"Striking a match near dry words"
Review of parsetreeforestfire by Hamid Roslan (Singapore: Ethos Books, 2019)
By Sebastian Taylor
How do you survive when your language is questioned, erased, thrown into the dark? The “Speak Good English Movement” (SGEM) was launched in Singapore on the 29th of April, 2000, after growing condemnation of Singlish by the People’s Action Party (PAP), the governing political party since 1959. The intent of the SGEM was to “encourage Singaporeans to speak grammatically correct English that is universally understood,” according to then-Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong. Ironically, instead of stamping out the local tongues, the SGEM sparked debate about how a language is used, whether locally or globally, and who has the right to use what language. This debate is ongoing, and its arguments are still developing in many areas of Singaporean culture. Poetry, too, does not exist outside of those arguments.
parsetreeforestfire by Hamid Roslan is an imaginative poetry collection that picks apart language and culture in the same way Nabokov portrays an entomologist picking apart and reassembling a butterfly in On Discovering a Butterfly. Comprised of four sections, and four sections only, the title represents the collection in its entirety: parse, tree, forest, and fire. Each section incorporates both the familiar and the pseudo-familiar, in form ranging from metered verse to poems written entirely as footnotes.
For readers unfamiliar with Singlish—the uniquely Singaporean creole that blends English with languages such as Malay, Hokkien, Teochew, and Tamil—the first section parse is a welcomed introduction. The text is brought to life through melopoeia, meaning that it is supposed to be read aloud. Consider the collection's opening poem, "Write statements for what,” a sharply-constructed sonic landscape:
Use your brain. If got formula
we sure export lah bodoh. Kan dah ken
bodoh. Don’t ask me for footnote. When
you read English you look up. They always
tell you speak up boy speak up
now I speak up.
Immediately apparent is the conspiratorial tone of the poem, aided by the use of first- and second-person narration. In this first call for exploring power dynamics in language, Roslan employs the pronouns you and they to establish a divide that immediately recalls the hierarchy of bureaucracy or teaching. You as the reader are asked to speak up alongside the narrator, and the narrator decides to step up and speak. There is a strength in this call to action that isn’t hindered by breaking the fourth wall and addressing the audience.
The general form of parse follows its role as an introduction to the collection. The pieces range in length and style, from fully justified blocks of text to nebulous clouds of Singlish. Crucially, one page consists of the word sayang repeated three times in a sentence. There is a footnote that ‘translates’ the poem into a sentence in English, “Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.” This dialogue between text and footnote keys the reader into the mercurial nature of Singlish. Repeating sayang three times isn’t just grammatically correct; like the buffalo sentence, it is both grammatically correct and expressively meaningful. Sayang in Singlish has connotations of comforting someone, but also of cooing to a younger child or someone you dote on. There are multiple ways to read the line, and this ambiguity doesn’t detract from the legitimacy of the language. If anything, it points out the hypocrisy of criticizing a language for inconsistency and nonsense when internationally recognized languages like English are riddled with them.
The next section, tree, is much more consistent in form than parse. This could be because Hamid has moved past the introduction and into the argument of the collection. ‘Argument’ is a good word for tree, because all the pieces in this section can be read as a response to its opposite page. For example, the page starting with “Maybe tongue prize-winning” is across from a piece beginning “But what really got my goat.” On the left page, the speaker uses Singlish with Malay influences to discuss the ingredients and flavors of local dishes with imaginative flair (“Bukan salah// kalua spice salah,/ onion go Batam never return.”) On the right page, in quotations and italics denoting another speaker, Singaporean food is reviewed in snarky, but ‘proper’ English (“Chow kway tuey comes with fish cakes, shrimp, bean/ sprouts, eggs, & TONS of chicken.”) Though the use of Singlish on the left page may make the poem hard to read for people who do not know the language, attentive readers will realize that the two pieces have a vastly different attitude and perspective towards the topic of Singaporean food. Although the right page is much easier to read for an international audience, it does not possess the smokiness of wok hei cooking, and so the speaker judges so-called proper English as “Way not cool.” In contrast, the speaker on the left page insists, “flavour is/ flavour,” demonstrating a local’s understanding of ingredients and preparation. The use of Singlish (or lack thereof) signals the cultural contexts the speakers operate in, and furthermore suggests that ‘proper’ English should not be seen as better than Singlish in every context. As this poem demonstrates, the local vernacular is more apt for concisely understanding and expressing local experiences. The Singlish speaker even conspires with the reader on this note, making the jibe, “Give chance. They forget/ eye test.” Though it seems easier to read the page in ‘proper’ English, the Singlish speaker is right that the other voice is completely off the mark.
Whereas the section parse introduces Singlish and its linguistic debates, forest provides a context for the anthology in a satirical mode. Consisting of a series of statements, numbered, evoking the tone of an oath, Hamid jadedly explains the history of Singapore. The statements are annotated by caustic footnotes, as in:
21. In 1637, the island which would come to be known as Singapore had been largely forgotten, after a trading post at the mouth of the island’s river was burned down by the Portuguese. [21] [Brackets are the editor’s additions.]
