Dato' M. Shanmughalingam

• In his school days at the V.I. from 1952 to 1958, Dato' M. Shanmughalingam was hyperactive in the debating, literary and drama fields.
• He was a member of the very successful school debating team and chairman of the Senior Literary and Debating Society. He topped the country in the 1956 Sixth Form Entrance Exam with 96% marks.
• He was the secretary and, later, joint editor of the Seladang, steering the V.I. newspaper through one of its most vibrant periods. He was in the first group of Victorians in 1958 to be awarded the coveted "Club 21" badge for meritorious service to the school.
• Shan holds an Honours degree from the University of Malaya, a Masters from Harvard and a Doctorate from Oxford University. At Harvard he graduated first in class with Grade A in all eight subjects and was admitted to the Ph.D. programme directly without formal application.
• Shan's literary publications include poems and short stories in Commonwealth Anthologies (London) international anthologies (Singapore), in universities (Harvard, Malaya, Oxford and Singapore) and in national literary journals. He is co-editor of an anthology of Malaysian poetry.
  

Muhammad Haji Salleh

Born in 1942 Muhammad Haji Salleh is one of Malaysia´s leading poets. For more than 30 years, through his poetry, translations and literary criticism and theory, as well as by publishing the magazine Tengara, a journal of Southeast Asian Literature, he has been contributing to the literary and cultural life of Malaysia. Openly rejecting conformity to western cultural patterns, his poems often refer to myths and legends of the Malay oral tradition. Haji Saleh lives with his family near Kuala Lumpur.

Muhammad Haji Salleh is one of Malaysia´s leading poets. Born in 1942 he studied in England and the USA, and since 1978 he has been a professor for Malaysian literature at the National University in Bangi near Kuala Lumpur. He has also made a name for himself as an essayist, cultural critic, translator and publisher of Tengara, a magazine for Southeast Asian literature.A central theme of his poems, written in Malay and English, is the conflict between town and countryside, between Malaysian and western culture. Openly rejecting conformity to western cultural patterns, his poems often refer to myths and legends of the Malay oral tradition, in which the genres are mixed quite differently to in the west.



Si Tenggang's Homecoming

1

the physical journey that i traverse
is the journey of the soul,
transport of the self from a fatherland
to a country collected by sight and mind.
the knowledge the sweats from it
is estranger's experience,
from one who had learnt to see, reflect
and choose between
the challenging actualities.

2

its true that i have growled at my mother and
grandmother,
but only after having told them my predicament
that they have never brought to consideration
the wife that i began to love in my loneliness,
in the country that alienated me,
they enveloped in their pre-judgement.
i have not entirely returned, i know,
having been changed by time and place.
coarsed by problems
estranged by absence.

3

but look.
i have brought myself home,
seasoned by faith.
broadened by land and language,
i am no longer afraid of the oceans
of the differences between people,
no longer easily snared
no words of ideas
the journey was a loyal teacher,
who was never tardy
in explaining cultures and variousness.
look i am just like you.
still malay,
sensitive to what i believe is good,
and more ready to understand

than my brothers.
the contents of these boats are yours too,
because i have returned.

Hilary Tham

• Hilary Tham Goldberg, 58, a poet, painter and teacher.


• Mrs. Goldberg was born in Klang, Malaysia, the daughter of Chinese immigrants, and was educated at a convent school taught by Irish nuns.


• Her grandmother grumbled that she wasted too much time with her nose in a book, but a high school English teacher urged her to continue reading and to write poetry.


• She received a master's degree in English literature in 1969 from the University of Malaya and immigrated to the United States in 1971 after her marriage to a Peace Corps volunteer in Malaysia.


• She was the author of nine books of poetry and a book of memoirs and poems, "Lane With No Name: Memoirs and Poems of a Malaysian-Chinese Girlhood" (1997).


• A book of poetry titled "Bad Names for Women" (1989) won second prize in the 1988 Virginia Poetry Prizes. Two of her books are used as Asian studies texts by the University of Pittsburgh, and her most recent, "Tin Mines and Concubines," a collection of short stories set in Malaysia, won the Washington Writers Publishing House Prize for fiction and will be published in the fall.


• She died on June 24 of metastatic lung cancer at her home in Arlington.

BECOMING A WOMAN

When I was twelve, my mother initiated me

into the mysteries of becoming a woman

with a pound of rice-paper, the unadvertised

kind made of stalks and leaves, the stubble

after the harvest.

She taught me the art of crumpling,

stretching, folding the sheafs into

a likeness of Modess-factory-rejects.

"You will bleed

at a special time of the moon."

she told me. "Use these

to preserve modesty and the secret

of your femaleness."

Her mother's way she passed to me

with the few words she has received

at her initiation.

Each full moon I cursed the tides

within my body. I abandoned

tradition's rice-paper.

I have forgiven the moon since

our children came, spores of sunrise

in their newborn hands.

ANALYSIS

• It is obvious that the main theme of this poem is the art of becoming a woman, in which it is the period whereby a girl turns to a woman through menstruation. During this time, they have to be taught on how to face the situation and how to take care of their cleanliness.
• Culture and tradition are the second theme of this poem, whereby the speaker's mother taught her on how to use the traditional rice-paper during her menstruation. However, it could be seen clearly that the speaker neglects her mother's advice by saying "I abandoned tradition's rice-paper."
• At first, the speaker seems to feel uncomfortable with the coming of her menstruation by stating "Each full moon Icursed the tides within my body." However, once she had children, she starts to realize the reason behind it. For her, the children bring happiness in her life and she is thankful for having them.

