Still reading the same book for the last week. A collection of short stories by Asian-American authors. Very good Asian-American authors. Chilling. Shocked. Powerful prose that shakes the soul leaving one numb.
Everyone who met me the last week thought I was depressed or upset: I could only tell them that I was reading and feeling a little shell-shocked.
Not the whole truth. I feel sick. There is a small little tuff of nausea in my stomach going through each page of the book. I wished the editor, Jessica Hagedorn, had put a few more comedies in ther to lighten up the load. But her attitude probably was, "who can laugh when so much is unhappy in the world. With Asians. In America."
I just finished Bharati Mukherjee's "The Management of Grief" was the perfect story about Toronto. I liked also the hyper-macho "Rico" by Peter Bacho. And Marilyn Chin. I honestly think I love her. And the enigmatic selection "Ahjuhman" from Chang-Rae Lee's "Native Speaker." Magical realism of Eric Gamalinda's "Formerly Known as Bionic Boy."
Feeling all sick and frighten and nauseated. It is as if that this is what I should aspire to and I cannot look at myself in the mirror and not see the seed of this thing in it.
Frightening. Truely frightening.
No comments:
Post a Comment