PARAH or HARAP?

As we were walking towards our car after the last performance of Alfin Sa'at’s PARAH, at Pentas 2 in KLPAC in early February, a friend said about her relative, “My sister won’t get it lah. She’ll say … see, see, see … I told you so!” I guess that would be the reaction of more than a few in the audience. (One person in the audience asked it the book, Interlok, is real.)

 Alfian’s play was like a punch in the stomach, designed to wake one up, to get a grip. But I felt there were many things that were not there. Certainly, the writer and the director would have had to decide what to leave out, or we would have been in Pentas 2 for a week. And as an editor, I understand that the most difficult task a writer faces is what to leave out. This is no criticism of Alfian’s play or Jo Kukathas’s direction -- they both did fantastic jobs, as did the actors. And I liked the way the play was produced in Malay (move out of the way DBP, the language belongs to the people, not to bureaucrats and politicians); English would have sounded so elitist and condescending.

I remember my first awareness of racism. We (my family) used to live in Johor, and we were visiting relatives in Bukit Timah in Singapore. I was sitting with the ‘men’ in the living room, while my mother, sister and my younger brother were in the kitchen. I was about thirteen, I think. My uncle was complaining to Father about his children running around with 'all those Chinese boys'. I dared not breathe. I stole a glance at Father, and saw him keeping a studious silence. He did not say anything apart from a ‘hmm’, which could have been interpreted either as acceptance or rejection.

I had never kept my Chinese and Malay friends a secret, nor did I try too hard to suppress my over-exuberant teenage hormones. My Chinese friends satisfied my nerdy needs, while my Malay friends -- many of whom were from the Police quarters on Jalan Masjid -- were simply great fun. (We loved music, but we also did many naughty things on the side, but in secret.)

During the drive home, I didn’t know if I was going to ‘get it’. I kept very quiet, trying to be as polite as I possibly could without throwing up. (That might have helped -- or not.) Father did not say a word either -- not in the car, not at home, not for weeks, months or years. He never did.

Another time was at the school padang, during the rugby season. I was with the field hockey crowd, and our season was over, but that didn’t stop us from knocking the ball around on the periphery, while watching the rugby game in progress.  Before long, the rugby ball rolled (or tumbled) in our direction, and one of my friends, Yoges (not his real name), decided to be helpful and tried to kick it back. Unfortunately, being aerodynamically challenged, the ball flew off at a tangent. Halim (not his real name), who was running towards us at that time, let out a tirade of swear words in several languages, complete with pariah, keling and 'descendants of slaves', questioned the legitimacy of our citizenships and our births. I was stunned because, first, I thought Halim was my friend and, second, because I had never heard the words being used with such venom. He was quickly escorted away by his friends (all Malay) and we, still stunned, decided to call it a day.

But, it was not until I arrived in KL in May 1969 that I saw how ugly it could get. On the first day in campus, I was forced to choose a side, and if I was seen with someone of a different colour, I'd hear, “Are we not good enough for you?” If you were Indian and you couldn’t speak Tamil you had it (even if you spoke Malayalam or Telugu or some other language at home). My Chinese friends (some of whom were Hokkien or Babas) had to live with the constant snide remarks, “Chinese also cannot speak Chinese,” because they didn't speak Cantonese. One (now a prominent politician) told me, "My parents say I can marry any girl I want as long she is not Kek (Hakka)." The Malays didn’t know what hit them -- yes they were referred to as ‘them’ when one was polite and many other things when one was not. I had never seen such ugliness in Johor.

Coming back to Alfian’s play, I couldn’t help feeling that he was a little unsympathetic towards the Malay character. While Kahoe and Mahesh were subject to racism, Hafiz only freaked out because he didn’t know who his parents were. (It could have been the playwrights metaphor for the Malay condition; having destroyed so many of their roots, they no longer know who they are, and that bothers them.) How about the constant taunts and slights Malays face: Melayu bodoh, Melayu malas, Melayu balek kampong, etc? The polite term in Tamil for a Malay man is Malai-karan, and the derisive reference is normally natukaran -- countryman -- a pretty benign term.  But the Hokkien term, huan-na, savages, is anything but. I have been told by my source that it has similar connotations to the term 'nigger', but she thinks the speakers don't realise how offensive the word is. That might be the case, but it's still a horrible, horrible thing to say. My source also says, she thinks, there is no other word for the Malay people in Hokkien! True? Someone, please, please, please, say it's not. (Indian's are referred to as keling-a, but increasingly the term In-toh is used.)

Two stories:

One, I was giving a ride to two of my wife’s friends. They were talking about this and that and, as usual, it veered towards social justice (or injustice). “It is all for their kind only lah. They can do anything they want, they still get everything.” (I asked my wife when we came home, “Why did they speak like that? They don’t even know me.")

