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Readings from Readings #2
Readings from Readings 2: New Writing from Malaysia, Singapore and Beyond
The victim of a snatch theft adopts a rock which she carries everywhere for protection; a world-famous author plots the perfect suicide in an anonymous hotel room, and a young neurosurgeon finds himself on the other side of the medical equation after a tragic accident. From the village headman who travels to weddings on his tractor, to an androgynous rock singer with a U2 tribute band, and a beautiful ghost haunting abandoned warehouses with her lover, the book is packed with fascinating characters and intriguing situations.
This second collection of stories, poems and essays under the Readings from Readings banner is as diverse as the writers who've penned the pieces. What unites them is their connection with Kuala Lumpur's longest running literary event, Readings@Seksan, which provides a regular platform for new work.
This second collection of stories, poems and essays under the Readings from Readings banner is as diverse as the writers who've penned the pieces. What unites them is their connection with Kuala Lumpur's longest running literary event, Readings@Seksan, which provides a regular platform for new work.
206 pages, Paperback
First published November 25, 2012
4 people are currently reading
48 people want to read
About the author
Bernice Chauly
15 books36 followersBernice Chauly is the author of six books of poetry and prose: Once We Were There (2017, Winner of the Penang Monthly Book Prize), Onkalo (2013, “Direct, honest and powerful” —JM Coetzee), Growing Up With Ghosts (2011, Winner of the POPULAR-The Star Readers’ Choice Award for Non-Fiction), The Book of Sins (2008), Lost in KL (2008), and going there and coming back (1997).
Born in George Town, Penang to Chinese-Punjabi teachers, she read Education, TESL and English Literature in Canada as a government scholar. For over 20 years, she has worked extensively in the creative industries as a writer, teacher, photographer, actor and filmmaker and has won multiple awards for her work and her contribution to the arts in Malaysia.
Chauly has served as Festival Director of the George Town Literary Festival since 2011, the only state-funded literary festival in Malaysia. She was also an Honorary Fellow at the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program (IWP) in 2014, and was awarded residencies at the Nederlands Letterenfonds in Amsterdam and the Sitka Island Institute in Sitka, Alaska. She is the founder and Director of the KL Writers Workshop, and currently lectures at the University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus (UNMC). She lives in Kuala Lumpur with her two daughters.
Born in George Town, Penang to Chinese-Punjabi teachers, she read Education, TESL and English Literature in Canada as a government scholar. For over 20 years, she has worked extensively in the creative industries as a writer, teacher, photographer, actor and filmmaker and has won multiple awards for her work and her contribution to the arts in Malaysia.
Chauly has served as Festival Director of the George Town Literary Festival since 2011, the only state-funded literary festival in Malaysia. She was also an Honorary Fellow at the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program (IWP) in 2014, and was awarded residencies at the Nederlands Letterenfonds in Amsterdam and the Sitka Island Institute in Sitka, Alaska. She is the founder and Director of the KL Writers Workshop, and currently lectures at the University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus (UNMC). She lives in Kuala Lumpur with her two daughters.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
April 6, 2013
I love the fact that there's been a Readings from Readings 2, keeping up with the momentum is good. I took Creative Writing from Sharon Bakar at one point in life and have been in love with reading and writing every since. I can't say I do it diligently, but when I do it, I am liberated. It's therapeutic and I recommend it for everyone! Similar to the book - so many different people with so many different stories to tell. Many broke my heart - then mended it - then gave it hope.
Someday, I hope to have something good enough to contribute to this compilation of gems! Brilliant and a job well done!
Someday, I hope to have something good enough to contribute to this compilation of gems! Brilliant and a job well done!
December 15, 2012
The first volume comprised of poems and stories in both English and Malay. This time, Readings from Readings comes back almost exclusively in English. It feels as though the second volume is targeted at readers beyond Malaysia and Singapore. I'm biased, but to me it's a good move.
The book is well-edited, with minimal typos, and the presentation is absolutely lovely. The stories and poems are so much stronger in this volume. Some of the stories are heavy-handed and didactic, and some are so open-ended they feel like a chapter from a much larger story instead of self-contained ones. I don't know; maybe this is a Malaysian thing.
