Donald Keene and Shiba Ryōtarō (authors), Tony Gonzalez (translator), Edo Japan Encounters the World: Conversations Between Donald Keene and Shiba Ryotaro, Japan Library, 2018. 137 pgs. Editor’s note: This review is cross-posted on Cha: An Asian Literary Journal. I remember when I was pursuing a Master’s in Japanese literature in London, my teacher in the first…
Category: James Au
Poetry Speaks: James Au’s Selection
題西林壁Written on the Wall at West Forest Temple (1084) 橫看成嶺側成峯，It’s a range viewed in face and peaks viewed from the side, 遠近高低各不同。Assuming different shapes viewed from far and wide. 不識廬山真面目，Of Mountain Lu we cannot make out the true face, 只緣身在此山中。For we are lost in the heart of the very place[1]. These days the poem of…
Pride of Place: James Au
Pride of Place: A series in which teaching staff and students from the English Department reflect on a place in Hong Kong. [Read all entries.] [Revisit the “Pet Sounds” series.] [Revisit the “Headspace” series.] [Revisit the “Ongoing” series.] [Revisit the “Interrogative” series.] I was at first hesitant when asked to write about Hong Kong. My…
Pet Sounds: James Au
Pet Sounds: A series in which teaching staff and students from the English Department reflect on a piece of music or song. [Read all entries.] [Revisit the “Headspace” series.] [Revisit the “Ongoing” series.] [Revisit the “Interrogative” series.] It was yesterday, if my memory did not fail me, yes, it was yesterday that I first heard…
Ongoing Moments: James Au
Ongoing Moments: A series in which teaching staff and students from the English Department respond to a photograph of their choice. [Read all entries.] [Revisit the “Interrogative” series.] “Before ‘youth’, if nothing was impossible, shades would be cleared, and one would surmount everything and become a sun that shines upon everything,” Japanese poet Yosano Akiko…
“Zhang Longxi on World Literature” by James Au
I first heard of Professor Zhang Longxi in Dr. Heidi Huang’s lecture. She introduced his article “The True Face of Mount Lu: On the Significance of Perspectives and Paradigms”, which I found truly impressive. In that article, Zhang mentions the importance of not analysing anything from only one perspective and suggests one trying to read from…
Announcement: James Au Awarded the Monbukagakusho Scholarship
James AU Kin Pong (MALCS, Class of 2014) has been awarded the prestigious Monbukagakusho Scholarship (MEXT) by the Japanese government as administered by its Hong Kong consulate. A highly competitive award requiring three rounds of interviews, the MEXT scholarship funds an entire course of PhD study at an institution of higher learning in Japan, pending…
“Don Yuan: A Review” by James Au
Don Juan is just as irresistible to writers as he is to women: both attractive and repulsive, courageous and honourable, yet entirely amoral and self-centred. We have all met someone like him, or at least someone who would like to be him. —Peter Gordon Two weeks ago, I had the pleasure of joining Dr. Tammy Ho to see Don Yuan (presented…
“Reflections Upon My Conference Presentation at ACAH/LibrAsia 2014” by James Au
My presentation topic during the Osaka Asian Conference on Arts and Humanities (ACAH) 2014 was “Comparative Studies: Europe Dada Poetry, Guo Moruo’s “The Goddesses” and Takahashi Shinkichi’s Poetry”. As the topic suggests, this paper compares “The Goddesses” written by Guo Moruo (郭沬若), a Chinese literary poet renowned for his new poetry, European Dada poetry and the…
Department of English, Hong Kong Baptist University 