Lucas Stewart's Blog, page 9

Call for Translators – Burmese to English Short Fiction

This is a fantastic, paid, opportunity for Burmese to English literary translators to work on a new collection of short stories from Myanmar.  I have copied the announcement below from the collection’s editor, Alfred Birnbaum, but am wary of putting his private email contact address publicly.  So if anyone is interested please just use the contact form on Sadaik and I will pass you onto Alfred.

 

‘The UK National Centre for Literary Translation and Stranger’s Press have launched a joint proje...

Pho Kyawt – Librarian to Novelist

Pho Kyawt is an ethnic Rakhine writer, born in Kyaukphyu Township.  He came to Yangon when he was 19 years old, working variously as a librarian and civil servant.  He began to write seriously in 1960, publishing 57 novels mostly based on Arakanese history.  He won a National Literary Award in 1972 for ‘Approaching to Victory’ and the Sarpay Beikmann Award 5 times – 4 times for his novels and once for a collection of short stories.  One novel, ‘I Gave My Life for Thee’ was translated into Eng...

Yezet – A New Collection of Burmese Short Stories in Translation

A few months ago I made a brief post on the recipients of this year’s English PEN translation award winners, one of which was the successful funding of a new collection of short stories from Burma, edited by Alfred Birnbaum and to be published by Strangers Press in the UK.

Alfred had kindly given more information on this exciting project.

For the moment, the collection is titled Yezet, ‘after the popular Buddhist belief that persons with affinities share “droplets” from previous lives’.

The w...

Sadaik Shorts: The Bamboo Clapper Essays

A collection of fifty short articles published in the mid to late 1960’s in the Working People’s Daily newspaper.  While most anthologised articles from Myanmar rarely have a thematic identity, this particular collection, compiled by Win Pe’s son, is an extreme jumble of thoughts; a mish-mash of writings on archaeology, astronomy, the cubic volume of a brain, damages to golf courses, ancient Egyptian poetry and the coconut.  As a diversion into the mind of Win Pe, the collection is certainly...

Exploring Burma’s Bookshops: Hin Lai O

With publishing power centres in Yangon and Mandalay, there are very few bookshops to be found in the smaller towns across the country.  Kalaymyo, a former Shan town on the northern edge of the hills that mark the beginning of Chin State and only a couple of hours drive from Tamu on the Indian border is probably the last place you would expect to find a bookshop to rival any in Yangon.

Its name, Hin Lai O refers to the popular four curry pot in Burmese cuisine, a dish with many varied ingredi...

# 8 – Palaung Culture and Literature Association

The Ta-ang are a Mon-Khmer group of thirteen communities who live in the hills of northern Shan state with their ancestral homeland centred on Namhsan, a stunning one road town that clings to the knuckle of a mountain overlooking steep, tea-leaf terraces.

With 13 different dialects among them using a combination of Burmese and Shan scripts, Ta-ang university students engaged with elders from their community and convinced them of the need to unite their people under a single, dominant script. ...

Ma Sandar – Architect to Novelist

Ma Sandar is an architect by trade and a writer by choice.  She made a name for herself with the publication of ‘Innocence of Youth’, a novel on the lives of students at the Yangon Institute of Technology in 1972.  She has gone on to publish 50 short stories and 13 novels, winning 3 National Literary Awards in 1994, 1999 and 2002.  5 of her novels have been made into movies.

 

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Manau Park

The Kachin, an umbrella term for the six ethnic communities who live in Myanmar’s most northerly state, were once led by Duwas or clan chiefs.  As well as governing their lands and the villages on it, the Duwa’s were also cultural guardians, commissioning Jaiwa’s – storytellers – to recount the epic oral myths and authorising the Manau celebrations.

Since the Kachin rebellion in 1962 the influence of the Duwa’s has waned, replaced by pastors and politicians.

It was a Duwa family, the Kareng,...

Sadaik Shorts: I am Poetry, Don’t you Cry

If ever there was a book which showed the world how to publish a translated work in minority, national and international languages, this is it.  Written originally in Lai Hakha by the ethnic Chin poetess and creative polymath Anna Biak, translated into Burmese by Maung Day, then bridge translated into English by Salai Zing Mang, published by the legendary Era Press, a foreword by the renowned Aung Cheimt, featuring tri-lingual scripts and partitioned by abstract, coloured artwork from Anna he...

Exploring Burma’s Bookshops: New Vision

One of my favourite bookshops in Myanmar, New Vision is the quintessential, tumble down second hand book store.  The entrance is narrow and already framed with books.  As you enter, the light dims and you are confronted by a wall of books.  To your right there is a small wooden counter with books dangling precariously above it like one of those coin push machines in the amusement arcades.  To your left is the English section.  As everywhere in this shop, the books are double if not triple sta...