SINGAPORE — In 2020, in the throes of the Covid-19 pandemic, Singaporean Kyla Zhao felt terribly isolated and homesick as a student at Stanford University in the United States.
Singapore’s literary scene has livened up in the past decade, with growing interest in SingLit
“Writing about places in Singapore and Singaporean food was a nice way for me to think about home while I was halfway across the world,” said Ms Zhao, who initially had no intention of getting her story published. While authors like Ms Zhao may secure multiple book deals through traditional channels, an alternative path to publication involves winning competitions that frequently offer publishing contracts as prizes.
But Mr Pasakorn, a fresh graduate from Yale-NUS College, said: “It is a great representation of the voice that I was capable of in 2022. Now, I'm writing a full-length memoir, and it’s going to take me maybe one or two more years.”Mr Max Pasakorn, 27, had his debut chapbook, A Study In Our Selves, published in 2023.For the 47-year-old who has been writing since his schooldays, the turning point came after he won the Golden Point Award in 2009 for his short story Trondheim.
He was also the first Singaporean to make the International Booker Prize longlist in 2023 for his translation of Chinese author and playwright Zou Jingzhi’s Ninth Building.In 2017, Ms Rachel Heng’s first novel, Suicide Club, landed six-figure book deals from publishers in the US and United Kingdom Mr Alexander Chua, 37, who owns independent bookstore BookBar, which focuses on Singaporean and Asian literature, said: “I think there's been a growing interest in local literature, we do see more people willing to try a local book for the first time.”
With authors and publishers in Singapore still driven more by passion rather than financial gains, TODAY explores the local literary scene to uncover what motivates the playersA LOVE FOR STORIES AND THE NEED TO TELL THEM There, she saw creative writing as a profession, a work with great cultural, historical, and social significance. As part of her doctorate, Dr Nuraliah wrote the beginnings of The Gatekeeper, which won the Epigram Fiction Prize in 2015.Dr Nuraliah Norsaid rediscovered her passion for writing while studying English at Nanyang Technological University.
The book largely details the traumatic time she experienced in a piano conservatory as a child in Singapore, and it was her way of reconciling herself with the past. Submitting a complete manuscript would normally involve need a cover letter pitching the work, a synopsis, and sample characters. Getting published by an overseas publisher often involves the same process though it can be a bit more complicated with larger publishers.
For Mr Li, his decision to go with an international publisher also has to do with taste. His latest book, Tenderly, Tenderly is published by a small press in Wales, Ireland.the impossible search for tenderness and human connection. With larger publishing houses, one typically needs a literary agent to pitch the manuscript and that also means finding the right agent who believes in one's work.One agent liked her manuscript but wanted her to rewrite it as she found it too “experimental”.
Mr Loh Guan Liang, a poet who has published three collections of poetry, said such a move comes with its own issues. Mr Daryl Qilin Yam, co-founder of the literary charity SingLit Station and a published author, said he would choose local publishers for his works as much as possible. Poet and photographer Marc Nair, who has self-published some of his work, said: “Self-published books are easier in the sense that you don't need to worry about the whole mechanism of what goes into publishing.”
They highlighted the emergence of new writers and the abundance of content being published, pointing to a vibrant and dynamic literary environment. In terms of genre, the poetry scene was hit pretty hard with the loss of Math Paper Press, resulting in a very “large gap” in the scene, said Mr Nair.It was an imprint of local bookstore BooksActually, which published mostly poetry titles and helped many young and debut poets get their work published.in 2021 after allegations of misconduct and financial mismanagement against its founder, Mr Kenny Leck, came to light.
In March this year, bookshop chain Times closed its Plaza Singapura and Waterway Point branches, with its sole remaining store in Cold Storage Jelita along Holland Road.“Two of my titles had waiting lists of up to one year long in the National Library Board, but people were prepared to wait! So I know people are reading. They just may not be buying,” he said.The cost of producing a book varies for different publishers.
“This book is on its way to selling 3,000 copies, but it's not gonna be the first year,” he said. “I have to make sure that the book is around for at least five years, it can sell 3,000 copies then it will make sense.” Mr Ng said for independent publishers like Ethos Books, the “gold standard” for any book they publish is about 2,000 copies — and that is considered a good run.
Another book that exceeded Ethos Books’ expectations is sociologist Teo You Yenn’s This is What Inequality Looks Like, published in 2018. It sold 40,000 copies and became one of the most talked-about books in Singapore. The Last Fools is about pioneer civil servants who built national icons, such as Singapore Airlines and the Housing Development Board. The Price of Being Fair is about a Singapore household name of a supermarket chain.Given Singapore’s small market, writers definitely cannot live by royalties alone. The standard royalty rate for a book published with 1,000 copies in Singapore is S$950.
For example, if the prize money is S$25,000, the writer would have to sell enough books worth S$25,000 before they can start collecting royalties in book sales. For Mr Yam, “the true success of a book isn't necessarily measured by its commercial success, but by how it is critically received”. While Mr Nair and the literary community at large are happy for writers who have made it big overseas, he wondered why those same opportunities are not available in Singapore.
She added that the key is to enable more Singaporeans to produce high-quality and engaging works of art. To that end, Mr Yam believes that Singapore’s literary scene will never be short of good local works. To be sure, there have been considerable efforts to encourage readers to pick up a piece of work by local writers.
On its part, the Singapore Book Publishers Association said that it works with publishers to develop their capabilities.
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