The piece that stands out the most is a poem by Rodaan Al Galidi, "Eight Hundred and Sixty". It is poignant. It resonates. It is brilliant.
I also love Angeline Woon's "Big Bertha and the Stone of Justice". The story, which is thankfully self-contained, feels inherently Malaysian without alienating readers from elsewhere. It is also relevant, but most important, it is well-written. The editors chose this story to open the book, and they chose perfectly.
If you want a glimpse of Malaysia (and Singapore and beyond), this book is a must-read.
The book is well-edited, with minimal typos, and the presentation is absolutely lovely. The stories and poems are so much stronger in this volume. Some of the stories are heavy-handed and didactic, and some are so open-ended they feel like a chapter from a much larger story instead of self-contained ones. I don't know; maybe this is a Malaysian thing.
The piece that stands out the most is a poem by Rodaan Al Galidi, "Eight Hundred and Sixty". It is poignant. It resonates. It is brilliant.
I also love Angeline Woon's "Big Bertha and the Stone of Justice". The story, which is thankfully self-contained, feels inherently Malaysian without alienating readers from elsewhere. It is also relevant, but most important, it is well-written. The editors chose this story to open the book, and they chose perfectly.
If you want a glimpse of Malaysia (and Singapore and beyond), this book is a must-read.
February 5, 2013
Every piece in this book was stellar, whether it dealt with suicidal ideation or a cat's opinion of who should ask forgiveness of whom.
Every piece took me into the everyday life in a world that's unknown and exotic to me, but also into the hearts of people just like the people in my town -- people like me.
I would like to recommend this book to everyone, if only for the way it shows the common humanity of the world, but the book gives more than that. The stories and poems are all love songs to the human condition, beautifully told, beautifully realized.
Poetry, fiction, and non-fiction, this book is thoroughly satisfying.
Well worth the money.
Every piece took me into the everyday life in a world that's unknown and exotic to me, but also into the hearts of people just like the people in my town -- people like me.
I would like to recommend this book to everyone, if only for the way it shows the common humanity of the world, but the book gives more than that. The stories and poems are all love songs to the human condition, beautifully told, beautifully realized.
Poetry, fiction, and non-fiction, this book is thoroughly satisfying.
Well worth the money.
February 9, 2013
Every so often you discover by chance a writer or writers you’ve never heard of before, and I had this experience when I received a review copy of this book. It’s a compilation of stories and poems by a variety of mostly South Asian names, only one of which I had ever heard of.
My way of reading “foreign” literature is to let it flow over me and make its impressions on me. When I read Tolstoy and Dickens in high school, loads of words and customs and concepts in their books were foreign to me. I embraced them, and I was rewarded.
In Readings 2, I especially enjoyed Angeline Woon’s “Big Bertha and the Stones of Justice” for its depiction of common brutality unwittingly being adopted by higher class people who should know better, and as well the spare, beautiful “An Orchestrated Ending” by Damyanti Ghosh.
Not surprisingly there are a number of stories and poems dealing with themes of subtle and not-so-subtle repression of women in the Malaysian culture. “Rani Taxis Away” by M. Shanmughalingam falls into this category, as does Shahminee Selvakannu’s “Lighting the Darkness.”
In the case of collections like this, which invariably contain quite a number of stellar performances but as well some pieces that somehow don’t quite convince, I find it hard to write a review and give stars. I certainly enjoyed this book from back to front, and felt at the same time I was learning from it about the very real terrors and nightmares of real people living in real places. Therefore I would also highly recommend it.
My way of reading “foreign” literature is to let it flow over me and make its impressions on me. When I read Tolstoy and Dickens in high school, loads of words and customs and concepts in their books were foreign to me. I embraced them, and I was rewarded.
In Readings 2, I especially enjoyed Angeline Woon’s “Big Bertha and the Stones of Justice” for its depiction of common brutality unwittingly being adopted by higher class people who should know better, and as well the spare, beautiful “An Orchestrated Ending” by Damyanti Ghosh.
