BOOKS
SAMPLE AND LOOP: A SIMPLE HISTORY OF SINGAPOREANS IN AMERICA (Bench Press, 2023)
Shortlisted for the 2024 Singapore Literature Prize in English Creative Non-Fiction
Shortlisted for the 2024 Singapore Literature Prize in English Creative Non-Fiction
Based on personal interviews, these poems together tell a part of the story of the migration of Singaporeans to the United States of America. Sample and Loop traces the nonlinear, multidimensional, and surprising trajectory of lived experience in musical verse. Here are the Ceramicist, the Pediatrician, the Scenic Designer, the Chef, the Porn Star, and a host of other migrant-pilgrims sharing the tales of their lives even as they continue to make those lives in a country not of their birth. By narrating their discoveries, troubles, hopes, and sorrows, they refract a powerful beam of light on both countries and compose a wayward music for the road.
"A poetry book that takes some absorbing. Rich in imagery and perception, but with lots of allusions that sometimes leaves the poetry in a rarefied world. Sample and Loop contains some of the best psychological portraits of individuals since Lowell."—Andrew Howdle
"A poetry book that takes some absorbing. Rich in imagery and perception, but with lots of allusions that sometimes leaves the poetry in a rarefied world. Sample and Loop contains some of the best psychological portraits of individuals since Lowell."—Andrew Howdle
Reviews
- Shawn Hoo, The Straits Times (March 9, 2024)
- Kristina Tom, The Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Vol. 23, No. 2, April 2024
- Shawn Hoo, The Straits Times (March 9, 2024)
- Kristina Tom, The Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Vol. 23, No. 2, April 2024
- Judges' comment, Singapore Literature Prize 2024
INSPECTOR INSPECTOR (Carcanet Press, 2022)
Shortlisted for the 2024 Singapore Literature Prize in English Poetry
Jee Leong Koh writes out of the heart of a contemporary reality most readers are familiar with at second or third hand. He writes of political exile and spiritual homelessness; he understands the perils of war, and the perils of certain kinds of peace. Inspector Inspector is his second Carcanet book (Steep Tea was published in 2015 and chosen as a Best Book of the Year in the Financial Times), and it develops his earlier themes with authority, passion, and a sense of possible justice.
Steep Tea dialogued with women poets from across the world; Inspector Inspector struggles with the legacies of fathers, personal, poetic and political. Threaded through the erotic poems and poems based on interviews with fellow Singaporeans living in America are thirteen palinodes in the voice of the speaker's dead father, which he answers when the father's voice falls silent.
Jee Leong Koh's is an inclusive, generous and forgiving imagination, with an enviable mastery of traditional and experimental forms.
Reviews:
- Toh Wen Li, The Straits Times (August 6, 2022)
- H. L. Hix, Stride Magazine (January 22, 2023)
- Jaya Savige, Times Literary Supplement, February 10, 2023
- Jennifer Wong, Poetry School, June 2023
- Judges' comments, Singapore Literature Prize 2024
SNOW AT 5 PM: TRANSLATIONS OF AN INSIGNIFICANT JAPANESE POET (Bench Press, September 2020)
Winner of the 2022 Singapore Literature Prize in English Fiction
Necessary Fiction's Recommended Reading 2020
The rescue of a literary manuscript results in a war of words over the interpretation of 107 haiku about New York’s Central Park. In the battle of commentaries, what is at stake is nothing less than the meaning of America in an imaginary but highly plausible future. Reenvisioning Vladimir Nabokov’s Pale Fire for a technologized age, Snow at 5 PM discovers revolutionary uses, and abuses, for literature and history.
Buy from Bookshop or Amazon.
Press and Reviews:
Necessary Fiction's Recommended Reading 2020
The rescue of a literary manuscript results in a war of words over the interpretation of 107 haiku about New York’s Central Park. In the battle of commentaries, what is at stake is nothing less than the meaning of America in an imaginary but highly plausible future. Reenvisioning Vladimir Nabokov’s Pale Fire for a technologized age, Snow at 5 PM discovers revolutionary uses, and abuses, for literature and history.
Buy from Bookshop or Amazon.
