A novel set in capitalist Hong Kong in the 1960s and steeped in alcohol, prostitution and stream-of-consciousness narration might not suggest a controlled work of fiction. Yet Liu Yichang’s classic The Drunkard, in Charlotte Chun-lam Yiu’s new translation, is measured, uninhibited and very good.
Power corrupts is the message from author Megha Majumdar in her blistering debut novel of prejudice and injustice set in contemporary Kolkata.
After a yoga retreat from hell somewhere between Shenzhen and Dongguan, twenty-year-old Tiller Bardmon meets single mother Val and her eight-year old son, Victor Jr at the Hong Kong International Airport’s food court. Val and her son are returning to the United States after visiting her family in Kowloon, yet when she tries to pay for their food she finds her credit cards don’t work and she has no cash. Tiller spots them the money and Val whisks him away to an empty table, confiding in him before he can tuck into his xiaolongbao.
To commemorate the 700th anniversary of the death of the great Italian poet Dante Alighieri, Chameleon Press will publish a new collection of poetry in which contemporary poets from Asia interpret themes Dante’s opus with a particular focus on Beatrice, the object of Dante’s youthful love, his muse and guide. Due to a change in the associated musical composition competition, as well as Covid-19-related scheduling issues regarding associated public events, the submission deadline for the Dante poetry anthology has been extended until May 2021.
In her brilliant second collection, Carlina Duan illuminates small and sacred moments of survival. Tracing familial lore and love, Duan reflects on the experience of growing up as a diasporic, bilingual daughter of immigrants in the American Midwest, exploring the fraught complexities of identity, history, belonging, and linguistic reclamation.
From about 1765 to 1840 Japanese finding themselves in Edo might have been amused by skimming over a few senryū, short satirical or comical poems which made fun of the pretensions of the administrative capital.
The gold of the Scythians exploded into the world of museum goers when Leningrad’s Hermitage Museum sent these treasures touring to London and New York in 1975. An equally noteworthy exhibition, Masters of the Steppe, took place in 2017 at the British Museum. This copiously-illustrated volume enables readers to revisit that exhibition, and to ponder essays produced by 30 scholars from 12 countries. These essays appear, confusingly, in alphabetical order by author. It is best to start by reading the magistral concluding essay, and then return to the essays in the order they are discussed in the conclusion.