[…]
[21] Good. This ang moh lang know a bit his history. Better than you all. Before 1965 after 1965 all big fuck. Eh you know 1963 got Operation Cold Storage? They take Lim Chin Siong all throw inside jail. Wah then send him go UK go die.
Hamid’s footnotes establishes an interplay of voices, as the body of the poem retains the format of respectable "proper" English while the footnote details in Singlish what the narrator considers to be truly important. Though some might find this distracting, in that the constant back-and-forth between the top and bottom of the page disrupts readerly flow, the text does not function as poignantly without this juxtaposition. It is hard to fully enjoy Animal Farm without a good grasp of the 1917 Russian Revolution. It is vital and necessary to understand the historical background that a literary work is referring to, especially if it is critically engaging with that background. The fact that Hamid provides context and commentary through footnotes helps the reader to enjoy the work for what it’s worth. By such a method, Singlish—the language that still struggles to be accepted by the state—becomes the voice of an alternative history, the language of resistance against the official narratives perpetuated by those in power. In addition, the fluidity of the Singlish in the footnotes is thrown into relief by the stilted formality of the statements, which, despite the conventional lineation of prose, are far less intelligible than the footnotes. It is also interesting how Hamid’s use of numbering mimics a common organisational strategy used in slam poetry. Yet, to read forest aloud creates absurdity, as the formality of a Received Pronunciation accent makes a mockery of the establishment it mimics. The title forest reminds me of the saying, “You can’t see the forest for the trees.” As the declarations of forest become more and more convoluted, it becomes apparent that more is lost in the formal diction than gained. You are reminded not to get lost in the forest of English words, which represents the organized reality that officials seek to impose.
An enjoyable part of reading forest is to see how footnotes are used to convey emotion, building off the more unemotional and formal language of the main text. Of the whole sequence, my favorite footnotes are “79 Aiyah just talk./ 80 Just talk./ 81 THEN OPEN YOUR MOUTH,” which come just before the final section, fire. In these final few lines, Hamid uses a staccato-like repetition to express the narrator’s frustration with the language of the main voice, whose language appears trapped, trying to define itself in order to speak ("This present speaker is this present speaker./ This present speaker would like to speak.") The capitalization in the final footnote drives home this frustration, which is further characterized as a hidden but real anger, as these words are relegated to the bottom of the page. Hamid’s choice to use strictly end-stopped lines strengthens this sentiment: the final footnotes resemble commands from someone who loves language, loves connecting, but is grappling with the pedantic English of post-colonialism. Despite the use of punctuation in conventionally English ways through the first two sections, the pleas in these final footnotes wish ardently for simplicity. They beautifully answer an earlier poem in parse, where the speaker was told to “speak up.”
fire, the final section of the collection, is the release of the speaker’s frustration in search of expression. A single poem that resembles a torrid stream of consciousness, fire collapses both public and private into a singular object of consideration, following a style similar to Kerouac’s spontaneous prose. However, where Kerouac’s spontaneity is filtered through a Puritan East-coast lens, Hamid’s final poem is uninhibited by language. Words are cut-off and truncated. Mimicking actual enunciation, the “L” is missing from “Lord,” and lines intercept each other. The chaos of fire is exaggerated by its form. Twin columns of text descend on each page. There is enjambment galore, and the text is fully justified. This format makes the pacing even, despite the word repetitions and the intermittent punctuation. The section is the appropriate culmination of the dramatic monologue in parse, the argument in tree, and the mounting frustration in forest.
The final two columns of the section go:
We see again the motifs of throats and mouths that have recurred throughout the collection. In earlier sections, we see the mouth either tasting or talking, the throat either swallowing or spitting. Hamid knows that our food shapes our language, just as our language shapes our food. In the very end, however, language seems to completely fail or exceed Hamid’s description. He resorts to four lines of monosyllabic sounds, which in their repetitive inchoateness feel as if all semblance of argument has broken down. All that is left is the child, fingers plugging ears, saying, “I don’t hear you.” There is so much emotion in this final poem. Perhaps language does finally fail. It is finally used up.
In parsetreeforestfire Hamid Roslan has constructed an ingenious collection out of a melange of Singaporean languages. I would not recommend it as a light distraction, as it constantly probes the linguistic centers of your brain. Instead, it is a collection to read and reread. I promise you, each time you will notice new constructions and new jabs at power. It has the potential of a matchbox, and the English language is tinder to the flame.
Sebastian Taylor studies physics at the University of St Andrews. Their area of interest is nuclear decommissioning and non-proliferation. They are also fascinated by performance poetry and write on the themes of queering the body, self, and space while serving as the Head Editor of the University’s Creative Writing Society.