Karim bin Raslan

Kam Raslan: A Brief Biography

Kam Raslan is a writer and director, working in film, TV, and theater in Malaysia. He is a columnist in The Edge weekly and Off the Edge magazine. His writings were previously compiled in Generation: A Collection of Contemporary Malaysian Ideas. He also writes for the Instant Café Theatre and will one day make his own feature fim.


Confessions of An Old Boy – A Review.

Dato’ Hamid is an MCKK (Malay College Kuala Kangsar) Old Boy and a civil servant (of course) who believes that working with the civil service is a privilege. Having said that, I find him a lovable because he’s so darned funny. His dialogue and reminiscences take the reader on a trip through pre-independence Malaya and what is to come in the new Malaysia.
Frankly, I felt like I was reading about people I knew even though the good Dato’ Hamid is a fictional character!

Dato’ Hamid amusingly refers to his son as the Ayatollah, and says of him and his generation: “I don’t know where they came from and I don’t know where they’re taking us.” This is something I agree with completely – I have no idea where they’re taking us either.
One part is particularly telling in its familiarity: “He wants to act, look and dress just like all the others. When he and all his little Umno Youth friends are together, it reminds me of that ridiculous pleasure ride that my grandson insisted I go on in Disneyland.” And what’s that ride? It’s a Small World After All.

Having been surrounded by the Old Boy network for as long as I can remember, and being previously married to one, I found the MCKK references very apt, especially the part where Dato’ Hamid agonizes over taking money from a Chinese man to (gasp!) spy on an MCKK old boy. I truly felt for him, as he would have been screwed if the old boys found out. Why, even today, you’d be in serious trouble if you break the code and turn on any of your brothers.
I enjoyed the Ariff and Capitalism chapter where Ariff plans to get rich the quick and easy way – I’m convinced Kam is recounting a true story as it sounds ridiculous enough to be believable and I seem to remember hearing a variation of that story years ago. The chapter, Murder in Parit Chindai, is a bit too drawn out, but it made me think of several well known Hamzahs (spoilt, ageing Mummy’s boys), who are still tied to Mummy’s apron strings and clinging pathetically to the illusion of grandeur that used to be real when their family had money and a name. But after one generation of squandering the family fortunes, they refuse to work because they’re not used to it and believe that someone will “save them” because their father had “helped someone” years ago. Hello ... isn’t that just another day in Damansara Heights?

The last chapter, The Malayans, was the most insightful – if you don’t know anything about how Malaysia works, go straight to this chapter and get up to speed. It will tell you everything you need to know regarding the races, their quirks and their children. When Dato’ Hamid complains (again!) about the Ayatollah and says: “It’s such a horrible irony, London gave me a taste for tweed jackets but it gave my son a taste for overthrowing Shahs.”

This reminds me that Malaysia is still divided between these two schools of thought: Western culture vs. religious fanaticism. Well, you can find the answer in this novel.

Shirley Geok-Lin Lim

HANDS by Shirley Geok-Lin Lim

• The major theme of this poem is about tradition, mainly on how a woman supposed to function, especially in terms of behaviour and manner.
• However, it can be seen that throughout the poem, the speaker sounds rather unwilling/ forced and frustrated.
• Perhaps, what Shirley is trying to convey here is for all the women out there to follow their own heart and dreams, instead of being forced to follow what others are asking you to do.
• In a family institution, women serve as the secondary role since they were little until they are married. When they were little they were taught by their parents, especially mother on how to behave like a real woman. Once they are married, they have to obey and to serve their husband.
• These show how a woman's life is being controlled by the society itself, thus, Shirley wrote this poem as to show her frustration regarding this matter.
• Through the Islamic perspective, it is compulsory for a wife to obey and to serve her husband as long as it is not against the Islamic teaching, and it is also a must for a child to obey his or her parents, or else he or she will be punished in the hereafter.
  
  

Salleh Ben Joned

Have Tempurung Will Travel by Salleh Ben Joned

• In this poem, Salleh Ben Joned uses several words in Malay language such as modernisasi, intellektual, moden, kampong, globalisasi and others. The use of these words signifies that regardless of the idea of preserving our own mother tongue, we are actually using or borrowing words from the West. The idea is that we can still use the modern or Western language, but we must not forget our roots.
• This poem highlights the idea of nationalism and the tone is provocative. Salleh ben Joned uses this particular poem in order to mock and to make fun of the Malays.(especially Malay Language)
• The theme of this poem leads to the issue on how to open up and deal with modern world. Salleh satirizes everyone in this country as a form to make them change their perspectives towards life.
• He indicates that we should never be narrow-minded and stay put in one place only. We should go out, go discover new things and take advantage on what the world has to offer.
• It could be seen from the title itself that Salleh urges and also provokes the Malaysian Malay not to sit under the coconut shell (tempurung), we should always be open-minded and learn new things rather than dwelling too much on unnecessary issue, for instance the issue of language politics itself.
• Besides that, he indicates that if we just sit still and do nothing, we could never improve and develop ourselves. thus, this country will never progress and develop.
• Therefore, this poem is relevant to the issue of language politics which is happening in our country. It is highlighted by the use of several words which are considered as Malaywords by the Malays themselves, but the truth is, those words are not ours and they belong to the West.
• Thus, the issue of language politics should be taken into consideration by looking at the positive side of it rather than focusing on the ethnic based, race based and theoriginality of it.
• Language is for everyone as a form of communication and it should not be politicized since we are all citizens of this country, and we should be positive with one another.