Not surprisingly there are a number of stories and poems dealing with themes of subtle and not-so-subtle repression of women in the Malaysian culture. “Rani Taxis Away” by M. Shanmughalingam falls into this category, as does Shahminee Selvakannu’s “Lighting the Darkness.”
In the case of collections like this, which invariably contain quite a number of stellar performances but as well some pieces that somehow don’t quite convince, I find it hard to write a review and give stars. I certainly enjoyed this book from back to front, and felt at the same time I was learning from it about the very real terrors and nightmares of real people living in real places. Therefore I would also highly recommend it.
March 23, 2015
Readings from Readings 2: New writing from Malaysia, Singapore and beyond, is a wonderful collection of work, comprising short pieces of fiction, non-fiction and poetry. The flavour is undoubtedly Malaysian (ok, and Singaporean) with sprinklings of other voices in between. I found that I preferred the local (or at least Asian) pieces more than the odd sprinkling of “Western” names that found their way into the book. For one, Marc de Faoite’s pieces on Night Fishing in Langkawi and The Milking Pen were rather bland, non-moving pieces that might have worked well with a more introspective or literary-type collection of stories. Also, whilst I liked Crimson Starlet, it felt rather out of place in the anthology, having nothing at all to do with Malaysia, or even anything remotely Asian.
Angeline Woon’s Big Bertha and the Stones of Justice and Shahminee Selvakannu’s Lighting the Darkness highlight starkly the realities of life and the apathy of the powers-that-be in Malaysia. Fadzlishah Johanabas’ Picking up the Pieces gripped me right from the start with the power of love and longing in his words. Damyanti Ghosh’s An Orchestrated Ending was beautiful prose with an unexpected ending, whilst Alfian Sa’at’s The Cat Who Asked For Forgiveness made me chuckle.
The non-fiction pieces have power of their own: Preeta Samarasan talks about the prejudice she faces as the dark-skinned mother of a blue-eyed child in Blue, whilst Saras Manickam pours out his heart about taking care of a disabled child in Will You Let Him Drink The Wind.
The poetry pieces didn’t quite work for me, except for Sharon Bakar’s Abuses at the end. It’s a strange thing because I do write poetry sometimes. Maybe it’s to do with the style of these pieces or maybe they were meant to be read aloud, rather than in your head.
Overall, Readings from Readings 2 was an enjoyable read. I would have finished it in one sitting, except that I had several work deadlines to rush, so I broke it up into a few manageable pieces instead. Which is what anthologies are useful for, aren’t they?
Angeline Woon’s Big Bertha and the Stones of Justice and Shahminee Selvakannu’s Lighting the Darkness highlight starkly the realities of life and the apathy of the powers-that-be in Malaysia. Fadzlishah Johanabas’ Picking up the Pieces gripped me right from the start with the power of love and longing in his words. Damyanti Ghosh’s An Orchestrated Ending was beautiful prose with an unexpected ending, whilst Alfian Sa’at’s The Cat Who Asked For Forgiveness made me chuckle.
The non-fiction pieces have power of their own: Preeta Samarasan talks about the prejudice she faces as the dark-skinned mother of a blue-eyed child in Blue, whilst Saras Manickam pours out his heart about taking care of a disabled child in Will You Let Him Drink The Wind.
The poetry pieces didn’t quite work for me, except for Sharon Bakar’s Abuses at the end. It’s a strange thing because I do write poetry sometimes. Maybe it’s to do with the style of these pieces or maybe they were meant to be read aloud, rather than in your head.
Overall, Readings from Readings 2 was an enjoyable read. I would have finished it in one sitting, except that I had several work deadlines to rush, so I broke it up into a few manageable pieces instead. Which is what anthologies are useful for, aren’t they?
February 3, 2017
A nice little medley of stories like a box of chocolates; some you like, some you don't.
My favourite picks: Rani Taxis Away, Blue, KL Trilogy, Milking Pen, Waiting
My favourite picks: Rani Taxis Away, Blue, KL Trilogy, Milking Pen, Waiting
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews