to attend this Saturday. Artist and illustrator Oliver Jeffers will be at Kinokuniya Bookshop on Saturday 21 February from 4.00 p.m. to 5.30 p.m. to talk about his work.

Some information about Jeffers from contemporarywriters.com :

Oliver Jeffers was born in Western Australia in 1977, and brought up in Belfast. He is an artist who began by exhibiting his work at several small exhibitions in Belfast from 1995-1998, before beginning to illustrate book jackets for local publishing houses. He graduated from the University of Ulster with a degree in Visual Communications in 2001. From 1999 to 2000, he travelled to Australia and the US, settling in Sydney and becoming a freelance illustrator and painter, working for various magazines, and illustrating for the Lavazza Coffee Company.

The first picture book he wrote and illustrated was How To Catch A Star (2004), which was shortlisted for the 2004 Booktrust Early Years Award (Best New Illustrator). Lost and Found (2005) won the 2005 Nestlé Children's Book Prize (Gold Award) in 2005, the 2006 Blue Peter Book of the Year Award, and was shortlisted for the Kate Greenaway Medal. The Incredible Book Eating Boy (2006), was shortlisted for the 2007 British Book Awards Children's Book of the Year. Oliver Jeffers continues to exhibit his work in London, Ireland, Australia and the US, and has undertaken illustration commissions for various organisations, including Starbuck's, Orange, and Sony PSP. He is also a co-founder of the art collaborative, OAR.

His latest book is The Great Paper Caper (2008).

My MPH Friends - Toonified!

I picked up the current issue of Quill magazine while I was at MPH yesterday, and was delighted to see my friends who run the magazine immortalised in cartoon form by E. Yu who recently an illustrated biography of the former Prime Minister (very nicely reviewed by Amir).

In the background you can see Datuk Ng Tieh Chuan, the CEO of MPH, with (in blue shirt) Tan Sri Syed Mokhtar Al-Bukhari (whose company Jalinan Inspirasi Sdn Bhd bought over the bookstore chain), while in the foreground is E. Yu (in a red check shirt) the editorial team of MPH. Janet Tay (in purple jacket), May Lee (in green) and finally Eric Forbes, set a trap to lure readers into the trap of reading a nice thick book! Really a nice picture.

(I put link to those guys' mugshots, so that if you don't know them you can see how close the likeness is. I think Janet and Eric are spot on!)

The picture above was intended to be the magazine cover (and do click up to full size so you can appreciate it fully) although in the end the ex-PM was featured instead.

Here are the same guys, spotting E. Yu's face in his cartoons ...

E. Yu actually runs food outlets in several food courts around the city ...

and here he is interviewed by Bissme S. in The Sun.

Lansell Looking for Illustrator

Are there any wanna be illustrators of children's books out there? Lansell Taudevin (left), an Australian author living in Malaysia, would like to find :

... aspiring/ brilliant/ talented/ (cheap) illustrators who might be interested in illustrating some children's books with a Malay theme??? The books are geared to 9-11 year olds, 3000 words, each book has about 40 pages with illustrations on at least every second page. What are they about? Maybe citing the 'intro' might give a clue. THE RAJA RAJAWALI BOOKS In days when dragons flew and every day was magic, a peaceful and prosperous Malay Sultanate held sway on the beautiful island of Sukahati in the Straits of Melaka. In those days there were many small Malay sultanates in South East Asia. Most were ruled by Sultans, but Sukahati, being one of the smallest, was ruled by a Raja. The Raja of the Sultanate of Sukahati had a grand title: Yang di-Pertuan Agong Raja Rashid Abdullah Johari Ahmad Wuji Adil Luqman Ibrahim. His people called him Raja Rajawali. Raja Rajawali was a noble and brave Sultan, even if he was sometimes a little bit of a bumbler. Most importantly, his people loved him, and when he was needed, he was always there to protect them. Follow the adventures of Raja Rajawali, Princess Sinara, the beautiful princess who loved Raja Rajawali, Garuda, Raja Rajawali’s cantankerous royal elephant, Bengis Khan, a troublesome nobleman, and many many more wonderful characters in the Raja Rajawali books. I had a few similar books published in Oz some years ago and had a brilliant illustrator. He is keen to do these, but I would prefer someone with an understanding of 'being Malay' - silat, songket, malay courts etc.... Cheers Lansell

So if there is anyone out there who is interested please let me know (either in the comments below or by email sharonbakar at yahoo dot com, or via Facebook) and I will pass the info on to Lansell. And I know at least one other writer looking for the same ... Incidentally, you can find this article by Lansell in MPH's current Quill magazine.

Chin Yew's Clouds

At Seksan's, just as we were packing up, a young man called Chin Yew came up to me and put his book in my hands.

The Boy Who Loved Clouds is whimsical and beautifully illustrated. I told him I could see the influence of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry and he said that indeed Le Petit Prince is one of his favourite books.

