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MarshallCavendishM - Shirley Lim

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154 pages

English

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Description

The novel is set in 1969 Kuala Lumpur, against a backdrop of political turmoil and social changes. Married to wealthy, conservative Henry, English literature graduate Li An is torn between the comforting lull of a secure world and the seductive erotism of the unknown, foreign spaces. When tragedy strikes on the personal and societal levels, Li An and her young friends find their lives turned upside down, and each must make decisions that will have far-reaching repercussions. Masterfully evoking the passions and struggles across three nations and decades, this book weaves a poignant fabric from the complex threads of human identity, friendships, and gender relations, all of which are utterly inextricable from the others.

Sujets

Historical fiction

Informations

Publié par	MarshallCavendishM
Date de parution	01 mars 2010
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9789814484435
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0400€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

2001 Shirley Geok-lin Lim
Designer: Steven
Cover image courtesy of Photolibrary
This edition published 2010 by
Marshall Cavendish Editions
An imprint of Marshall Cavendish International
1 New Industrial Road, Singapore 536196
All rights reserved
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. Request for permission should be addressed to the Publisher, Marshall Cavendish International (Asia) Private Limited, 1 New Industrial Road, Singapore 536196. Tel: (65) 6213 9300. Fax: (65) 6285 4871 E-mail: genrefsales@sg.marshallcavendish.com. Website: www.marshallcavendish.com/genref
The publisher makes no representation or warranties with respect to the contents of this book, and specifically disclaims any implied warranties or merchantability or fitness for any particular purpose, and shall in no events be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damage, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.
Other Marshall Cavendish Offices
Marshall Cavendish Ltd. PO Box 65829, London EC1P 1NY, UK Marshall Cavendish Corporation. 99 White Plains Road, Tarrytown NY 10591-9001, USA Marshall Cavendish International (Thailand) Co Ltd. 253 Asoke, 12th Flr, Sukhumvit 21 Road, Klongtoey Nua, Wattana, Bangkok 10110, Thailand Marshall Cavendish (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Times Subang, Lot 46, Subang Hi-Tech Industrial Park, Batu Tiga, 40000 Shah Alam, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia
Marshall Cavendish is a trademark of Times Publishing Limited
National Library Board Singapore Cataloguing in Publication Data
Lim, Shirley.
Joss gold / Shirley Geok-lin Lim. - Singapore : Marshall Cavendish
Editions, 2010.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978 981 4484 43 5
1. Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) - Fiction. 2. Americans - Malaysia - Fiction. 3. Chinese - Malaysia - Fiction. 4. Women - Malaysia - Fiction. I. Title.
PS3562.I459
813.54 - dc22 OCN502177908
Printed in Singapore by Craft Print International Ltd
DEDICATION
To Charles Bazerman, as always, with gratitude.
My thanks to Florence Howe, Jean Casella, Amanda Hamlin, and Lisa London of The Feminist Press , to Shirley Hew and Karen Kwek of Times Media, and to Leong Liew Geok, Jenny Wang, Abdullah Majid, and my colleagues at the University of California, Santa Barbara and at the University of Hong Kong for their love and support.
Contents
Book 1
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Book 2
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Book 3
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
After Word
About the author

