So, this week I'm the Tuesday Poem editor. Pop over to the post to check out this amazing poem by Chris Tse, then read this interview which will also shortly be published on The Big Idea....
Renee: So, how long have you
been working on your collection?
Chris: I started writing about
Joe Kum Yung towards the end of 2005, when I was completing my masters in
creative writing. It was the 100th anniversary of his murder, so there was
quite a bit of activity around commemorating his death. I've been working on
the manuscript on and off since then.
Renee: You have Joes on
one side of your family? Is he any relation?
Chris: My Mum's maiden name is
Joe, but there's no direct relation. He might've been a ‘village cousin’
though!
Renee: Reading through the
book, I'm struck by how deeply you've gone into the psyche of both Kum Yung and
Lionel Terry, his murderer. Did you know you'd be spending nine years in
such dark places?
Chris: When I first started
writing these poems, I envisaged them as a short sequence of a dozen poems or
so. I didn't think that this story would still be with me in nine years time!
It took me a long time to realise (and accept) that this story needed more time
and space than I was allowing it.
I never felt that I was spending my
time in dark places. The story is concerned with death and murder, but I didn't
want to be trapped by or preoccupied with the heaviness that can come with that
territory. I wanted to focus on Joe Kum Yung's search for light. It was
important to me that the book carry a sense of hope, despite the life he had
lived.
Renee: I do sense that hope
towards the end, although it comes in glimmers. Do you think that you
have helped him on his journey?
Chris: A part of me does hope
that by telling his story and giving him a voice I have set a place for him in
history. He was always a footnote to Lionel Terry's story; I wanted to reverse
that and show another side to the aftermath of murder.
Renee: You seem to focus very
much on giving Kum Yung a voice. At times you seem to let your frustration be
seen, at how difficult it is to 'find' him in the reports of the day. What do
you think about the role of literature to investigate historical events, where
the voices of the original perpetrators are no longer able to be heard?
Chris: Unsurprisingly, the
news reports of the murder weren't very detailed and didn't say much about Joe
Kum Yung. Lionel Terry murdered him to prove a point, and in a way his turning
himself in was just an extension of his theatrics – he had a point to make and
he made sure people heard him. I didn't want to focus too much on Lionel and
his so-called message. It's always been clear what he was trying to achieve.
For better or worse, his voice still lives on in the news reports of the time
and the way in which the story has been told up until this point.
Writing this book was a chance to
give Joe Kum Yung a voice, but that became just a small part of it. As the book
took shape, it was the importance of remembering our dead and acknowledging the
darkest moments of our history that began to emerge as the major themes.
Renee: You reference Chinese
history and traditional beliefs (about the dead, about how those who cannot go
home are compelled to wander as 'hungry ghosts'.) As a fellow Chinese I'm
familiar with these concepts. Did you find, in discussing the book with those
outside our culture, that you had to explain these more clearly?
Chris: Not really. I guess the
few people that have already read the book just accepted that they were aspects
of our culture or just went ahead and googled things themselves!
Renee: Did you find out things
you didn't know? And how much did you rely on Dr Google and how much on
the 'aunties' in our community?
Chris: There was so much that
I didn't know before writing the book. I did research quite a bit, but also
drew from personal experience. My Por Por passed away when I was nearing the
completion of the manuscript. It was the first time that as an adult I had lost
a close family member, so a lot of the grieving process, including the rituals
and customs, made its way into the final poems written for the manuscript.
The Chinese attitude to death is
very different to Western cultures – the idea of celebrating someone's life
after their death goes against the solemnity and responsibility of the living
to make sure that the dead find their way to their next life. My research for
this book reinforced and expanded on the way I've been taught to think about
death and honouring my ancestors.
Renee: How about other Chinese
traditions? There were moments when the formality of your verse and the
structures (often a series of couplets) reminded me of Chinese forms.
But a modern version. You don't
spend much time gazing at the moon with a cup of wine....On the other hand, you
have an eye for beauty, and beautiful phrases, that is very traditional.
