By Sharon
Lydia Kwa’s third novel, Pulse, is a riveting tale that follows about protagonist Natalie Chia, a Singapore-born acupuncturist living in Canada whose life is intricately entangled with her haunting childhood experience, unrequited forbidden love affair and her deep, compelling secrets that she has kept from her loved ones. Pulse effectively stitches the life of two individuals together by their life experiences and their tenacious approach to the complexities of the world we live in. Following the suicide of former lover Faridah’s son, Selim, Natalie returns home to Singapore to uncover the dark truths that has been enshrouded by facetious niceties and conservative denial. Pulse deals with the painful and ignominious social issues that plague our seemingly pristine and respected civilization and handles them with the right balance of delicacy and honesty. The novel is socially, politically moving in a way where it is accessible not only to a local that has lived for long in this baked sun-ripened island but to anyone who has ever felt displaced in their own skin.
Interestingly, despite its contemporary themes, Kwa reminisces a lot about the old Singapore and cleverly draws retrospective links through flashbacks and characterisation while still propelling the narrative forward. For example, Selim’s internet pseudonym “Benkulen Bound” accounts a fascinating history lesson about the poor geographical location of a successful pepper-producing trading port damned by its own success, leading to many resultant effects that would ultimately conclude in the fall of Malaya and Singapore to the Japanese during WWII. The butterfly effect here serves to amplify the novel’s overarching theme of connection and the intricate bonds that transcends the impassable gaps between humans and our past that binds us all together in ways that seems most unlikely.
Kwa creates characters who are compelled to examine the painful episodes of their past in light of their mature experiences. The charge of these characters is to surface nuances and impressions that were, at the time, misconceived or repressed, and to reframe a sequence of events in a way that makes healing and wholeness at least imaginable in the present.
An epigraph from psychologist R.D Laing hints at the multiplicities of awareness, both conscious and otherwise, that saturate this text with psychologically sound ambivalence.
“Moreover Jack sees that Jill herself knows what Jill thinks Jack knows, but that Jill does not realize she knows it.”
I think that perhaps the epigraph sums Pulse up perfectly with its intriguing complexities of understanding through unspoken words and implicit hints at taboos that the society is so afraid to confront. Kwa unabashedly lays all these socially unacceptable topics of bondage, homosexuality and incest on the table and deals with them with a boldness that is both frankly quite terrifying yet fascinating.
As the story unfolds, allusions to both western and Asian cultures are featured heavily with the likes of the popular Chinese film( A Love Without End: 不了情), Bee Gees tunes (“Run to me whenever you are lonely”) and even Max Ehrmann’s “Desiderata“. These cultural references are layered into the narrative and act as commentaries on the social issues and internal conflicts faced by the characters.
“Desiderata“, which translates from Latin as “desired things,” is a famous poem written in 1927 by Max Ehrmann. In Natalie’s secondary school concert performance, “Desiderata” was being recited by her class and it still has its echoes resonating throughout her life way into her adulthood. It is akin to an inspirational manifesto for the basis of humanity in a world fraught with sufferings and immorality. In its plain, unembellished language communicated with precision and tenderness, “Desiderata” is disarmingly simplistic and it seemed like something in which most anyone could find a bit of solace or relatability. This is especially poignant for Natalie whose life, like the dramatic sequence of the Chinese film A Love Without End is punctuated with betrayals and let-downs by people closest and dearest to her. And as depicted by her defensive stance of refusing access into her impervious shell of protection, Natalie assumes the dominant role in her Kinbaku practice of bondage so that she will never be in the position of vulnerability.
“Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul. With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.”
Overlaid on Kwa’s saga of repressed angst and trauma is her equally absorbing introduction of her mystical, sorceress-like Mah-Mah and her family business in Chinese Medicine. This introduces a radically different dimension to the story and interweaves it with a more Oriental and traditional backdrop. The mystical Oracle and prophecies accompanied by the potency of Chinese acupuncture exposes Natalie’s unbreakable bonds to her hometown in Singapore and how she could never fully extricate herself from her past. Interestingly, the narrative doesn’t unfold in a linear fashion and is interspersed with flashbacks and historical accounts of Singapore. It seems highly mimetic of Natalie’s inability to completely divorce herself from her roots/origins and childhood memories no matter how hard she tries to move on from her harrowing past.
Overall, I think that Pulse is a brilliantly written piece of literary artefact with its reflection on the history of modern Singapore. Natalie’s return trip elicits rich descriptions of her homeland’s transformation from the rustic, traditional community into a hyper-modern global city in the years since she left. These observations are those of an estranged daughter whose diasporic identity becomes the basis of a sustained queering of nationalism and its heteronormative structures. Effectively, it challenges the quandaries faced by our conservative society and is not afraid to address it with such honesty and sincerity that makes it an endearing and intimate read.