One
Li An was rushing to get to her second class on time. A new tutor, she was timid with her students, arts freshies just arrived at the university in June. The big dark Ceylonese student, Gomez, had looked at her during the first meeting as if to say he didn t believe she understood Keats s Ode on Melancholy as well as he did. His superior stare had made her doubt her decision to begin the year with the poem, considering there were easier passages in the practical criticism collection every first-year student had to read. She had selected the Ode on Melancholy on impulse, although she had presented it to the class with an air that suggested she had carefully planned to teach it. That was her first mistake, and being late now was her second.
Henry had taken the car early. He was always up early and in his biology lab by 7:00 AM . She had insisted on keeping her motorbike after they married. The 125 cc Honda couldn t keep up with the Norton and Suzuki motorbikes and speeding taxis on the Federal Highway, but it carried her fast enough, with lots of wind in her face.
Six students were waiting for her in the tiny seminar room-four girls, Gomez, and a pale Chinese boy who had made the wrong selection in courses. Wong, inarticulate, giggled nervously when he didn t understand something, but when she spoke to him about changing to a different subject, he refused. He had heard the geography lecturers were notorious for failing their students, and he hoped she would be easier on him.
It wasn t more than a few minutes after the hour, but the students looked at her reproachfully, as if she had stolen something from them. This morning she had prepared a prose passage from D. H. Lawrence s Sons and Lovers, and she read it aloud, relishing the overflow of sibilants like spiced chickpeas in her mouth. When the students ventured no comments, she spoke with increasing recklessness, ignoring the giggles from the corner and Gomez s glare: You see, Lawrence suggests that physical attraction, sex, is a powerful force.
The Chinese girls lowered their eyelids. Pretty Eurasian Sally listened intently, and Mina, the Malay student whose father worked in the Ministry of Agriculture, who said she wanted to be an actress, and who Li An knew admired her, remained silent, seemingly unconvinced.
When the hour was over, Li An sat in the empty room, unable to move. Was this struggle of English words against unyielding minds what she wanted?
Only last year she had been cramming for the exams and couldn t have enough of English literature. The library was crowded with students-a hundred seemed to be waiting on line at the reserved books counter-and so cold with air-conditioning that everyone wore sweaters and cardigans. She sat upstairs, reading old copies of Scrutiny and copying fine phrases by F. R. Leavis, occasionally tearing off her sweater and running outside in the blazing sun to the back of the faculty lounge, where she bought sizzling flaky curry puffs and smoked two cigarettes in a row. All the English lecturers seemed glamorous and witty, even portly ones like Mr Mason, and Jane Austen s novels dazzled her with social comedy that unfailingly ended in civilized marriage.
Henry was very kind to her that year. One afternoon in the library she fainted from lack of sleep and food and too much reading, and he offered her a ride back to the residential hall in his car. That evening he visited her with jars of Brand s Essence of Chicken in their distinctive green boxes and a bottle of eau de cologne. He was a chemistry graduate student whose father owned rubber estates, a brick factory in Segamat, a lorry transport company, and blocks of housing estates in various towns, including a few in Petaling Jaya. Henry, the eldest son, was living with his father s second wife in Kuala Lumpur while he was studying at the university.
You can t be serious! Gina said, when Li An began seeing Henry. He s such a China-type! What can see in him, lah?
Plenty of money, man, Ellen mocked. Now no more hawker food, only air-con coffee shops.
Henry, oh Henry, buy me diamond ring, big like pigeon egg, Gina yodeled unbelievingly.
They pummeled each other, hooting and laughing.
Of course Li An wasn t serious! She was wild, smoked a pack of cigarettes a day, spent the rest of her small scholarship funds on petrol for her secondhand Honda, and hardly ever washed her three pairs of Levi s.
She brooded on Henry s love in between studying for finals. It was like being on two different planets.
In the library there was her body s silence-a silence that was filled by the conversation she was listening to intently, in a world of insidiously overpowering words. To be an English student was the most enviable position in the world! Everyone should be jealous of me, she thought.
Outside the library she swung her dirty blue-jeaned leg over the Honda and turned the throttle till it roared, grinning at her Indian friends, Raja, Maniam, and Paroo. A swaggering teddy boy, she rode her bike bent over the handlebars. The Indian students made a space for her in the lecture halls whenever she rushed in late, having sped her motorbike all over Kuala Lumpur and Petaling Jaya.
But later, in Henry s white Mercedes, on her way to dinner at his second mother s house, she thought of his father with fear. Mr Yeh, a short thick man in his late forties, spoke Hokkien with a loud brutal voice. He wore sleeveless undershirts and transparent tetralyne shirts that didn t conceal the powerful rolls of muscle in his chest. His hair was cropped short like a Hailam butcher, and if you didn t know who he was, you could easily mistake him for one. She had seen butchers just like him, standing behind blood-splattered wooden trestles in the wet markets, hair bristling under their bloodied singlets, cleavers in massive hands, looking as meaty as the unskinned haunches of pork hanging on giant hooks beside them. A rich odor surrounded them, the fragrance of lard cakes, and she imagined them like impassive murderers before their execution.
Second Mrs Yeh was dressed in an expensive lace blouse and London-imported skirt. She studied Li An carefully.
Hello, Auntie, Li An said. She wriggled her toes in the worn Bata sandals and hoped the stain from the afternoon s curry puff wouldn t show on her jeans.
Second Mrs Yeh, she suspected, could probably see right through her cotton T-shirt to the discolored bra straps. Auntie had those peculiar women s eyes that could detect immediately where a fingernail had cracked and not been filed. Whenever she looked at Li An, her glance stayed on the frayed thread, on the loose button.
Auntie was very different from Li An s mother. Li An s father had died when she was three, and her mother had remarried a year later. Then beset by baby after baby, she had never had time, it seemed to Li An, to look at her. Li An s stepfather, Han Si-Chun, a rubber trader who spent many weeks each year traveling to plantations in the interior, had commanded every atom of her mother s body ever since-in childbearing, housecare, cooking, and dutifulness to his family, his loud bossy sisters