Hong, Cathy Park - Dance Dance Revolution
Sun, Feb. 10th, 2008 05:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterMy foray into the world of poetry continues, this one prompted by Asia Pacific Arts' Best of 2007: Wordsmiths.
Dance Dance Revolution has nothing to do with the video game; instead, it's set in the not-too-distant future, in a place only called the Desert. The Desert is hotels and glamour and rich tourists in the center, and poverty everywhere else; the introduction compares it to Dubai or Las Vegas, though probably more apocalyptic. We're introduced to the Historian, who has come to interview the Guide, a Korean expat survivor of the Kwangju Massacre turned tour guide.
The Historian introduces the volume by saying that the Guide, like many others in the Desert, speaks Desert creole, a mix of hundreds of languages. The poems in the books are a mix of actual Desert creole and a mix of English clarifications that the Historian has provided/inserted; any ellipses are when he didn't clearly record what the Guide was saying.
This was a very difficult book for me to get through; the Desert creole meant having to sound out everything in my head as I read it. I did like the conceit of the book, and there are bits of prose taken from the Historian's memoir (largely set during his childhood in Sierra Leone). And some passages I took to very much, particularly the one below. But overall, I suspect this would reward a rereading or three on my part, only I don't quite have the mental energy to do so.
The Lineage of Yes-Men
Nut'ing but brine jars y jaundice widows en mine old village.
I's come from 'eritage o peddlas y traitors,
whom kneel y quaff a lyre spoon-me-spondas. Mine fadder
sole Makkoli wine to whitey GIs din guidim to widows fo bounce.
Me grandfadder sole Makkoli wine to Hapanese colonists
din he guidim to insurrectas ... sticka hop? Some pelehuu?
Afta war, villa men pelt mine grandfadder wit ground stones.
He stand in de cold tillim fingas frost jawed, until blewblack.
Villagers callim yellow, callim chihuahua ssaeki, a dies irae
fo yesman—he yessed his way to gravestone.
Din mine fadder sole Makkoli—he a 'Merikken GI chihuahua.
Some populii tink GIs heroes wit dim strafing "Pinko chink"
but eh! Those Jees like regula pirates, search for booty y pillage ...
He took Jees to war widows tho widows too dry woeing tears
for Eros. He like mine grandfadder yessed y yessed, nodded
til no lift him fes up. In his deathbed ... sayim to me,
Ttallim, you say no, no, no, you say only no. Him fes
waterlog de liquor y when him die, he retched white.
I join movement to fightim me yesman lineage ...
Listen to achim song ... woodcut fists lignified
de crown ... I fight mine legacy, mine curse
dat pulsed en me aorta to say no....
This piece is a pretty good example of the Guide's voice, though this piece and others on Korea have more Korean than the rest of the book. From what I recall, much of the language doesn't play with Asian languages (the APA article says it's largely English, Spanish and Jamaican), which I sorely missed, particularly considering that the Guide is Korean. I'm sure adding in Asian languages would make the poems even more difficult to read for the average English-speaking reader, but still.
This will be an interesting book to revisit some day when I can concentrate more.
Dance Dance Revolution has nothing to do with the video game; instead, it's set in the not-too-distant future, in a place only called the Desert. The Desert is hotels and glamour and rich tourists in the center, and poverty everywhere else; the introduction compares it to Dubai or Las Vegas, though probably more apocalyptic. We're introduced to the Historian, who has come to interview the Guide, a Korean expat survivor of the Kwangju Massacre turned tour guide.
The Historian introduces the volume by saying that the Guide, like many others in the Desert, speaks Desert creole, a mix of hundreds of languages. The poems in the books are a mix of actual Desert creole and a mix of English clarifications that the Historian has provided/inserted; any ellipses are when he didn't clearly record what the Guide was saying.
This was a very difficult book for me to get through; the Desert creole meant having to sound out everything in my head as I read it. I did like the conceit of the book, and there are bits of prose taken from the Historian's memoir (largely set during his childhood in Sierra Leone). And some passages I took to very much, particularly the one below. But overall, I suspect this would reward a rereading or three on my part, only I don't quite have the mental energy to do so.
The Lineage of Yes-Men
Nut'ing but brine jars y jaundice widows en mine old village.
I's come from 'eritage o peddlas y traitors,
whom kneel y quaff a lyre spoon-me-spondas. Mine fadder
sole Makkoli wine to whitey GIs din guidim to widows fo bounce.
Me grandfadder sole Makkoli wine to Hapanese colonists
din he guidim to insurrectas ... sticka hop? Some pelehuu?
Afta war, villa men pelt mine grandfadder wit ground stones.
He stand in de cold tillim fingas frost jawed, until blewblack.
Villagers callim yellow, callim chihuahua ssaeki, a dies irae
fo yesman—he yessed his way to gravestone.
Din mine fadder sole Makkoli—he a 'Merikken GI chihuahua.
Some populii tink GIs heroes wit dim strafing "Pinko chink"
but eh! Those Jees like regula pirates, search for booty y pillage ...
He took Jees to war widows tho widows too dry woeing tears
for Eros. He like mine grandfadder yessed y yessed, nodded
til no lift him fes up. In his deathbed ... sayim to me,
Ttallim, you say no, no, no, you say only no. Him fes
waterlog de liquor y when him die, he retched white.
I join movement to fightim me yesman lineage ...
Listen to achim song ... woodcut fists lignified
de crown ... I fight mine legacy, mine curse
dat pulsed en me aorta to say no....
This piece is a pretty good example of the Guide's voice, though this piece and others on Korea have more Korean than the rest of the book. From what I recall, much of the language doesn't play with Asian languages (the APA article says it's largely English, Spanish and Jamaican), which I sorely missed, particularly considering that the Guide is Korean. I'm sure adding in Asian languages would make the poems even more difficult to read for the average English-speaking reader, but still.
This will be an interesting book to revisit some day when I can concentrate more.
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Mon, Feb. 11th, 2008 04:12 am (UTC)(no subject)
Mon, Feb. 11th, 2008 10:43 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Mon, Feb. 11th, 2008 06:10 am (UTC)(no subject)
Mon, Feb. 11th, 2008 10:44 pm (UTC)(Psst, have you read Kevin Young too?)
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Mon, Feb. 18th, 2008 07:25 am (UTC)I have not read Kevin Young. Is he another you've run across?
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Tue, Feb. 19th, 2008 09:06 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Mon, Sep. 15th, 2008 09:35 pm (UTC)