|
Volume 10, Issue 1
November 2017
Letter from the Editor
Welcome to the November 2017 issue of Transnational Literature. We begin our tenth year with a wide-ranging selection of peer-reviewed articles, review essays, translations, poems, stories and book reviews from more than fifty contributors based all over the world. And as a recent post on the Flinders University Library eResearch blog points out, you – our readers – come from all over the world as well.
The literature covered in our seven peer-reviewed articles stretches geographically from America to the other Georgia (in the former USSR), with intersecting links between France, India, Persia, China, Poland and Australia. Chronologically, the writers dealt with range from Alfred Jarry in fin-de-siècle Paris, to the American Agnes Smedley in China in the 1930s, to Polish poet Andrzej Chciuk, writing in Australia after the second world war, and Iranian poet Nader Naderpour, writing in the USA in his last years following the Iranian revolution of 1979, up to the present with Indian writers Anita Desai and Lavanya Sankaran. The diasporic and the exiled take their places alongside the confidently American voice of essayist Edward Abbey and the beleaguered members of the avant-garde in 1920s Georgia.Ron Singer’s review essay surveys an important African literary prize, and Paul Sharrad provides an in-depth consideration of a new work on post-colonial studies. We have also included Melinda Graefe’s eloquent tribute to Jaydeep Sarangi’s latest book of poems, Faithfully I Wait¸ delivered at the launch at Flinders University during Jaydeep’s eventful visit to Adelaide from Kolkota in October.Translations of Iranian and Bangla poetry form a bridge to the riches of the poetry section curated by our new Poetry Editor, Alison Flett. Alison has instituted a new tradition. For each issue there will be a feature from a different country. For this issue, she has invited Cyril Wong, an established poet from Singapore, to choose three of his own poems, and to invite contributions from three other Singapore poets. (Followers of the TNL poetry section will remember that when Alison was the guest poetry editor back in November 2014 she included a feature on Scottish poetry.) There is also an equal number of poems from Indian and Australian poets, including a feature on Adelaide poet Jill Jones.Six short stories make up the prose creative writing section. Three of the writers this time are Australian, and the others are from Kashmir, the UK and the USA. All write, in fiction or memoir, about unique experiences and memories in places as widely dispersed as Alsace, Kuwait, the Upper Murray River and Macedonia.Nearly thirty book reviews round out this issue, divided between creative writing and theoretical and critical works.Thanks to all those who have helped make this issue possible – the anonymous peer reviewers, the section editors Alison Flett (poetry), Md. Rezaul Haque (translations) and Ruth Starke (prose creative writing). And my gratitude goes also to the team of dedicated people who keep the wheels turning – who read and assess submissions, edit articles and reviews, and help with the many administrative tasks involved in running a journal which is transnational in nature as well as name, especially Melinda Graefe and Elizabeth Weeks who took on the day to day editorial tasks while I was overseas for much of August and September. It has also been splendid to have Annette Couch on the team as an intern during the past few months.
Gillian Dooley, General Editor
| |
Contributors to November 2017 Issue |
|
| |
|
|
| |
Articles (peer reviewed) |
|
| |
Mary Besemeres |
Evoking a Displaced Homeland: the 'Poetic Memoir' of Andrzej Chciuk |
| |
Anna Guttman |
Home, Factory, World: Domestic and Global Fictions in the work of Lavanya Sankaran |
| |
Bhawana Jain |
Intersecting Memory and Witnessing Violence in Anita Desai's The Zigzag Way |
| |
Medea Muskhelishvili |
Pataphysical Discourse and Georgian Reflections in Comparative Analysis of Georgian and French Avant-Garde |
| |
Michael Potts |
Dumping Grounds: Donald Trump, Edward Abbey and the Immigrant and Pollution |
| |
Fredrik Tydal |
Of Surface and Depth: Agnes Smedley's Sketches of Chinese Everyday Life |
| |
Rouhollah Zarei |
The Beloved in Nader Naderpour's Poetry |
| |
|
|
| |
Review Essays |
|
| |
Paul Sharrad |
Check your metaphors: Review Essay - Daria Tunca and Janet Wilson (eds), Postcolonial Gateways and Walls: Under Construction |
| |
Ron Singer |
Review Essay: Nzuri Na Mengi ('Good and Plenty'): The Caine Prize for African Literature, 2007-2016 |
| |
|
|
| |
Launch Speech |
|
| |
Melinda Graefe |
Speech delivered at launch of Faithfully I Wait: Poems on Rain, Thunder and Lightning at Jhargram and Beyond by Jaydeep Sarangi, Flinders University, 20 October 2017 |
| |
| Complete
articles and review essays in one file for ease of downloading or printing |
| |
|
|
| |
Poetry Singaporean Feature
(Editor: Alison Flett) |
|
| |
Cyril Wong |
Singaporean Poetry: An Introduction by Cyril Wong |
| |
Cyril Wong |
The Singaporean Poet |
| |
Cyril Wong |
Incoming Reports |
| |
Cyril Wong |
Equivalences |
| |
Daryl Qilin Yam |
Drain Circling, A While Ago |
| |
Pooja Nansi |
What Now Old Woman |
| |
Noorhaqmal Mohamed Noor |
Jalan Ibadat (Al-Firdaus Mosque), translated from the Malay by Annaliza Bakri |
| |
|
|
| |
Poetry General
(Editor: Alison Flett) |
|
| |
Featured Poet: Jill Jones |
Introduction |
| |
Jill Jones |
Approaching the Magic Number |
| |
Jill Jones |
Laundromat near the Corner of Passage Alexandrine |
| |
Jill Jones |
Arctic Express |
| |
Vinita Agrawal |
About Roots |
| |
Stuart Barnes |
Ghazal for the Sisters of Mercy |
| |
|
|
| |
Anjana Basu |
Kali |
| |
Gillian Dooley |
In Memoriam |
| |
David Mortimer |
Scaffold |
| |
Jaydeep Sarangi |
Translator of Hope |
| |
|
|
| |
Poetry in Translation
(Editor: Md Rezaul Haque) |
|
| |
Three Poems by Nader Naderpour, a Poet of the Sun, translated, introduced and analysed by Rouhollah Zarei |
| |
'A Chance Meeting' by Rabindranath Tagore, translated by Md. Rezaul Haque |
| |
|
|
| Complete
poems and translations in one file for ease of downloading or printing |
| |
|
|
| |
Fiction and life-writing
(Editor: Ruth
Starke; assistant editor Molly Murn) |
|
| |
Michael Armstrong |
Shawarma, Muhummara and the Osh Guys |
| |
Food is an important part of Arabic culture, and when you accept their food it is as though you accept them - even if you mess up the pronunciation! |
| |
Ishrat Bashir |
Absent Beloved |
|
| |
Lauren Butterworth |
Finding Mathilde |
| |
‘Finding Mathilde’ explores the struggle I had discovering a fictional character while researching my PhD novel in Alsace, France – the conflict between expectation and reality, and the complicated power of the witch archetype.