Chris: At one point I did want
to borrow from and appropriate traditional Chinese forms, so the moments you've
spotted might be remnants of those earlier experiments. But I soon felt that
trying to follow those forms wasn't letting the story and poems to breathe and
speak for themselves. The search for beauty was important – the romantic belief
that death can provide what life can't was something I really wanted to
explore.
Renee: How have you changed as
a poet through this first collection? It's a huge project!
Chris: I feel like a weight
has been lifted! There were plenty of times when I wanted to put this story
aside and focus on other projects, but I simply couldn't let it go. Writing
this collection has taught me a lot about empathy and, to an extent, restraint.
There were so many possible directions in which this story could go, so for me
it was about finding that focus and sticking to it without letting politics or
my own personal anger overshadow the story.
I do feel like this is the end of
the first part of my career as a writer. I'm now focusing on more personal
stories and themes outside of Chinese culture.
Renee: I was going to ask you
about that. Did you feel an expectation to write on certain themes because of
your ethnicity and gender?
Chris: Yes I thought there was
an expectation, and I resisted it when I first started writing. It was a
mixture of fear of being pigeonholed and thinking that it was too obvious, but
I think a lot of it was a product of my own anxieties. I soon realised that I
had to get over it, and that if these stories were to be told then I had a point
of view to offer. I've had writing published that isn't Chinese-themed and it's
been well received, so I don't feel like there's this expectation that I have
to write about certain themes. However, I acknowledge that there are certain
voices missing from New Zealand literature and I have a responsibility to speak
up when appropriate.
Renee: Well said!
Chris: Is it something that
you've struggled with as a writer? Just turning the tables for a bit! Haha.
Renee: Yes, and in much the
same way as you. I resisted it, yet at the same time it was being honest to
myself, as the questions I was answering as/for my characters were the same
ones I had come across in my daily life.
It kind of bothered me that I was
being seen as some sort of 'voice' for the community, but at the same time, I
figured that, well at least they were reading it from someone who knew and not
someone from outside the culture. So I was really pleased that you were writing
too! 
I think the drift towards less 'coloured' stories is a
pretty normal one too. You see it with other writers, like Alison Wong and
Lynda Chanwai Earle. And with Maori and Pacific writers too.
I think the drift towards less 'coloured' stories is a
pretty normal one too. You see it with other writers, like Alison Wong and
Lynda Chanwai Earle. And with Maori and Pacific writers too.
Chris: That responsibility of
being a "voice" is troubling, because who can ever truly speak for an
entire community?
Renee: Hear hear!
Chris: And if they purported
to, I wouldn't trust them!
Renee: I guess what we're
doing is wearing a path through the grass. It's up to others to follow, or make
their own paths.
Chris: Sometimes I feel like
I've left the grass and ended up knee-deep in a river.
Renee: Yes and I don't like
the stones underfoot...But in a way, the interest is what's kept me writing.
It's surreal that only a few years
after I decided I was serious about writing, my work is being taught in schools
and uni, and analysed by academics. More for my timing (being one of a select
group still) than for the quality I suspect...
Chris: Typical Chinese trait,
talking yourself down! Even if that were true, this only shows that there's a
need for our stories and voices.
Renee: Aw shucks… Why did you
choose poetry as the best form to explore Joe Kum Yung's story?
Chris: I never entertained the
thought that this book and story could be anything else other than poetry. The
fragmented nature of the story, of what we knew about Joe Kum Yung's life,
seemed tailor-made for poetry. It just felt right to me – it was the perfect
form to play with a variety of voices, and to explore those contrasting ideas
and images of light and shadow, life and death, beauty and destruction. It was
also an opportunity to test my ability as a poet to sustain my intentions over
the course of a book-length sequence of poems.
Renee: I admire how you have
resisted the urge to showcase your 'best' poems to instead take a journey.
One last question: what are you working on next?
Chris: I did feel a sense of
responsibility to finish what I started, and that meant a lot of what I've
written in the past nine years that wasn't for the book has had to wait in the
wings. As for what's next, I've been writing poems that a lot more personal. At
the moment I'm exploring how music and memory are intertwined, as well as the
role of music in contemporary society and a conduit for shared experience.
Renee: It sounds amazing! and
of course music and poetry are natural partners.
Chris: Exactly!