Press and Reviews:
- Winner of 2022 Singapore Literature Prize, judges' citation
- Yeow Kai Chai, SP Blog's My Book of the Year 2020
- Yeow Kai Chai, SP Blog's My Book of the Year 2020
- Andrew Howdle, Goodreads
- Diane Josefowicz, Necessary Fiction's Recommended Reading 2020
- Gregory Woods, Facebook, February 3rd, 2021
- Vivek Narayanan, Poetry Daily
- Indran Amirthanayagam, Interview at Talking with Poets, October 13, 2024
CONNOR & SEAL (Sibling Rivalry, March 2020)
Shortlisted for the 2022 Singapore Literature Prize in English Poetry
Inspired by Rita Dove's groundbreaking Thomas and Beulah, Connor & Seal is a masterful queering of poetic lineage. With oracular grace and whimsy, these poems innovate the public and private axes of gay love in a tumescent future. We meet Connor, a native Nebraskan and fledgling grant writer, and Seal, a financial analyst from Kingston, Jamaica, as they flummox the space between desire and demise, “the sun again a big orange pill / stuck in the blue throat of the sky.” Connor & Seal serves as almanac to a time not far off, of techno-queer bots, state-sponsored violence, and individual resistance. With imaginative dexterity and stylistic flexibility, each poem in Connor & Seal becomes a cipher of the labor of tomorrow’s construction: “a bench where two old faggots had to stop,” an emblem of a future history, “as quiet as the siren / is alarming.”
Buy from indie press or Bookshop or Amazon
Inspired by Rita Dove's groundbreaking Thomas and Beulah, Connor & Seal is a masterful queering of poetic lineage. With oracular grace and whimsy, these poems innovate the public and private axes of gay love in a tumescent future. We meet Connor, a native Nebraskan and fledgling grant writer, and Seal, a financial analyst from Kingston, Jamaica, as they flummox the space between desire and demise, “the sun again a big orange pill / stuck in the blue throat of the sky.” Connor & Seal serves as almanac to a time not far off, of techno-queer bots, state-sponsored violence, and individual resistance. With imaginative dexterity and stylistic flexibility, each poem in Connor & Seal becomes a cipher of the labor of tomorrow’s construction: “a bench where two old faggots had to stop,” an emblem of a future history, “as quiet as the siren / is alarming.”
Buy from indie press or Bookshop or Amazon
Press and Reviews:
- Finalist for 2022 Singapore Literature Prize
- Praise from Jericho Brown, Vahni Capildeo, and Dale Peck
- Thow Xin Wei, Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Vol 19. No. 4 Oct 2020
- Thow Xin Wei, Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Vol 19. No. 4 Oct 2020
- Kiran Bhat, The Adroit Journal, March 12, 2021
- The Rumpus, What to Read When You Want to Celebrate AAPI Month, May 29, 2020
- The Rumpus, What to Read When You Want to Celebrate AAPI Month, May 29, 2020
BITE HARDER: OPEN LETTERS AND CLOSE READINGS (Ethos Books, 2018)
Fifteen years ago, Koh Jee Leong left a promising career in Singapore’s Education Service in order to become a poet in New York City. The change was transformative. Bite Harder: Open Letters and Close Readings tells the story of the change through essays that blend the personal and the literary: unlikely friendships in graduate school and the Village; encounters with the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche and the activism of gender rights advocate Pauline Park; reading Eavan Boland on the Upper West Side and reading Gregory Woods in Queens. These formative experiences are described alongside pioneering essays on Singapore poets, such as Goh Poh Seng, Cyril Wong, Yeow Kai Chai, and Justin Chin, and uncompromising letters about the struggle for freedom of expression. Koh’s unique perspective as both insider and outsider informs these essays and letters.
Bite Harder is a vital contribution to the nascent genre of literary essays and the field of cultural criticism in Singapore.
