This collection of essays brings together work by some of the most internationally acclaimed critics of Malaysian literature in English from different parts of the world, including Australia, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and the US. It investigates the works of major writers of the tradition in the genres of drama, fiction and poetry, from its beginnings to the present, focusing mainly on thematic and stylistic trends. The book pays particular attention to issues such as gender, ethnicity, nationalism, multiculturalism, diaspora, hybridity and transnationalism, which are central to the creativity and imagination of these writers. The chapters collectively address the challenges and achievements of writers in the English language in a country where English, first introduced by the colonisers, has experienced a mixed fate of ups and downs in the post-independence period, due to the changing, and sometimes strikingly different, policies adopted by the government. The book will be of interest to readers and researchers of Malaysian literature, Southeast Asian studies and postcolonial literatures.

This book brings together fourteen articles by prominent critics of Malaysian Anglophone literature from five different countries: Australia, Italy, Malaysia, Singapore, and the US. It investigates the thematic and stylistic trends in the literary products of selected writers of the tradition in the genres of drama, fiction, and poetry, from its beginnings to the present, focusing mainly on the postcolonial themes of ethnicity, gender, diaspora, and nationalism, which are central to the creativity and imagination of these writers. The book explores the works of not just the established writers of the tradition but also those who have received little critical attention to date but who are equally gifted, such as Adibah Amin, Edward Dorall, Rehaman Rashid, and Huzir Suleiman. The chapters collectively address the challenges and achievements of writers in the English language in a country where English is widely used in daily life and yet marginalised in the creative domain to elevate the status of writings in the national language, i.e., Bahasa Malaysia. The book will demonstrate that in spite of such recurrent neglect of the medium, Malaysia has produced a number of outstanding writers in the language, who are comparable in creativity and craftsmanship to writers of other Anglophone traditions. The book will be of interest to readers and researchers of Malaysian literature, postcolonial literatures, minority literatures, gender studies, and Southeast Asian studies.

China's recent economic growth has fed a rapid increase in the study of modern Chinese language and literature globally. In this shifting global context, authors who work on the edges of the literary empire raise important questions about the homogeneity of language, identity and culture that is produced by the modern Chinese literary canon. This book examines a key segment of this literature and asks, "What does it mean to be of Chinese descent and Chinese-speaking outside of China?" While there have been several excellent works that deal with individual Chinese authors from Malaysia, there is to date no broadly framed and comprehensive study of the body of Chinese diasporic literature emerging from this multiethnic, polylinguistic country. This neglect is surprising given the vibrant development of Chinese Malaysian literature.This book fills the gap by looking specifically at how diasporic Chinese subjects make sense of their Chinese and Malaysian identities in postcolonial Malaysia. This book will be of value to scholars and students of Chinese-language literature and culture.It will also appeal to scholars and students in the fields of Chinese and Southeast Asia studies as well as those interested in postcolonial, diaspora, migration, Asian American studies, and world literature.

Religion has featured in Anglophone literature in Malaysia from colonial times to the present. In Intimating the Sacred, Andrew Hock Soon Ng considers the practice of everyday religiosity as represented in literature, which is often starkly opposed to the impression created by religious rhetoric promoted by the government. The book's examination of intersections between (post)modernity and religion highlights links between religion and other facets of colonial and postcolonial identity such as class, gender and sexuality. It will appeal not only to scholars and specialists, but also to anyone who enjoys modern Southeast Asian literature. Andrew Hock Soon Ng is senior lecturer in literary studies at Monash University, Sunway Campus, Malaysia. He is the author of Dimensions of Monstrosity in Contemporary Narratives and Interrogating Interstices. "In Intimating the Sacred, Andrew Hock Soon Ng confirms his status as one of the most important new voices in Malaysian literary studies, moving beyond national and postcolonial frameworks to a more subtle plotting of the psychic contours of Malaysian modernity." – Philip Holden, National University of Singapore "In Malaysia, the relationships between various religions, the state ideology and the multicultural composition of the populace are fraught with tension. Ng's book, with critical insights derived from a balanced treatment of texts and theory, deals with these issues in a robust and uncompromising manner. This is a welcome contribution to Southeast Asian literary studies." – Eddie Tay, author of Colony, Nation, and Globalisation "This refreshing approach to Malaysian canonical texts combines diverse literary theories and religion. Courageous and convincing, it engages post colonialism, feminism, and theories of religion with a sophisticated focus on texts." – Gaik Cheng Khoo, Australian National University

This book is a collection of research-based papers on the development of Malaysian English (ME) from the immediate post-Independence period to the present. The chapters chart the chronological, linguistic as well as functional development of contemporary ME that provide new information on the variety beyond its identity as a postcolonial English.

The literature of Malaysia and Singapore, the multicultural epicentre of Asia, offers a rich body of source material for appreciating the intellectual heritage of colonial and postcolonial Southeast Asia. Focusing on themes of home and belonging, Eddie Tay illuminates many aspects of identity anxiety experienced in the region, and helps construct a dialogue between postcolonial theory and the Anglophone literatures of Singapore and Malaysia. A chronologically ordered selection of texts is examined including Swettenham, Bird, Maugham, Burgess, and Thumboo. This genealogy of works includes colonial travel writings and sketches as well as contemporary diasporic novels by Malaysian and Singapore-born authors based outside their countries of origin. The premise is that home is a physical space as well as a symbolic terrain invested with social, political and cultural meanings. As discussions of politics and history augment close readings of literary works, the book should appeal not only to scholars of literature, but also to scholars of Southeast Asian politics and history.

Nations are built by narrating their past. Threads of common memories weave the fabric of the national culture, integrating the heterogenous communities into the idea of a single nation. In multicultural societies, the process is a messy one. Different communities remember the past from perspectives that often clash with each other. Multiple memories of a multicultural nation challenge the idea of a singular national identity and call for multiple forms of belonging. Memory and Nation-Building explores the contemporary images of World War II in Malaysian literature and the continuing significance of the conflict in the collective memory and nation-building in Malaysia. Given the multicultural nature of the nation, the War memories of Malaysia are multiple and often contradictory. In the contemporary Malaysian literature, these memories embody the search for a historical narrative that would accommodate the cultural and ethnic diversity of the country.