How was SG Unbound born, when, who created it?
It all began when writer and
arts administrator Paul Rozario-Falcone and I got together one wintry afternoon
in Cornelia Street Café, in New York City, to discuss the possibility of organizing
a Singapore literature showcase in our adopted home. The literary scene in
Singapore was growing, with new writers, presses, and publications, and we
thought it was time to introduce the Big Apple to the Little Red Dot.
To rally support from the
creative community in NYC, we started the Second Saturdays Reading Series, a
monthly gathering featuring an open mike and a published author, and hosted in
different private homes around the city. The first Second Saturdays gathering
was held in Paul and Al’s home in Carroll Gardens in February 2014.
With the support of this
community, we mounted the first Singapore Literature Festival in NYC in October
that year, showcasing 14 Singaporean writers. The festival was so warmly
received that I
was encouraged to make it a biennial event. At the 2nd
Festival in September 2016, Singapore
Unbound was officially launched.
What was the purpose and how it has changed over time (if at all)?
Our purpose has changed
radically in a very short time. We’re now concerned to bring together
Singaporean and American authors and audiences for in-depth conversations about
literature and society. The 2nd Festival featured such tremendous
American authors as Jessica Hagedorn, Gina Apostol, and Jason Koo, together
with the Singaporeans Alfian Sa’at, Ovidia Yu, and Jeremy Tiang, to discuss
hot-button topics such as sexuality, religion, and migration. Literature is
still at the forefront of every event, but we want to explore the social
conditions and functions of this great art, as well as its aesthetic and formal
qualities.
Part of the stimulus for change
came from Singapore. In 2016, the Media Development Authority banned Tan Pin
Pin’s To Singapore With Love, a documentary film about Singapore’s
political exiles, from public screening. Then the National Arts Council
withdrew part of its publishing grant from Sonny Liew’s graphic novel The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye .
I was so outraged by these
actions that I decided not to work with the Singapore government or to apply
for any state funding. By raising funds through private donations and
individual goodwill, Singapore Unbound is able to maintain its artistic and
organizational independence. We can stand for social and political causes that
we believe in. Our tagline is “Freedom of Expression. Equal Rights for All.”
What
are the main activities of the organization?
In addition to the biennial
festival and monthly reading series in NYC, Singapore Unbound offers writing
fellowships to Singaporean writers to visit New York City and Thailand. Our
first fellow Nur Sabrina bte Dzulkifli is staying in NYC for two weeks next
month to work on a writing project. We announce the award of the Singapore
Unbound Fellowship (Thailand) soon. The fellowships provide authors
with the means to develop writing projects of significant social importance.
From the start, we have seen the
importance not just of event organizing, but also of literary publishing. Our
arts blog, SP Blog, commissions and publishes reviews of Singaporean books by
Americans and vice versa, in an effort to strengthen cross-cultural
understanding. SP Blog also
publishes original poems, stories, essays, and artist interviews.
We’re very excited about our
latest venture, a literary press called Gaudy Boy, which is dedicated to bringing
Asian voices to America. Gaudy
Boy publishes poetry, fiction and non-fiction of exceptional merit by
authors of Asian heritage. Our first title, released just this month, is Malay Sketches, a short-story collection
by the Singaporean author and social critic Alfian Sa’at. Book release events
will be held in Harlem and the Upper West Side.
How
do you stay in contact with other Asian, Asian-American groups?
In the USA, mostly through
personal and professional friendships with the leaders and members of the Asian
American Writers’ Workshop, the Asian American Literary Review, and Kundiman,
an organization devoted to the develop of Asian American literary talent. I’m a
poet myself and so I know many of the writers in the Asian American community.
More formally, I stay in contact
through book fairs and conferences, such as the Asian American caucus at the
recent Association of Writing Programs Conference in Tampa, Florida. There is
also a growing network of North American scholars working in Southeast Asian
studies, many originally from Singapore. They have set up a Southeast Asian
caucus in the Modern Language Association Conference.
From
your experience what has been the reception in the USA to SEA and Singapore
literature in particular?
Vietnamese American Viet Thanh
Nguyen’s novel The Sympathizer has
been critically acclaimed, as was fellow Vietnamese American Monique Truong’s
novel The Book of Salt. Filipino
American Gina Apostol won a PEN award for her novel Gun Dealers’ Daughter. Singaporean Balli Kaur Jaswal, who is coming
for the 3rd festival in NYC in October, published her third novel Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows with
Harper Collins. Another Singaporean author, and festival alum, Ovidia Yu
publishes her very Singaporean mystery novels also with Harper Collins. My last
book of poems Steep Tea was a
finalist for the Lambda Awards. I think there is growing interest in Southeast
Asian and Singapore literature in the USA. Readers want to read beyond the news
headlines.
What
are your plans and main activities for the year?
The 3rd Singapore
Literature Festival in NYC will be held in October this year. It will again
feature essential authors from both countries. The festival theme is “Say It
Differently.” It will celebrate the power of literature to help us rethink our
language and practices.
Gaudy Boy is also launching a
poetry book prize for an unpublished English-language manuscript by an author
of Asian heritage residing anywhere in the world. The Gaudy Boy Poetry Book
Prize will be judged by the wonderful poet Wong May. Born in China, educated in
Singapore, trained as a writer in the USA, and now residing with her family in
Ireland, Wong May is a transnational writer before that term became
fashionable.
How
do you stay connected to the Singapore literary happenings? What do you miss
the most about Singapore and its literary community?
I visit Singapore every summer
to see family and so use the time to watch plays, attend readings, and hobnob
with writers. Last July, when I was back, Singapore Unbound also held a number
of events in Singapore: the first SU Fellowship Award Event, a panel on the
Japanese influence on Singapore literature, and a marathon reading of émigré Goh
Poh Seng’s book-length poem Lines from
Batu Ferringhi. The year before last, we held a memorial reading for the
late Malaysia-born, Singapore-educated, San Francisco writer Justin Chin. It’s
important, I think, to remember the Singapore writers who moved away. Singapore
the country may be small but Singapore the culture has spread far and wide.
It’s vital for our literature to have the most expansive view of Singapore.
What I miss most: calling a
fellow writer to go out for late-night prata and chitchat. It’s not easy to do
so when you’re 9,521 miles away.