Reviews:
-Goodread reviews by Andrew Howdle, Jason Irwin, and Alessio
STEEP TEA (Carcanet Press, July 2015)
A Best Book of the Year (UK's Financial Times) and a Lambda Literary Awards Finalist
Steep Tea is Singapore-born Jee Leong Koh's fifth collection and the first to be published in the UK. Koh's poems share many of the harsh and enriching circumstances that shape the imagination of a postcolonial queer writer. They speak in a voice both colloquial and musical, aware of the infusion of various traditions and histories. Taking leaves from other poets - Elizabeth Bishop, Eavan Boland and Lee Tzu Pheng, amongst others - Koh's writing is forged in the known pleasures of reading, its cultures and communities.
"The Singapore-born poet’s first UK publication is disciplined yet adventurous in form, casual in tone and deeply personal in subject matter. Koh’s verse addresses the split inheritance of his postcolonial upbringing, as well as the tension between an émigré’s longing for home and rejection of nostalgia." - Maria Crawford in UK's Financial Times
Buy from Carcanet Press or Bookshop or Amazon
Press and Reviews:
-Tara Safronoff, Goodreads review, Jan 23, 2021
-Tse Hao Guang, Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Vol. 15 No. 1, Jan 2016
-Jennifer Wong, Asian Review of Books, 12 January 2016
-Mothership: 8 must-read Singaporean English fiction and poetry books of 2015
-Jerrold Yam, Christmas reading recommendations by members of The Poetry Society (UK)
-Split This Rock: 2015 Poetry Books We Love
-Gwee Li Sui, Jinat Rehana Begum, and Richard Angus Whitehead, Singapore Poetry's My Book of the Year 2015, December, 2015
-Maria Crawford, Financial Times, Best Books of Poetry of 2015, November 27, 2015
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, November 2015
-Richard Scott, Ambit Magazine, October 2015
-Ian Pople, The Manchester Review, September 2015
-Anthony Huen, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, September 2015
-Tara Bergin, POETRY magazine's Editors' Blog, September, 2015
-Carol Rumens, Poem of the Week, The Guardian, September 7, 2015
-Eric Forbes, Book Addict's Guide to Good Books, July 2015
-Akshita Nanda, "Poet Koh Jee Leong had to leave Singapore to engage with it," Sunday Times, March 15, 2015
-Jennifer Wong, Asian Review of Books, 12 January 2016
-Mothership: 8 must-read Singaporean English fiction and poetry books of 2015
-Jerrold Yam, Christmas reading recommendations by members of The Poetry Society (UK)
-Split This Rock: 2015 Poetry Books We Love
-Gwee Li Sui, Jinat Rehana Begum, and Richard Angus Whitehead, Singapore Poetry's My Book of the Year 2015, December, 2015
-Maria Crawford, Financial Times, Best Books of Poetry of 2015, November 27, 2015
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, November 2015
-Richard Scott, Ambit Magazine, October 2015
-Ian Pople, The Manchester Review, September 2015
-Anthony Huen, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, September 2015
-Tara Bergin, POETRY magazine's Editors' Blog, September, 2015
-Carol Rumens, Poem of the Week, The Guardian, September 7, 2015
-Eric Forbes, Book Addict's Guide to Good Books, July 2015
-Akshita Nanda, "Poet Koh Jee Leong had to leave Singapore to engage with it," Sunday Times, March 15, 2015
SHADOWS OF JAPAN: IMAGES & WORDS
Photography by Guy E. Humphrey and Poetry by Jee Leong Koh
A record of Humphrey and Koh's visit to Japan in the summer of 2014, the folio features thirteen photographs and ten haiku responding to the beauty of Tokyo, Kyoto and Hakone. "For me, photography is not about capturing what we can easily seen. It is about finding the special moment that we will never see again. A shadow moving across the mountain ridge at morning's first light, a group of children's feet as they wait in line at the temple's gate. the steam rising from the cook's stove as our meal is being prepared. These are the moments that I remember, creating the emotional bond between a place and the context of my life. This is my reason for seeing." (from the Preface). 10x15, saddle-stitched, 23 pages, $15.00. Limited edition of 100. Available at select book fairs.
