W.F. Lantry’s “Rainbow Bridge” is a kind of translation, deriving from a Song Dynasty scroll painting that, in this case, is evidence of a woven bridge having existed in antiquity. Lantry wonderfully demonstrates the limitations of visual art without language; his poem verb-alizes the painting, not only exalting in the details but animating them and, in the process, expounding instructions to build such a bridge. The attention to detail would be prolix if not for the enjambment and inconsistent rhymes.
If you followed the links to these poems, you’ll know that many are paired with commentary or reviews in the correlating blog, A Cup of Fine Tea, emphasizing the dialogue that small-press literary journals are intended to be.In the review, works by Annie Zaidi, Clara Hsu, Eddie Tay, Fiona Sze-Lorrain, Helle Annette Slutz, Kim-An Lieberman, Marco Yan, Inara Cedrins and Peters Bruveris, Phill Provance, Steven Schroeder and W.F. Lantry are discussed, some very favourably.
I also had no sense of the diversity of the Asian writing community. When we began, I assumed that Asian writers were those found on the continent, locals, maybe a handful of expats. I have come to realise that this definition was far too narrow—that in a globalised world the idea of Asian writing must be more inclusive and fluid, must encompass the perspectives of writers from the diasporas, travellers to the region, even people with an interest in the continent. Asia it turns out is everywhere. All you have to do is open your doors. How else can one run a Hong-Kong based journal from a house in London?Admittedly, the passage above does not cover works by 'foreigners' that are not in any way thematically relevant to Asia -- a concern raised by Henry in his review of Cha. Looking through the journal's archive, I can say that the prose pieces are all Asian-related while in other categories we have not been as strict. For example, in our selection of poetry, "Asian" is far from the first criteria that we use to judge a piece. Why is that? Henry has drawn our attention to a point that we will certainly be thinking some more. What are people's thoughts on this?
If you would like to receive a review copy of The Mental Life of Cities, please also write to Tammy.
CHA is Chinese for tea, and CHA is also a laudable literary Online Journal based in Hong Kong. Read the rest of the post here.
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Fiona Sze-Lorrain's Water the Moon, Steven Schroeder's A Dim Sum of the Day Before, Cyril Wong's Oneiros, Leung Ping Kwan's Shifting Borders, Christopher (Kit) Kelen's To the Single Man's Hut: Poems and Pictures, Song Zijiang's Wiping the Dim Sky, Daisy Hasan's The To-Let House, Cecilia Manguerra Brainard (ed.)'s Growing Up Filipino II: More Stories for Young Adults, Jennifer Ching's A Painted Moment and Patty Ho's Heart to Heart
I went unaccompanied, so hungry was I for reading material that I had no fear of the ghosts that reputedly haunted this place. My heart did thud though as I unlocked the door. A murky ray filtered through the dirty panes of this one window and lighted grudgingly upon the books piled up against one wall and sliding to the floor in a muddle.
O, wonder! O, brave new world. Miranda could not have been more overcome with amazement and delight.
The clock’s ‘tick-tock’ I take to be a model of what we call a plot, an organisation which humanises time by giving it a form; and the interval between ‘tock’ and ‘tick’ represents purely successive, disorganised time of the sort we need to humanise. (p. 45).
The clock face in Modern Times approaches six o'clock. Ours approaches one. Any significance?
Mad Hatter talks about Time. In all his insanity he manages to remind us that 'Time' and 'clock' are two separate entities. 'Time' is a being with subjectivity, 'clock' is his tool. The 'T' and the 'c'.
'He won't stand beating. Now, if you only kept on good terms with him, he'd do almost anything you liked with the clock. For instance, suppose it were nine o'clock in the morning, just time to begin lessons: you'd only have to whisper a hint to Time, and round goes the clock in a twinkling! Half-past one, time for dinner!'
Do you know the author of the poem "The Watchmaker's Shop"? It has the following lines:
I wonder he doesn't get tired of the chime
and all the clocks ticking and telling the time;
But there he goes winding lest any should stop,
This queer little man in the watchmaker's shop.
Or, consider this image in Sunday Times magazine earlier this year:
I wrote in a blog:Yesterday, we saw this remarkable image in Sunday Times, which is part of a series of photographs by Andrew Moore capturing the tough times in Detroit. The pictures are from the photographer’s book, Detroit Disassembled.
When JZ and I saw this image for the first time, we both immediately thought of Salvador Dalí’s famous “The Persistence of Memory” (1931). In the painting, melting pocket watches are found in a landscape scarcely inhabited by humans. The tick and tock gone for time, although persistent, no longer means anything without a perceiver. Or, to be precise, time as a concept is defunct if there is no one measuring its units.
So many years have passed since my first visit to Cambridge. And the giant Corpus Clock (above) outside of the Taylor Library at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, only reminds me of the harshness of time more.
According to a Wired article in January 2009, the Corpus Clock (also know as “The Time Eater Clock”) does ‘un-clocklike’ things such as slowing down, stopping and even running backward (Dr John Taylor, the clock designer, says, “I wanted a clock that could play with you.”). But we all know regardless of the movement of the device, time marches forward, waits for no one. (Listen to the programme “The Physics of Time”.)
The insect on top of the clock, which is called a chronophage, or time-eater, is at first glance scary, but at second glance, pitiable. The creature looks as though it is punished by a higher power to forever ride on time, and yet never able to control it. It looks ghastly. Humans are it.
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"On Fridays" from Lovers and Strangers Revisited — my 100th Short Story published! — will be reprinted in Hong Kong-based Cha: An Asian Literary Journal. Cha is also providing a link to my blog "On Fridays: The Story Behind the Story" sending the Story Behind the Story blog series international with its first literary magazine connection. "On Fridays" has now been published 13 times!
A Swedish journalist recites Mao's poetry; the Chairman's presence is unavoidable, even years after his death.
It is set in a city "growing / unfamiliar fast," presumably Shenzhen. The newly rich are displacing the traditional dwellers: "Now / oyster fishermen's huts have given way to tents, and you know they will not be here long."
In the September 2010 issue of Cha, we will be publishing essays by four children's picture book authors: Sarah Brennan, Adeline Foo, Emily Lim and Margaret Lim. These essays are curated by our Reviews Editor, Eddie Tay, who is a professor at Chinese University of Hong Kong, teaching poetry and children's literature in the English Department.
If you are interested in donating to Cha, please feel free to use PayPal. Our account is sighming@graduate.hku.hk
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