Two, I was driving with three friends towards Pudu looking for bak-kut-teh along the crowded Jalan Tun Perak when I swore, “Aiyah, I wish they’d watch where they are going.” This friend, who was at the back, said, “Never mind, you can run over and kill a few. There are too many of them, anyway.” I was shocked. Sometimes, I think I should have stopped the car and told her to get out. But she was laughing. Did she think it was a joke? Did she think she was being clever? Did she think the rest of us would have agreed with her? Did she speak that way because all her other friends did? Did she think it was fashionable to be a racist? Is racism merely a fashion?

Why the hell did the rest of us tolerate that?

Why are UK books so crappy?

When I finally got my hardcover copy of 1Q84 some two months ago, I was appalled. It was the UK edition – the paper was coarse, the printing uneven, typography chunky and the cover design cheesy. I kept drooling over the American editions I saw online. You can accuse me of being fussy or call me a “Yankee lover’, but facts are facts. I have been selling books for over 12 years, and I have never understood why UK editions of the same titles are so crappy. Britain produces more titles per capita than any other country in the world.

Some years ago, when we were selling the Faber & Faber edition of Orhan Pamuk’s My name is Red, in A-format, another distributor imported an American edition of the same title (albeit in the larger B-format) with a selling price of RM39.90 (that is, 5sen less than the British edition). We took 20 copies immediately, not because it cost 5sen less, but because it was far better designed and manufactured. The difference was so apparent, it was embarrassing. Why are you still selling that crap edition, some customers asked? Yes, the British edition really did look bad. The book was twice as thick, threatened to scream like a vestal virgin if one opened it out by more than 15 degrees (wtf… how does one read it?), had schoolboy typography, was printed on cheap yellowing bulky newsprint, and looked as if it was cyclostyled using a 1950s Gestetner.

Have you ever seen the UK Vintage edition (also-A format) of JM Coetzee’s Disgrace? I will toss it even if it comes with a free magnifying glass. Don’t even ask about the page layout, text margins and alignment, typography, binding and printing. Okay, the A-format is really meant for us poor third-world country cousins; the natives should be grateful. But how does one explain the difference in quality in the B-formats? Take an American edition of a Vintage, place it side by side with a UK edition of the same title, same format, and you will see the difference – quality of paper, design, typography, printing and binding. And you know what? The American book would often cost less. (Even if it cost more, I’d prefer to pay the extra – the book will open smoothly and comfortably to at least 150 degrees, will not threaten to break its spine, be easier on the eyes and will not yellow so easily.)

One can also compare American and UK Penguin paperbacks (or any other common imprint) side by side. UK editions fare less badly in the case of hardbacks, but they still cannot compare with the ones from the US: more stylish, better printed and bound and, usually, cheaper.

Some years ago, Silverfish published a book by an Englishman (who was in Kuala Lumpur for the 2004 literary festival). He bought several copies of his book to give/sell to friends and to place in a local bookshop. He later sent me an email saying how surprised most people were at the quality. In Frankfurt, too, I’ve got very favourable comments (though, to me, the East – the Czech ambassador insists it’s Middle -- European books are to die for).

Recently, I had an interesting exchange of emails with a publisher in the UK. When he was here last year, I had suggested that he print the books in Malaysia to save costs. He had also been impressed with the quality of our books. He sent me an email recently, saying that he was finally ready and asked me to get him a quote. I gave him a list of things I’d need for a proper quote, including a cover design in Adobe Illustrator with proper crop/registration marks and colour bars. The text document he had attached (pdf) was in A4 size and appeared to have been done on a word processor. (I didn’t even bother to comment on the typography.) His return email asked why I wanted all those things – he had his cover design only in Photoshop. When I suggested that Photoshop might not be the best design tool, he threw a hissy fit, saying that’s how it was done in the UK, how they’d simply give printers the pdfs of the text and covers for them to sort out, how what I was asking seemed like a lot of ‘faff’, and that ‘these are book covers, not works of art!’ implying that it was about time tree-dwellers learnt how the modern world worked.

I told him he could do it himself. Sheesh.

A joke, albeit a cruel one, often heard, in the shop is about the quality of books from India – with their crooked layout, ‘potato-printing’ text with missing words/lines/paras and the recycled ‘toilet-paper’ pages. But, the quality of books from India is improving rapidly and, the way things are going, will soon be better than those from the UK.

First, they forgot how to make nice cars. Now, they can’t even make nice books.

