Lucas Stewart's Blog, page 17
July 21, 2018
N Hpan Ja Ra – Video
I met N Hpan Ja Ra towards the ends of 2014, in the front room of her house in Myitkyina, Kachin State. I had been invited by a publisher friend who only introduced her as the Jade Lady of Kachin.
It’s a moniker well earned.
Agnes, her real name, is famous for her voice. She was the first to sing Jinghpaw language songs on the radio and the first women to compose her own lyrics. She was given the name Uyen Sinwa N Hpan Ja Ra, after the bird that sings so beautifully that others will come t...
July 17, 2018
Mi Chan Wai
Mi Chan Wai (1953) was born in Tha Htone in Mon State. Her first article “Kyaw Hein Wanted” was published in the widely respected Oway journal in 1972. Under the pen name Thakhut Pann (Tha Htone) taken from the novel “Thakhut Pann” by well-known author Khin Hnin Yu she wrote poems for Tine Yin May journal.
In 1984, she wrote her first short story “I, the raft man” under her current penname Mi Chan Wai for Myeik Magazine. Since then she continued to publish stories featuring the lives of fi...
July 16, 2018
Ma Ju – The Other Side of the Wall
The Other Side of the Wall is one of those curious books that you discover in the rounds of the bookshops in Yangon. I found it only once, in Innwa Books on Pansodan I think, and have never seen it for sale since. One of the pleasures of these book-hunts is in finding a gem such as this. A novel. In English translation. From one of Myanmar’s most respected women writers.
The story follows the young girl, Nhaung Khin Zaw, who, whilst travelling by sea from Dawei to Yangon, receives three...
July 12, 2018
Rohingya in Modern Fiction
The Rohingya crisis has produced a number of recent non-fiction works most notably, Francis Wades much reviewed ‘Myanmar’s Enemy Within‘ and Azeem Ibrahim’s earlier work ‘The Rohingya’s: Inside Myanmar’s Genocide‘ while long time Myanmar based journalist Poppy McPherson will have own take on the crisis out this year from I.B Tauris in the UK.
The conflict is now finding its way into fiction.
Rosalie Metro’s sardonically titled ‘Have Fun in Burma’, out now through Northern Illinois University...
July 10, 2018
Mascara Literary Review – Hidden Words Hidden Worlds
Many thanks to Martin Kovan and the Mascara Literary Review for an intense and deep analysis of the Hidden Words, Hidden Words anthology. Some nice words from them:
‘Singular not merely in its collaborative breadth, it is unprecedented: it is the first time in a half-century that such an ambitious and eclectic literary undertaking has been able to occur at all.‘
‘… we can’t yet speak fully, even in the expressive terms of national literature(s), of a ‘Burmese thaw’. Hidden Word Hidden Worlds...
June 9, 2018
Kyaw Zwa Moe’s Prison Memoir
The audience for political prisoner memoirs hasn’t yet dimmed in Myanmar, though its still rare to find one in English.
Kyaw Zwa Moe, (8 years in Insein and Tharawaddy Prison) is the Managing Editor of the English edition of the Irrawaddy Journal. He has selected 37 pieces, written on his experiences as a prisoner, published by the Irrawaddy over the last 18 years and compiled them into a singe work titled Cell, Exile and the New Burma.
Myanmar Times has the rest of the info and an interview...
June 8, 2018
Maw Ma Thae
Maw Ma Thae (b. 1988) is an ethnic Kayah, born in Demawsoe Township, Kayah State. She is an active member of the once outlawed Kayah Nationalities Literacy and Culture Committee, assisting in ongoing community projects promoting Kayah literature and mother-tongue based education.
*This is the seventh in a series of adapted profiles on writers taken from the 2017 anthology ‘Hidden Words Hidden Worlds: Contemporary Short Stories from Myanmar’
May 19, 2018
Celebrating Karen Literature and Music (video)
‘Only a small number of Karen people living in the Karen State and along the Thai-Myanmar border play the traditional instruments and they have nearly disappeared in other areas inhabited by the Karen people.’
Saw Shar, in an article for the Karenews.org, laments the decline in popularity of traditional Karen instruments, such as the harp, (Nar Dain), the pipe (Pi Par) and the drum.
The above video was taken at the Live literature night that followed the Hidden Words, Hidden Worlds short...
May 10, 2018
Winning the DA Prize for Short Fiction
It’s been a lucky month so far. On the back of the shortlisting for the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing, i am now delighted to say i have won the inaugural Dinesh Allirajah Prize for Short Fiction for my story ‘Bakhur’.
Press Release Here: Comma Press
Comma press is an award-winning publisher in the UK at the forefront of the short story form. The prize honours the memory of a former Comma director and writer, Dinesh Allirajah. The prize continues into a second year on the...
May 5, 2018
UK Fellowship for Myanmar Literary (and other creative industries) Professionals
Goldsmiths University of London in association with the Charles Wallace Burma Trust is inviting applications from Creative and Cultural mid-career practitioners and academics from Myanmar for a 3 month (September to December) Fellowship in London .
The Fellowship will cover the cost of academic fees, living costs, flights and visa.
Applicants must have an equivalent UK BA (hons) Degree and preferably a Masters. Have good English skills and a clear idea of how you will cascade what you have l...
