Two days ago, I saw a notice about an upcoming book, “Singapore: A Biography” on the Singapore Heritage mailing list. “Wow, wow, wow,” I said to myself in the quiet of the night. “I have to get my hands on a copy!” Silently I applauded the second author whom I knew of and toiled on into yet another sleepless night.
Just after midnight yesterday, the news had reached Buffalo, NY, with Kevin exploding “AWESOME!” – he was Retwittering @skinnylatte:’s comment that “Yu-Mei spent the last 2 years researching her “Singapore: A Biography” book”. Hours later he was telling @joonian that he “hopes to attend Yu-Mei’s “Singapore: A Biography” book talk … seems like a seminal piece of work every Singaporean should own. ”
Kevin also alerted the Friends of Yesterday.sg mailing list and amidst the chatter that followed, Shaun facebooked an alert and echo-ed out sentiments in saying that the “extracts show that it will shape up to be a bloody good read and I’m personally loving the Sgt Pepper-ish cover montage.”
The “Fortress of Testicular Solitude” now sports a ringing endorsement to the book:
We are neglecting the second author of course so let me hasten to say, “kudos to him too!”
I forwarded the Singapore Heritage post to the Pasir Panjang Heritage Guides as we have, at times, found vivid comments almost embarrassedly tucked away in footnotes of academic tomes. Many a story have thus fallen by the wayside and are waiting to be dug up by eager hands. Here these two fill a book and cite their sources – the arsenal of many an embattled history teacher has just improved. Let’s hope some will find this useful in confidently blowing life into the many dusty characters in the age-old narrative.
So we eagerly await this *drum roll* – click the image for excerpts of the book at their website:
The authors of Singapore: A Biography are Mark Ravinder Frost & Yu-Mei Balasingamchow. The publishers are National Museum of Singapore, Editions Didier Millet & Hong Kong University Press. The book hits the streets in mid-October 2009.
They will discuss their book during these events:
- 18 Oct 2009, 2pm, National Library: “History as literature: the writing of Singapore: A Biography” – register.
- 20 Oct 2009, 7.30pm, Polymath & Crust: “Singapore: A Biography – a reading & discussion.”
- 24 Oct 2009, 2pm, National Museum of Singapore: “Heroes, villains and ordinary citizens: a short history of Singaporean dissent” – register.
- 31 Oct 2009, 11am, Singapore Writers Festival, at The Arts House: “Finding the Singapore Story.”
Otterman speaks... 