Larry Feign, a professional visual artist who made his living as a cartoonist for many years. has written a rather unusual book. The Village at the Centre of the World has no cartoons, but the format is not dissimilar in that the work consists of a set of captioned photos, where the captions are essays of a few hundred words discussing the subject of the image.
“In the early summer of 1819, a British hunting party was heading through thick jungle near Aurangabad when the tiger they were tracking disappeared into the chasm of a deep ravine.” With that romantic and somewhat Indiana Jones-like opening, William Dalrymple begins his Foreword to this new and updated edition of Benoy K Behl’s classic The Ajanta Caves: Ancient Buddhist Paintings of India.
A sprawling, multigenerational epic, Hwang Sok-yong’s Mater 2-10 tells the story of a working-class Korean family and details their struggles against the tides of the 20th century, from the Japanese colonial era through the division of the Peninsula to South Korea’s economic boom. Their agitation for workers’ rights spans the generations, as does the unique ability of the family’s women to speak and affect events from beyond the grave, both of which define the family and mark the epochs of the story.
In 1987, Chris Stowers ditches his dull job in the UK and embarks on a trip throughout the Asia-Pacific, following countless other adventurers traveling with just a backpack and a minuscule budget in what he calls the “golden age of travel”.
Sir John Seeley once claimed that the British had “… conquered and peopled half the world in a fit of absence of mind.” This would have bemused the many adventurers, mercenaries, and administrators who dedicated their lives to displacing indigenous power across India. More pragmatic than perfidious, Albion accommodated hundreds of princely states ruled by sundry begums, nawabs, nizams, and maharajas.
Hiro Arikawa came to international attention when The Travelling Cat Chronicles became a bestseller in many languages, not least English. The story of a man named Satoru and his cat Nana who go on an extensive journey to visit Satoru’s friends won over readers in Japan and around the world, especially those who appreciate the special bond between humans and cats. Both characters return in a couple of stories in Arikawa’s new collection, The Goodbye Cat, translated by Philip Gabriel.
Pierangelo Valtinoni is a contemporary Italian composer best-known, among other things, for his operas for children. The Snow Queen (La regina delle nevi), originally commissioned by the Komische Oper Berlin, was given its Asian debut (in English translation) at Hong Kong’s Shatin Town Hall 14-15 October.
Oksana Dyka brought a powerful voice and stage presence to Opera Hong Kong’s new production of Puccini’s one full-length foray into melodrama which runs through 15 October at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre.
The stories in Khem K Aryal’s new collection present a deeply human perspective on the travails—and triumphs—of a group of Nepalese immigrants struggling with the consequences of their decision to come to America.
The railroads, San Francisco Chinatown, the Chinese Exclusion Act, laundries, restaurants: just when you thought there was nothing more to be written about the story of Chinese immigration to America, along comes Hugo Wong with an absorbing account of his families’ history in Mexico. Wong is a scion of two of Mexico’s erstwhile most important and successful Chinese families, but whose stories have largely been forgotten. Both the remembering and the forgetting contain important lessons.
You must be logged in to post a comment.