What is the value of Southeast Asian literature as world literature? This question needs to account for the uneven playing field of the global literary marketplace dominated by Euro-American publishers, critics and academics. These centers once made and broke works of world literature.
For an umpteenth number of years since the independence of Southeast Asian nations, very little of the region’s works have figured prominently in Euro-American literary marketplaces. For the few that did, such as Pramoedya Ananta Toer’s coming-of-age novels about Indonesia that form his famous Buru quartet, their value was tied to what they can reveal about the workings of the societies and cultures from which they hail. In other words, their worth was more anthropological than artistic.
Recent developments suggest that this situation is changing. With access to abundant economic resources, Singapore is emerging as a literary center to rival London or Paris, a nation whose institutions and publishers are keen on championing not just local works but also regional. More and more Southeast Asian and Southeast Asian diasporic works are also gaining traction in the global literary award circuits. Eka Kurniawan’s Beauty is a Wound was longlisted for the 2016 International Booker Prize. In 2017, Night Sky with Exit Wounds by Vietnamese-American Ocean Vuong clinched the T.S. Eliot Prize.
This panel will attempt to make sense of this relatively new literary consciousness about Southeast Asia. Are we witnessing a renaissance of sorts? Or is this more of the same? Join Indonesian translator and writer Tiffany Tsao, Thai-American author Sunisa Manning and Burmese poet Ko Ko Thett as we wrestle with the issues surrounding Southeast Asia between art and anthropology. This session is moderated by Nazry Bahrawi, assistant professor of Southeast Asian literature and culture at the University of Washington.
VENUE: Zoom (online)
LINK: To be given to registrants
EVENT WEBSITE: University of Washington
DATE AND TIME
5 May 2022, 8am-9am