Lucas Stewart's Blog, page 3

Sadaik Short Reviews: A Short Mon History

Though the Mon secured their place in world history through the introduction of Buddhism and the first indigenous script to South East Asia, this place is little known and only barely recorded by the Mon themselves.  In this short but accessible work the academic Dr Nai Pan Hla attempts to correct this narrative dominated by foreign observers through a modest exploration of the archaeological and linguistic findings providing a brief, but still illuminating light on this oldest of...

Sadaik Shorts: A Short Mon History

Though the Mon secured their place in world history through the introduction of Buddhism and the first indigenous script to South East Asia, this place is little known and only barely recorded by the Mon themselves. In this short but accessible work the academic Dr Nai Pan Hla attempts to correct this narrative dominated by foreign observers through a modest exploration of the archaeological and linguistic findings providing a brief, but still illuminating light on this oldest of...

Exploring Burma’s Bookshops: Sarpay Lawka

Sarpay Lawka (World of Books) is the granddaddy of bookshops in Yangon. Though there maybe one or two specialist shops focussing on Buddhist liturgical texts that are older, Sarpay Lawka is accepted as the oldest general trade bookshop. Begun in 1956 as a mobile bookstore from the back of a small open topped truck which stopped at street corners, Sarpay Lawka has grown into one of the biggest and most respected bookshops in the country, with 8 locations already in operation and a 9th soon to...

# 18 – Khokant Culture and Literature Association

Descendants of Ming royalist’s fleeing the Manchu conquerors in China, the Khokant are ethnic Chinese who live in a thin strip of land along Myanmar’s north eastern Shan State. Like many of the ethnic communities they have endured decades of conflict, though unlike many of the ethnic groups their language and literature has escaped relatively unscathed. Teaching the Khokant script in schools was illegal until the transition, but the Khokant were able to work around this ban, due to writing in...

Za Wa Na – Student to Satire

Za Wa Na (real name U Thein) was born 1911. One of Myanmar’s earliest comedic and satirical writers, he made his name at the age of 24 with the publication of ‘College Student’ a semi-fictional account of a student and his experiences at college. The work was so successful it spawned a sequel from the point of a female student and written by the grand dame of Burmese literature, Daw Khin Myo Chit. Za Wa Na later directed his wit at the British colonial administration before turning his...

U San Shar’s Street

The emergence of a ‘Burmese’ literature in the 1910’s and 1920’s was influenced by the import and translation of western literary forms, in novels and short stories. Though this influence has arguably been exaggerated – the first true Burmese language novel by James Hla Gyaw has been often called an adaption of Duma’s Count of Monte Cristo, in reality the two share only a peripheral resemblance – perhaps the most famous example of literary imitation is Shwe U Daung’s U San Shar stories. The...

Sadaik Shorts: Burmese Family

Mi Mi Khaing’s memoir still stands as a classic of Burmese non-fiction, though it’s been 70 years since its initial publication. A multi-generational memoir, it follows the life of the author’s elite non-typical family (the author is of Mon descent, married into a ruling Shan Saopha dynasty, her children in altogether different Military dynasty in the 1960’s) in the pre-war era. Rightly known for one of the first depictions in English of the life of women in a Burmese household, the narrative...

Exploring Burma’s Bookshops: Seikku Cho Cho

Seikku Cho Cho’s owner, San Oo is a known poet and artist, but his real passion lies in his publishing house. Originally operating from a two-storey brick house on 164th street, the printing press was housed in the garage and a small shop selling their titles at the front of the main house. With over 100 books printed a year, the house is one of the largest, non-government affiliated publishers in the country and certainly the most admired. Known for their literary fiction, especially their...

# 17 – Kachin Culture and Literature Cooperation

The Kachin are among the latest arrivals to Myanmar, descending south from the mountains that border the north of Myanmar with China at some point in the 16th or 17th century. They travelled east and west, to Yunnan province in China and to India. The main settled in the Sumprabum Triangle, the once cultural heartland of the Kachin people. The decades of conflict which began in 1962, shifted this heartland to their self-controlled territory in Laiza, along the Chinese border, where Kachin...

Ko Nyein – Modernism to Poetry

Ko Nyein (Mandalay) is a Modernist poet and short story writer. Born in 1945 in the city after which he takes his pen-name, his first poems appeared in the respected Moe Way magazine, such as ‘A Boat with Three Men’, and ‘A Man with a Rickshaw’ and later in the 1990’s his short stories were featured in Shwe Amyutae journal. His first full poetry collection ‘Summer Sky’ was published in 2000 and his first full short story collection, ‘3rd September Dream’ in 2002. He still lives in Mandalay.

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