I had no idea of the interesting story behind the book until I found Chin Yew's website and read this article in KLue.

He graduated from Lim Kok Wing majoring in animation in 2001, but due to a lack of job opportunities he found himself working a nine to five job in printing sales. Then he decided to break free in a spectacular way! :

In 2005, he rented a room near his house for 30 days, and bought 40 large four-by-four foot canvases. He then blogged about this whim, firmly stating that come August, he would paint each canvas within a month and blog an entry of the artistic and personal process daily. He soon found out that this escape was rather over ambitious.

Firstly, he had to leave his house in a shirt and tie, and make it seem he still went to work for the sake of his parents. As tedious as it sounds, like most, his dad never saw art as a proper job. Secondly, and most importantly, he would have to face himself as his biggest critic. For one, Chin Yew hadn’t picked up a brush since school – his techniques would be rusty, while his expectations of his capabilities still remained. “It’s a painful thing for an artist. I felt like I was dirtying the white canvases instead of beautifying them,” he admits. But he trucked on anyway. Focusing only on the colours black, white and red, Chin Yew successfully churned 40 paintings, spurring much interest and praise.

On his 30th day, he passed the torch to his friend who underwent the same project for that month of October. And ever since, the site has been hosting guest artists who want to try the 30-day project for themselves. Chin Yew himself has been annually tapping into 30-day series. In 2006, he explored The Boy Who Loved Clouds. In 2007 and 2008, he produced a graphic novel, I See So Many Butterflies,

It sounds like a sort of Nanowrimo for art! (Nanoartmo?) You can see some very exciting artwork from Chin Yew and others who have particiapted in the project here.

Amir Muhammad who knows a talented illustrator when he sees one has baggsied Chin Yew to illustrate his next volume of Politicians Say the Darndest Things. Let's hope his fortunes change ...

When Fatimah Lost her Kampung

A few days ago I wrote about the launch of a children's book called Fatimah's Kampung by Iain Buchanan at Badan Warisan. I ended up being pretty late because I had decided to walk to Jalan Stonor from KLCC, along what I thought was a familiar route. I ended up getting lost, completely thrown by the way the area has changed since I was last there, with huge high-rises and building sites beginning to dominate this formerly green and peaceful enclave with its colonial bungalows.

I realise now, after reading the book, that there's a certain irony to all this - for Fatimah's Kampong is the story about how a landscape changes as the city encroaches, and how what is best about a place will be sacrificed to commercial interest.

In the introduction to the book Buchanan talks about how the book came to be written. He says he came to Malaysia first to teach shortly after Independence and that he took away with him a memory of the landscape which became part of him.

He continued to teach geography in a university in the East Midlands, and one day he had a call from one of his former students, Maznoor, now a college lecturer herself, coming to the UK to do a diploma in TEFL. They later married and Buchanan found himself part of a :

... large, lively, and very loving Malaysian family ..

But revisiting the landscape he had fallen in love with, he found that there was good reason to mourn :

... there was painted concrete, dead laterite and a gaudy brittle sameness ...

After taking early retirement, and wanting to communicate the ideas that he has lectured on in a way that was more vivid and exciting to young people, he began work on Fatimah's Kampung, a labour of love which took him eight years to complete, while Maznoor went out to work in a British factory to pay the bills. It was a true labour of love.

The book tells the story of a girl growing up in Kampong Hidayah. The family home was built by her great-grandfather with materials taken from the forest. When most of the other kampungs disappeared because of the expansion of the city it was allowed to remain untouched by the Sultan who owned the land.

Fatimah grows up amidst fruit trees, and forest (where she believes Pak Belang the tiger still might be hiding), and near to the frangipani filled graveyard where her relatives were laid to rest, and the keramat once home to a holy man who knew the ways of the forest in the way no others did.

The rhythms of kampong life of are recorded - her grandmother gathering herbs to cure ailments, the children's games, the visits by hawkers, Ramadan and the bustle of Hari Raya at the end of it, the monsoon floods.

But then the bulldozers move in and Fatimah and her family are forced to relocate to a high rise near by where they can see the final destruction of their kampung, and the forest around it.

There is one small mercy - the kampong house itself is to be saved and taken to be part of a new theme park which Fatimah gets the chance to visit.

Labelling books can sometimes do them a disservice, and whilst the book will undoubtedly appeal to older children (many of whom may have lived the story!), it will strike a chord with every Malaysian who cares about the environment and heritage, regardless of age, and will probably travel very well beyond these shores as the issues it raises are universal ones. I'm not ashamed to say that the story moved me to tears - especially the part where Fatimah finally does come face to face with her tiger.

But it is the stunning illustrations, with every detail of tree and leaf and kampung lovingly recorded, which make this book an absolute joy to own. (I have had to pries my copy out of the hands of visitors to the house who haven't wanted to put it down and talk to me!)

