Song of a Reformed Headhunter

This hybrid memoir offers many pleasures and insights, but I will return to it for poetic prose passages such as this one about migration:  "I had once thought life here would be divided into before and after. It's not like that at all. Rather, it is what is now and what is yet going to happen. Whatever is "now" includes the so-called past, no matter across which border. Forgive me—it turned out that I like being an emigree, just as like the 30th of a long month: it seems to be over, but look, there is still the 31st."

My favorite essays in this book are the ones that examine the death of Theresa Hak Kyung Cha and female artistic friendships. The first is a feat of snooping, the second a feat of honesty. I also enjoyed the meditation on Richard Pryor and what he taught the author about impersonations while remaining one's own racial identity. The more personal materials are well written, but exhibit a big gap in them—the absence of the mother—which Park Hong admits is matter for another time. Without the tussle with that obviously out-sized person in her life, the reckoning feels incomplete.

The subtitle—An Untouchable Family and the Making of Modern India—provides a sober summary of the content of this memoir, but it deliberately underplays the harrowing stories told in lucid prose by the author Sujatha Gidla. The national tale is one of class-initiated and state-supported oppression of the lower castes and, in helpless response, the divisions in the Communist Party of India when it abandoned armed revolution to enter electoral politics. The family tale traces the transformation of an uncle into a famous poet and leader of a left-wing guerilla movement. The other hero of the story is a heroine, the author's mother, who comes into her own as a mother and teacher in the later part of the story. A wonderful aspect of this memoir is that it never lets you forget the impact of social upheavals on women. The author is, however, not concerned with hagiography. The different members of the family, including their circle of friends, are here depicted with warts and all. I...

Given to me by Elda Rotor in a bag full of literary goodies, The Book of Emma Reyes is a revelation. Godmother to Latin American writers and artists in Paris, Emma Reyes was illiterate until her late teens, escaped from grinding poverty and the convent in Columbia, to Buenos Aires and then Paris, to re-invent herself as painter. The memoir, written as a series of letters to Colombian historian and critic Germán Arciniegas, won praise from Gabriel Garcia Marquez. As translated by Daniel Alarcón, the style is artfully simple and wholly faithful to the world. No literary flourishes, no imaginative metaphors. Just a sustaining belief that the material itself holds its own interest.

Living in a Time of Deception by Poh Soo Kai (Singapore: Function 8 Ltd, 2016). Dr. Poh Soo Kai was detained without trial for a total of 17 years on the false charge of being a communist out to subvert the state of Singapore. What he shows convincingly in this historical memoir is that, like many of his fellow detainees under Operation Coldstore, he was not a communist, but an anti-colonialist and socialist, in other words, a patriot. He was detained for so long because he refused to sign any statement that suggested otherwise. Such a powerfully principled person deserves a hearing at the very least. If you read this book and give him a hearing, as I did, you will make astonishing discoveries about Singapore's struggle for independence from the British, and the legacy of that struggle. After reading this book, I am outraged by the political chicanery for personal ends, but I am also inspired by the heroism of a few good men.

On Sunday, celebrated New York Pride by having brunch with WL, CC, DM, and PB at Philip Marie. After brunch we watched the parade and saw the Resist and Gays Against Guns contingents. GH left for Standard Hotel's Pool Party, and DM and PB left soon after. WL, CC and I had drinks at French Roast and then watched more of the parade along 5th Ave, after which we had dinner at Rasa. Good day. I still think it's important to support the parade. At night, GH and I watched Terry Gilliam's The Fisher King (1991).  Jeff Bridges was very good at a suicidal radio DJ and so was Robin Williams as a deranged homeless man. Today I've been reading Elie Wiesel's memoir The Sea Is Never Full . In its absolute uniqueness, the Holocaust, which Wiesel prefers to call the Event, cannot be described or shown. It is on the other side of language and image. Also, the tension between Jews living in Israel and those living in the Diaspora.