In The Feather of Ma’at, Fernando rewards the attentive reader who does the heavy lifting to fill in the gaps between his lines for themselves. In this regard, he leaves the authorship and authenticity in making meaning, and meaning-making, to the reader thus rendering us (his readers) a part of his tapestry of loose writings surreptitiously strung together as signposts for the one who chooses to follow him down his ‘rabbit-hole’ (Chen, 2022). The artistic gaps in Fernando’s writing speak to the ‘wounds’ he philosophises in his other seminal collaborations such as in ‘The ..read more

“Thanks for the American Dream To vulgarize and falsify until The bare lies shine through” –William S. Burroughs, “Thanksgiving Prayer” Vulgarized, falsified, lionized, satirized, vilified, glorified and on and on, the American Dream is many things to many people.  But just what is it? We Americans (excuse me, United Statesians) are known for loving quick and easy answers, and there are none to be found in 100 Years of the American Dream: Representations and Conceptions in American Literature, 1919-2019.  What is to be found, however, is a wealth and variety of reflection on this fr ..read more

A figure, in the precise sense of one who cares for (cura) — books, works, texts, people, ideas, people, oh people —, one might even say a guardian of ideas and people, persons with ideas, is no longer with us … Most everywhere else, they have already been swallowed by the rise of the salesperson. Or the gallerist, if you prefer the other name with which they go by. Which is no fault of the gallerist as such: after all they are merely living up to their call to play to the gallery. And, it is perhaps of no coincidence that galleries quite possibly bring with them echoes of church porches (gal ..read more

Michael Batty’s most recent book, Inventing Future Cities, deserves more attention than what it has been accorded from both academics and policy makers since its publication in 2018. It also comes at a time when the cities of the world are now home to close to sixty percent of the world’s population, and set to further increase in the near future. Specialists or mainstream readers seeking a singular and coherent work on the complex issues involving the future of cities will find a number of useful insights that are supported by Batty’s sense of historical nuance and theoretical rigour. It is ..read more

To teach, perchance to dream, aye, there’s the rub Keeping in mind that dreams come to one, envelop one, quite possibly take over one — and not only does one never quite have control over the dream, it might well write itself into one in ways that will always remain beyond one’s knowledge. A dream writing; an unreadable writing; perhaps an invisible writing; or maybe a writing that is awaiting reading. And where the effects of said writing are precisely its traces unveiling itself — waiting to be read. Where perhaps, to teach is to risk being in the realm of the unknown — in the oikos of the ..read more

  As its title suggests, Robert Wood’s Suburbanism is centrally concerned with the concept of place as both ideological site and lived experience. These two elements are fused in Wood’s sense of space as deeply connected to one’s personal identity; rooted in words and shaped by the imagination, “my world is a world of suburbs…being from Wembley means being from, about and for those suburbs” (51). However, identity is also conceptualised as fluid and multiple; built and re-built through language and social interactions, constantly renegotiated through the examining of various aspects of t ..read more

The philosopher John Moriarty used to say that, if anybody wants to fully understand his work, they only have to read John McGahern’s last novel, That They May Face the Rising Sun. Truly, the novel’s consecration of the Irish countryside, and its acute observations of the deeply instinctive ritualisation of the agrarian quotidian, can offer us a glimpse into the otherwise dense, cryptic vision that Moriarty’s writings make of the Irish physical and metaphysical terrain. As a culmination of a forty year writing career, McGahern’s That They May Face the Rising Sun demonstrates the distillation ..read more

  Twisted and unconventional, Marylyn Tan’s debut poetry collection Gaze Back opens with a poem about, in her own words, “steaming up your vagina.” Exploring themes such as sexuality, queerness, and the female body, this poem is a strong introduction to a collection that voices the clash between tradition and female sexual expression. This clash becomes particularly clear in the poems concerned with Catholicism and the portrayal of Jesus. The author here takes the image of Jesus and transforms it into that of the familiar, struggling young girl. Jesus is bleeding, walking home alone at n ..read more

Just as disability and race are not exclusively personal issues but also political and social ones, weighted and shaped by entrenched discrimination and exclusion, these stories give insight to the diverse and sometimes intersectional experiences that come under the somewhat controversial umbrella term of “queerness”. Yet as several contributors explore, education and awareness can lead to personal empowerment. In many instances, they paint a hopeful roadmap to redemption and absolution from internalised prejudice, hatred, and shame, and ultimately a promise of happiness and release. A common ..read more

  Sergius Seeks Bacchus is the debut poetry collection by Indonesian writer and poet Norman Erikson Pasaribu, translated into English by Tiffany Tsao. Rooted in Pasaribu’s identity as a queer person of Batak descent and Christian upbringing, Sergius Seeks Bacchus is an exploration of past, present and future histories, of truths and fictions, of the deeply personal and the universal. At its centre is the seeking, the ever-present urge towards something or someone. Throughout, while Pasaribu makes ample use of the free verse form, the collection also features prose poems, two contrapuntal ..read more