Hello and welcome back to another episode of In Conversation With, a series of interviews with Singaporean writers, publishers, educators, and more. In this episode, my guest interviewer, Daryl Lim, and I speak to the ever-delightful Yeow Kai Chai about the philosophical and the literary, the nebulous and the granular. What is a good poem? What does it mean to 'understand' something? And for the KC fanboys, why lakes and towers? For one hour, the enigmatic author of 'Secret Manta', 'Pretend I'm Not Here', and 'One To The Dark Tower Comes' puts his cards on the table and gives us generous insight into his life and his mind.
Personally, I was completely confounded by my first reading of Dark Tower--the words formed an unscalable wall. But read again and again, without the academic need for comprehension, I began to simply immerse myself in the intriguing worlds the words conjured up--the wall was still unscalable (you can't say I know what a Kai Chai poem means exactly) but the bricks began to speak.
Kai Chai's voice is singular. Singularly coy. Its practised art of seduction--revealing itself slowly after repeated reading--betraying a sadomasochistic kink. For some, the foreplay can be frustrating and tiresome; for others, there is delight in the teasing and tussle.
Ultimately, despite the apparent suspension of meaning and feeling, it is a human voice I am encountering. Because it is playful. Kai Chai embraces the playfulness of postmodernism, and sure gets a kick out of it.
Colorful Flowers by Tokyo Music Walker | https://soundcloud.com/user-356546060
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