Hang Tuah lives

"Hang Tuah was not Malay."
"Are you trying to pick a fight with me?"
"It is the truth."
"How could you say that? That’s the most absurd thing I have ever heard," Subuh stares at Angeh.
"He was not a Malay man."
"What else was he? A lost Arab?"
Jumaat laughs. SiTumi remains quiet and observes his friends.
"Hang Tuah was an aboriginal man like me. He was Semang."
"What?" Jumaat and Subuh say in unison.
"His name was SiTuah, not Hang Tuah; that was the name Malays gave him in Malacca. SiTuah is a common name among the Semang people. It is common to put a prefix Si in front of one’s name in our community, like SiTumi."
"I seriously doubt that," Subuh shakes his head.
"It is the truth. When Malacca fell to the Portuguese, Tuah escaped to Perak. He lived with the aboriginal tribes here and was elected as their leader. He became the chief of a village called Suah Padi Village near Changkat Melintang in Perak. He later died in Lambor Kanan, a town half a day’s journey from his village."
"I very seriously doubt that," Subuh says again.
"Tuah was not only a hero for the Malays, he was a hero for all."
Jumaat and Subuh look at one another.
SiTumi smiles, but says nothing.

The Beruas Prophecy by Iskandar Al-Bakri, Silverfish Books, 2011

Hang Tuah is a great story; so strong that even the Chinese and the Orang Asli want a piece of it. It is a good Malaysian story; unfortunately, it cannot be taught in schools because it is not history; it is a myth, or so says Emeritus Professor Khoo Khay Kim. He is right, of course. Not only is there no historical evidence, the story has many contradictions. (Was it Hang Kasturi he fought or Hang Jebat?) But the Hang Tuah story has far deeper roots than the good professor gives credit, emotional roots, which are not surprising, given that his interest is in history. One dismisses myths at one’s own peril, although it has become increasingly fashionable to do so in some circles (especially in this country).

The power of the myth

An interesting demonstration of the power of the myth was provided by the Sethusamudram project in India that began in 2005, involving dredging the shallow waters of the Palk Straits known variously as Adam’s Bridge, Ram Sethu or Ramar Palam, to reduce navigation distance between east and west of the country by some 650 km. In May 2007, Subramanian Swamy of the BJP challenged the dredging of the Adam’s Bridge arguing that it is a man-made structure going back to Hindu mythology despite Archeological Survey of India (ASI) and the Geological Survey of India (GSI) both having conclusively proved that it is a natural feature. Finally, in July 2008 the Government was compelled to withdraw its submission from ASI due to political and religious sensitivities.

That is the power of the myth. Rama and Hanuman may have been merely products of a fertile imagination (or imaginations), but try telling the 800 million Hindus in India that the Adam’s Bridge was not built by Hanuman, and a horde of monkeys, for Rama. The Ramayana has been a part of the daily life of Hindus for milliniums, and is, on top of that, a great story. Also, one could try telling 1.8 billion Christians that, since there are no historical records currently, Jesus or Moses and other biblical characters are not real. Some may be willing to accept the absence of hard records, but that would hardly diminish the relevance of these stories in their lives for over two thousand years (with minor variations).

“There should be no question that we should pursue the truth” said the headline in the New Straits Times on Sunday 29 January over an op-ed piece. (The rest of the story was not worth reading.) Really? Are you ready for the truth? How much of history is about the truth, whatever the good professor says, or believes it should be. He would protest that history is not perfect, but the shocking reality is how imperfect it is. But is that really a problem? "Western societies remembers its historical figures and separates legend and history ..." Khoo was quoted in the NST interview on the same day. Unfortunately, reality has a way of upending statements like that.

Agincourt

(There are hundreds of examples, but this is a good one): The Battle of Agincourt, which was the centrepiece of the play, Henry V, by William Shakespeare, has been taught for centuries in schools in Britain as a major English victory against a numerically superior French army in the Hundred Years' War. (It was also part of my school curricullum in the early sixties.) According to that version of history (or legend, depending on who you ask), Henry V deployed his exhausted English army of 1500 men-at-arms and 7000 longbowmen,  against a French army of 8000 men-at-arms, 4000 archers and 1500 crossbowmen in the vanguard, and two wings of 600 and 800 mounted men-at-arms, and, complete with a rousing speech, defeated the enemy. This victory of "the band of brothers" became the stuff of popular legend, complete with folk songs. Not so, say modern historians, especially the French (and there is enough information on that on the internet for the reader to check out). The truth is more complicated. But, so what? That victory at Agincourt, that myth, that legend, that lie, played a huge part in making Britain what it became; it gave the Brits self-belief, that cocky confidence that made them the greatest imperial power the world has ever known (whether one likes it or not).

That story alone should be enough to discourage devaluation of legends. I have always been fascinated by the influence of myth, however patently false they are, and how history and science remain powerless it their presence. Is it only a matter of time before myths are broken down and replaced with truths? What would happen then? No more stories and no more storytellers? Imagine living in such a world; will we even remain human? We can live without food for a while, but once we stop telling (or listening to) stories, we're dead, even if there's still a pulse.

