by Hazel Toh

On Friday evening, I had the pleasure of attending my first book sharing session “Afterwords”, organized by Ethos Books at Marine Parade Library. As pointed out by the organisers, we were in for a double treat as the event was divided into two sessions, a sharing by Jerrold Yam on his new poetry collection Intruder, and a sharing by Yong Shu Hoong, Dave Chua and Wong Shu Yun on their work for the 2013 anthology Passages: Stories of Unspoken Journeys. I shall focus on the latter for this blog post as the sharing by these writers left a deep impression on me.

Dave Chua and Wong Shu Yun’s individual works were on sale during the event, but their sharing session was focused on Passages, a Singapore Writers’ Festival project that provides a platform for writers to “pen original stories after meeting different segments of our society whose voices are often not strongly heard: senior citizens looked after by a hospice or a home for the elderly, low-income families that had endured tough times making ends meet, and former offenders who had spent time behind bars” (quoted from the promotional poster by Ethos Books). Dave Chua and Wong Shu Yun shared their experiences interviewing ex-convicts for their writing of “The Zookeper” and “A Short History of the Sun” respectively.

One thing that struck me during the session was Dave Chua’s admission that he was not too happy with the final product. He explained how his interviewee, a drug dealer turned zookeeper, seemed more excited to share about his ‘glamorous’ days as a triad member than to discuss his occupation at the zoo. As a result, Chua had to refocus the discussion, and in the end, he admitted having to do much research on what it meant to be a zookeeper.

Reading his short story, it seems that his research has paid off because the story contains some fascinating details about the lifestyle of a zookeeper, who has turned over a new leaf and quit his drug dealing days. “The Zookeeper” is a fun and interesting story, but I now have some reservations about the visionary project that Passages undertakes, or was meant to undertake. I understood Passages as a noble initiative that hoped to provide a voice for the silenced minorities of Singapore, but as the event progressed into the night, I began to lose sight of this social project that Passages has promised. It becomes somewhat evident that Passages is not being quite faithful to these marginalised voices that it has promised to elevate.

And it seems that both writers and audiences have picked up on it. During the FAQ session, Professor Holden inquired if the purpose of the interview sessions was to understand the voices of the silenced so as to better broadcast them, or to gather creative fodder. The answers provided by Yong Shu Hoong (editor of the anthology) seem to imply that he and the writers are aware of the limitations of their work. Yong emphasized the sensitivity of handling issues pertaining to the marginalised in Singapore and he compared writing about senior citizens to writing about low-income families, pointing out that there is greater sensitivity when it comes to writing about low-income families because of an underlying issue of politics. He also questioned, “How do you write about poverty without sensationalising it?” Indeed, that seems to be the problem that has perplexed the writers for the 2013 anthology: how do you represent the voices of ex-convicts without celebrating their criminal lifestyles?

Dave Chua chooses to skirt around the issue, while Wong chooses to focus her story on the relationship between a father and son, inspired from the interview sessions she had with an ex-convict who mentioned that his father had also been in the triad. We can’t blame them though, given the current social and political environment we are in, and especially if the project you are working on is initiated by a government body such as the National Arts Council.

It was mentioned during the sharing session that readers were concerned if it was ethical for writers to dwell on people’s misfortunes and to benefit from them by sensationalising and dramatizing their stories. Yong’s answer to that was, ultimately, what was produced was still fiction. (Note how the promotional poster, as well as the backcover of Passages, are quick to qualify that the writers are “pen[ning] original stories”!) But doesn’t that raise doubts and questions about what the true purpose of literature is? If what is produced is mere fiction, then what hope is there for literature to redeem the silenced? And in the context of our module, doesn’t that mean that the early Singaporean writers’ attempts to construct identity through literature turned out futile?

Furthermore, if our social and political environment has no place for literature that remains faithful to marginalised voices it tries to elevate (even if it means glamorizing crime because there are ex-convicts who do miss their criminal lifestyles), then what does this mean for our national literature? Doesn’t the situation prove that we are constructing, to borrow Ricard’s terms, a “mausoleum” of national literature by dictating and prescribing what Singapore literature should include and exclude?

For me, this sharing session has prompted many questions about the future of literature in Singapore, even if these were not issues directly addressed during the event. It is my sincerest hope that these concerns will be addressed one day, or literature in Singapore may eventually lose its essence, meaning and value.