I wonder if Fatimah's Kampung might not be better described as a graphic novel and one that could easily become a classic of the genre?

The book is published by the Consumers Association of Penang, and this surprises on two counts. First of all, the organisation is known for its pamphlets on consumer and environmental issues and they have not, to my knowledge, ever undertaken a project like this before. Secondly, that they have made such a great job of it - this is a beautifully produced book that you could put beside any produced overseas and feel proud of.

Have I raved? Sorry. But I sincerely mean every word of praise I have heaped on this book.

But why not see for yourself? Iain will be appearing at Readings@Seksan this coming Saturday and a limited number of his books will be on sale.

Bibliobay

Here's are the pieces that illustrator Shahril Nizam's has donated to be auctioned to raise funds for the Malaysia-UK Exchange Project with the current bids.

(If you want to bid, contact Daphne Lee at oneredflower at gmail dot com.)

Two Children. Current bid RM220.


Teapot. Current bid RM250 RM350

No 3. Current bid RM 50.

Conference for Children's Writers and Ilustrators

Thought some of you might be interested in this - The Asian Children’s Writers & Illustrators Conference 2008, to be will be held on the 5th and 6th June 2008 at the National Library, 100 Victoria Street, Singapore.

Full details are on the Singapore Book Council's website.

And you can click the poster up to full size to read what it actually says.


(This information via the very useful SEALIT blog.)

Fairy Tales for Grown Ups

Many of the pictures, with their echoes of fairy tales and children’s stories, might be described as “charming”, or even “cute”, but then on the next page the reader is confronted with an image that totally jars – a headless torso, a tree sprouting from the top of a boy’s head, a strange monster, or an unearthly fruit. ... It’s a dissonance that fascinates, and it can be found in the accompanying poetry, too. ...

... The book’s slightly other worldly quality is further emphasised by the quaint formality of Shahril’s word choice (for example, enraptured, partake, comely, reverie, perchance, methinks), items that have long slipped from the general English lexicon. And the poems themselves, often written in rhyming quatrains, are often reminiscent of Victorian verse. (Think Edward Lear or Lewis Carroll.)

From my review of Shahril Nizam's magical collection of illustrations and poetry If Only, in Starmag today.

The book has two different covers, so you can choose the one you like best!

Pi Pictured

You may remember the competition that was held some time back to find an illustrator for Yann Martel's Booker winning The Life of Pi.

The winner was Croatian artist Tomislav Torjanac, and you can view his illustrations for The Illustrated Life of Pi on the Guardian website.

Beautiful!

The Tale of a Rickshaw Puller

Biggest congrats to Choong Kwee Kim (better known in blogging circles as K.Kim!) who is featured in Starmag today. Her beautifully illustrated children's book features a rickshaw puller Ah Fu in late C19th Penang, and she apparently dug into the history books to dig out the story of a real rickshaw strike in 1901.

Choong began work on Ah Fu in April last year when, on a moonlit night, the story that had been simmering in her head became bright as day. Less than two months later, the writing was completed.

Next came the more arduous task of illustrating the story. Plugging away at her labour of love after work each day, she brought to life the adventures of Ah Fu, using pen and water-soluble colour pencils.

“I told myself, ‘A page a day will get your book published one day’,” says the art hobbyist who minored in art education when she studied the Teaching of English as a Second Language at Universiti Malaya in the early 1990s.

Her work was done by December and, in March this year, when MPH Publishing responded favourably to her manuscript, Choong was over the moon.

I'm going to buy this book for this illustrations ... even though I haven't got a kid in sight! (or maybe the kid is me??)

If you want to meet Kwee Kim, there's a hi-tea for local authors at MPH 1-Utama 2-5 p.m. next week to which you are all invited!

(Photo on right from author's blog.)

Chinese Festivals Illustrated

Feature in the Star today about Penang-born freelance writer and self-taught artist Moey Sook Ching who has written and illustrated a beautiful cookbook called Chinese Feasts and Festivals published by Periplus Editions.


This is a book I'd buy for the pictures alone!

The Versions of Pi

Back in November I mentioned that the Times were holding a competition to find a new illustrator for Yann Martell's Booker winning Life of Pi. You can check out the finalists here. Each one now has to submit three more illustrations for the books before a winner is chosen.

The standard is very high. But I must confess that I like the illustration by Victor Tkachenko best of the bunch:

Time for a Tiger (in a Lifeboat)?

Yann Martel is looking for an illustrator for a new edition of Life of Pi to be published by Canongate Books next year. And hey, it could be YOU!

Do you find illustrations an enhancement or a distraction? I love them and think it's a shame that so few books for "grown-ups" are illustrated. Maybe that's why I appreciate Mervyn Peake and Edward Carey so much?

Times cartoonist Peter Brookes ponders the relationship between illustrations and text.