Hang Tuah may be a myth, but that does not in any way take away its relevance and power. Khoo, in dismissing its value (albeit only with respect to history) has stepped on an emotional minefield. One can take away Hang Tuah (or Hang Jebat) from the Malay ethos as much as one can attempt to remove the Ramayana from Hindus, or Journey to the West from the Chinese. Myths give us our aspirations and inspirations; our rights and wrongs; our prides and prejudices. But I agree;  they should not be part of the history syllabus. Their content is cultural and should be part of the humanities. Literature would be a good place. Unfortunately, this subject is either not taught at all, or chucked under language. (Literature with a small 'l'; what the hell is that?!)

Why do language departments in universities teach Literature, with all their provincial interpretations? Literature studies should be open and not subject to language limitations. One should be able to study and analyse Hang Tuah, Ramayana or the Journey to the West in the same class, or even Kalidasa, Cervantes and Shakespeare (or any other combination). But that calls for enlightenment minds, a commodity in extreme short supply at the moment in this country. 'Parochial' is the best we've got.

On a parting note: The late Professor Lim Chee Seng told us how he was taken on a tour to visit Juliet's house in Verona. Yes, that same Juliet of Shakespeare's fiction. If the Italian tourism officials can do that, surely it's not too much for the museum authorities of Melaka to pass off a fake tomb as Hang Tuah's.

Raman Krishnan
Silverfish Books

Living in interesting times

It was the best of times, and the worst of times for the book industry in 2011; a year of living dangerously. Borders finally shuttered its stores after a long terminal illness. It seemed like the end of an era when, in fact, it was not. The international age of the superstore started only in 1999, when the super chain store opened shop in Singapore. Within 12 years, it was all over. Twelve years is not an era; it is an aberration. It was bizarre to any thinking person: how could bookstores that operated on such small profit margins, most of which they were giving away as discounts on bestsellers, afford to rent such large expensive real estate in prime locations in major cities throughout the world? After killing off thousands of independents over the decade, the romance with the mega bookstore has ended, leaving the landscape looking like Japan and Germany after the second world war.

A war zone

If book retailers tried to defy gravity, the 'big four' publishers were involved in a weird outer-space ballet in the first decade of the second millennium. By some accounts, out of 300,000 new titles published by Anglo-American industry, 3,000 or one percent made it to bookstore shelves, given three months to perform before being axed. Most books sold in double digits, many of those shortlisted for the Man Booker doing no more than three digits. Add to this overprinting and the SOR terms for book retail, it was waiting to be exploited and it was (by the major chains). The wreckage in the aftermath of this disaster looks like another war zone.

In Frankfurt, I decided to walk around Hall 8, the international hall, on Friday afternoon of the Bookfair after most business transactions had been concluded. In the last -- or was it the first -- row, I came across the stands for remaindered book dealers from the US and the UK. I was browsing through one, The Book Depot, and speaking to the bloke who was there, who asked me where I was from. You should have seen his face light up when I told him that I was from Malaysia. He has several Malaysian customers, he said happily, and rattled off a few names. I was not surprised to hear the name of one independent remainder-books shop, but when I heard the names of the other two, both major chains in the country, I was taken aback. So the big boys are in it, too. It’s no wonder The Book Depot guy’s face lit up. Looks like I've got another live one, here!

The Yellow Submarine

2011 was also the year of the e-book and print-on-demand (POD). The e-book is of the future, and is still work-in-progress (as anyone who’s looked at the free download of The Yellow Submarine from the iBook store can see). How big it is going to be? That depends on how creative the products become. Something is bound to happen, there are too many talented people out there for it not to. As for POD, we have always had vanity publishing. It has now gone high-tech, although most sales numbers are still in single or double digits. POD is good for keeping publisher’s backlists in print, but that’s not the only reason to support it.

I read this in a Publishing Perspective’s story, What is the ‘New’ Publisher? : ‘The “new publisher” is a creative intermediary between the author and reader, and not merely a gatekeeper.’ Strange. That’s what I used to think all publishers were about -- to be creative intermediaries. As a bookseller, I was frustrated when local distributors (who don't read) decided what books the people got to buy. Life was bad enough with government censorship, only to discover later that big Anglo-American publishers subscribed to the same ethos. POD is, in part, a reaction against this hegemony. It is a little sad, because there are many talented writers out there who will have to be satisfied with double digit sales because they do not avail themselves of the ‘creative intermediary’ role good publishers can provide.

Maybe, like Borders and super stores, that hegemony will break. After all, they are run by MBA’s and, if there is more money in watered down syrup, they’ll shift. Despite the unrelenting cry in the media in 2011: the book is dead; the book is dead, we say, “Long live the book.”

Happy New Year.

Raman Krishnan
Silverfish Books