Woots! Tan Twan Eng's Gift of Rain has made it to the Man Booker Longlist! He's up against a strong crowd with the likes of Mohsin Hamid and Ian McEwan, but I'm certainly rooting for Mr. Tan.
(Via Eric Forbes).
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I am sure they're just drawn by the exoticism(sic) of Tan's novel. Its actually poorly edited and could have done with less description of food and the fauna/flora of Penang ad neuseum. It comes across like a mishmash of Clavell and Mishima. Writing and hiding behind a half chinese/english character and writing about he knows just shows that he's hardly stretched as a writer, much less as a novelist
ReplyDeletePoorly edited? I must check again.
ReplyDeleteAs for exoticism... nothing wrong with that! Isn't that Asia's biggest export next to Apple computers and Nike shoes? :p
as for the food, this is the most food obsessed nation on earth (and rightly so!) so the authors are going to reflect that i think
ReplyDeletei also think authors here feel a need to fill in background detail that western readers and readers elsewhere might not know or understand.
why is he "hiding" behind this character? seems to be a v. useful way of exploring belonging vs. dislocation
It's his first novel and he's on the Booker Longlist, so I think he's doing well enough. I think the novel reads well and the exoticism doesn't bother me. Makes Malaysians more interesting! :-) Half-English semi-Chinese, whatever lah! What comes across is how HUMAN Philip is, so who cares if he's half this and half that.
ReplyDelete