THE PILLOW BOOK (Math Paper Press, 2012)
Shortlisted for the Singapore Literature Prize in English Poetry
Inspired by the example of eleventh-century Japanese author and court lady Sei Shōnagon,Jee Leong Koh collects his miscellaneous jottings in his own pillow book. Written in the genre called zuihitsu, which comprises both prose and poetry, these observations, lists, and anecdotes on life in Singapore and New York are, in turn, humorous, reflective, satirical,nostalgic and outrageous. They were penned for the author's own amusement. Perhaps they will amuse you as well. Buy from BooksActually
Now in an illustrated Japanese-English edition published by Awai Books (New York & Tokyo).
Buy from Amazon
Reviews of The Pillow Book:
-Tiffany Tsao, Mascara Literary Review, Issue 15 - May, 2014
-Thow Xin Wei, Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Vol. 12, No. 1, January 2013
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, January 6, 2013
-Philip F. Clark, Lambda Literary, November 15, 2012
-Steve Fellner, Pansy Poetics, November 3, 2012
-Grady Harp, Poets and Artists #41 (December 2012)
SEVEN STUDIES FOR A SELF PORTRAIT (BENCH PRESS, 2011)
Seven Studies for a Self Portrait, Jee Leong Koh's third book of poems, subjects the self to an increasingly complex series of personal investments and investigations. Ever-evolving, ever-improvisatory, the self appears first as a suite of seven ekphrastic poems, then as free verse profiles, riddles, sonnet sequences, and finally a divan of forty-nine ghazals. The discovery the book makes at the end is that the self sees itself best when it is not by itself.
Amazon
Reviews of Seven Studies for a Self Portrait:
-Grady Harp, San Francisco Review of Books, October 15, 2017
-Mary Ann Sulliven, The Tower Journal, January, 2013
-Steve Fellner, Pansy Poetics, November 26, 2011
-Carol Chan, Mascara, Issue 10 October 2011; my response
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, Parts One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six and Seven.
-Nicholas Liu, Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Vol. 10 No. 3 July 2011
-Freke Räihä, Tidningen, Kulteren
-Grady Harp, Gently Read Literature, June 2011
EQUAL TO THE EARTH (Bench Press, 2009)
"Jee Leong Koh is a vigorous, physical poet very much captured by the expressive power of rhythm, rhetoric, and the lexicon. He is also, paradoxically, a poet in pursuit of the most elusive and delicate of human emotions. The contradiction is wonderful and compelling, and so are his poems."—Vijay Seshadri, author of The Long Meadow (Graywolf Press)
Reviews of Equal to the Earth:
-Quincy R. Lehr, Shit Creek Review, Issue 12
-Andrew Howdle, Boxcar Poetry Review, Summer 2010
-Mary Ann Sullivan, The Tower Journal, Winter 2009
-Andy Quan, Mascara Issue 7, May 2010
-Nicholas Liu, The Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, April 2010
-Paul Stevens, The Chimaera, March 2010
-Jerry Wheeler, Out in Print, February 22, 2010
-Rob Mackenzie, Surroundings, December 30, 2009
-Moira Moody, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, November 2009
-Grady Harp, O&S, November 2009
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, August 14, 2009
-Robert Urban, Robert Urban Productions, February 7, 2009
-Christopher Hennessy, Christopher Hennessy, January 23, 2009
PAYDAY LOANS, Second Edition, published by Math Paper Press (2014)
With a critical introduction by Joshua Ip, and an interview with the author conducted by Chloe Yelena Miller for Eclectica Magazine.
BooksActually
Review of Payday Loans (Math Paper Press reissue, 2014):
-Tse Hao Guang, WeLoveBooksActaully, January 22, 2015
"Smart, irreverent, often unnerving, these sonnets smirk, smile, argue and bless. Jee Leong Koh has taken a month of days and rendered a very contemporary version of the artist as a young man. Cash in your paycheck and buy this book."—Marie Howe, author of The Kingdom of Ordinary Time
Reviews of Payday Loans:
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, February 10, 2008
-Tia Ballantine, Sphinx, issue 7, October 7, 2007
-George Held, Home Planet News, October 1, 2007
-James Midgley, Roundtable Review, July 2007
-Richard Marx Weinraub, A Gathering of the Tribes, June 2007
Inspired by the example of eleventh-century Japanese author and court lady Sei Shōnagon,Jee Leong Koh collects his miscellaneous jottings in his own pillow book. Written in the genre called zuihitsu, which comprises both prose and poetry, these observations, lists, and anecdotes on life in Singapore and New York are, in turn, humorous, reflective, satirical,nostalgic and outrageous. They were penned for the author's own amusement. Perhaps they will amuse you as well. Buy from BooksActually
Now in an illustrated Japanese-English edition published by Awai Books (New York & Tokyo).