|
| |
Natasha Garrett |
A Family of Aliens |
| |
In theory, bilingualism sounds like a natural and reasonable option for many transnational families, yet in reality it can be complicated and at times impractical. I wanted to play with the term 'alien' and its legal connotations in the US, and expand it to include family relations in order to see how language can both connect and alienate. Most of all, I wanted to show that there are no definite answers when it comes to language usage in multilingual families. |
| |
|
|
| |
Rebecca Gould |
Crossing the Danube |
| |
Like much of my fiction, Crossing the Danube is informed by an urban landscape. Other stories I have written in a similar vein have been based in Tbilisi and Damascus. The disjuncture between the world as we imagine it and the world as it exists link these stories thematically.
|
| |
Reg Taylor |
Snow |
| |
Snow is set in the Upper Murray of South Australia where I grew up in the 1950s and '60s. It was the scene of large scale post-war immigration and has had an enduring fascination for me. |
| |
|
|
| |
Book reviews: Creative and life writing |
|
| |
Sienna Barton |
The Schooldays of Jesus by J.M. Coetzee |
| |
Annette Couch |
Flute of Milk by Susan Fealy |
| |
Gillian Dooley |
Underground Fugue by Margot Singer |
| |
Lauren Dougherty |
Surviving the Gulag by Ilse Johansen |
| |
Lauren Doughherty |
Datsunland by Stepher Orr |
| |
Sebastian Galbo |
Red Peonies: Two Novellas of China by Stephen Edgar |
| |
Robyn Greaves |
The Woman Priest: a translation of the novella La femme abbe by Sylvain Marechal (1750-1803), translation and introduction by Sheila Delany |
| |
Robyn Greaves |
The Travel Writings of Marguerite Blessington: The Most Gorgeous Lady on the Tour by Aneta Lipska |
| |
Kathryn Hummel |
Transit by Niloofar Fanaiyan |
| |
Nasima Islam |
Depoeticized Rhapsody by Sarwar Morshed |
| |
Jobin M. Kanjirakkat |
The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy |
| |
John Miles |
Poems of Rolando S. Tinio, Jose F. Lacaba, Rio Alma translated from the Tagalog and introduced by Robert Nery |
| |
Mario Relich |
The Homing Bird by Bashabi Fraser |
| |
Jaydeep Sarangi |
Sea Dreams by Bibhu Padhi |
| |
Ruth Starke |
The Waiting Room by Leah Kaminsky |
| |
Philip Sulter |
Exit West by Mohsin Hamid |
| |
Heather Taylor Johnson |
Rallying by Quinn Eades |
| |
Heather Taylor Johnson |
Notes on the Flesh by Shahd Alshammari |
| |
|
|
| |
Book reviews: History, Theory and Criticism |
|
| |
Abdelfattah Adel |
Alternative Modernities in French Travel Writing: Engaging Urban Space in London and New York, 1851–1986 by Gillian Jein |
| |
Yingjie M. Cheng |
Post-Multicultural Writers as Neo-Cosmopolitan Mediators by Sneja Gunew |
| |
Md. Rezaul Haque |
Troubled Testimonies: Terrorism and the English Novel in India by Meenakshi Bharat |
| |
Anne Lauppe-Dunbar |
Australian Literature in the German Democratic Republic: Reading through the Iron Curtain edited by Nicole Moore and Christina Spittel |
| |
Lorenzo Mari |
A Companion to Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie edited by Ernest N. Emenyonu |
| |
Jennifer Osborn |
Gender, Madness and Colonial Paranoia in Australian Literature: Australian Psychoses by Laura Deane |
| |
Kathleen Steele |
Multicultural and Marginalized Voices of Postcolonial Literature edited by Varun Gulati and Garima Dalal |
| |
Graham Tulloch |
Jane Austen's Names: Riddles, Persons, Places by Margaret Doody |
| |
Jean-François Vernay |
Thinking with Literature: Towards a Cognitive Criticm by Terence Cave |
| |
Pete Walsh |
Genre Fiction of New India: Post-Millenial Receptions of 'Weird' Narratives by E. Dawson Varughese |
| |
Pete Walsh |
The Fiction of Thea Astley by Susan Sheridan |
| |
|
|
| Complete
Book reviews in one file |
| |
|
|
| |
Contributors to November 2017 Issue |
|
| |
|
|
| |
|
|
| |
|
|
| |
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
.jpg)