Buy from Amazon
Reviews of The Pillow Book:
-Tiffany Tsao, Mascara Literary Review, Issue 15 - May, 2014
-Thow Xin Wei, Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Vol. 12, No. 1, January 2013
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, January 6, 2013
-Philip F. Clark, Lambda Literary, November 15, 2012
-Steve Fellner, Pansy Poetics, November 3, 2012
-Grady Harp, Poets and Artists #41 (December 2012)
SEVEN STUDIES FOR A SELF PORTRAIT (BENCH PRESS, 2011)
Seven Studies for a Self Portrait, Jee Leong Koh's third book of poems, subjects the self to an increasingly complex series of personal investments and investigations. Ever-evolving, ever-improvisatory, the self appears first as a suite of seven ekphrastic poems, then as free verse profiles, riddles, sonnet sequences, and finally a divan of forty-nine ghazals. The discovery the book makes at the end is that the self sees itself best when it is not by itself.
Amazon
Reviews of Seven Studies for a Self Portrait:
-Grady Harp, San Francisco Review of Books, October 15, 2017
-Mary Ann Sulliven, The Tower Journal, January, 2013
-Steve Fellner, Pansy Poetics, November 26, 2011
-Carol Chan, Mascara, Issue 10 October 2011; my response
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, Parts One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six and Seven.
-Nicholas Liu, Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Vol. 10 No. 3 July 2011
-Freke Räihä, Tidningen, Kulteren
-Grady Harp, Gently Read Literature, June 2011
EQUAL TO THE EARTH (Bench Press, 2009)
"Jee Leong Koh is a vigorous, physical poet very much captured by the expressive power of rhythm, rhetoric, and the lexicon. He is also, paradoxically, a poet in pursuit of the most elusive and delicate of human emotions. The contradiction is wonderful and compelling, and so are his poems."—Vijay Seshadri, author of The Long Meadow (Graywolf Press)
Reviews of Equal to the Earth:
-Quincy R. Lehr, Shit Creek Review, Issue 12
-Andrew Howdle, Boxcar Poetry Review, Summer 2010
-Mary Ann Sullivan, The Tower Journal, Winter 2009
-Andy Quan, Mascara Issue 7, May 2010
-Nicholas Liu, The Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, April 2010
-Paul Stevens, The Chimaera, March 2010
-Jerry Wheeler, Out in Print, February 22, 2010
-Rob Mackenzie, Surroundings, December 30, 2009
-Moira Moody, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, November 2009
-Grady Harp, O&S, November 2009
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, August 14, 2009
-Robert Urban, Robert Urban Productions, February 7, 2009
-Christopher Hennessy, Christopher Hennessy, January 23, 2009
PAYDAY LOANS, Second Edition, published by Math Paper Press (2014)
With a critical introduction by Joshua Ip, and an interview with the author conducted by Chloe Yelena Miller for Eclectica Magazine.
BooksActually
Review of Payday Loans (Math Paper Press reissue, 2014):
-Tse Hao Guang, WeLoveBooksActaully, January 22, 2015
"Smart, irreverent, often unnerving, these sonnets smirk, smile, argue and bless. Jee Leong Koh has taken a month of days and rendered a very contemporary version of the artist as a young man. Cash in your paycheck and buy this book."—Marie Howe, author of The Kingdom of Ordinary Time
Reviews of Payday Loans:
-Eshuneutics, Eshuneutics, February 10, 2008
-Tia Ballantine, Sphinx, issue 7, October 7, 2007
-George Held, Home Planet News, October 1, 2007
-James Midgley, Roundtable Review, July 2007
-Richard Marx Weinraub, A Gathering of the Tribes, June 2007
