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The challenge was simple. Take a Chinese word and reinterpret its form as a haiku. In English. For 30 days. Chinese characters, being logograms (written characters that represent words or phrases), lend themselves easily to such creative interplay. Playing around with Chinese characters in English poetry is something I’m familiar with, having written “Pursuit”, a poem based on the appearance of the word 追. “Pursuit” features in Bitter Punch, my 2nd poetry collection, but you can also read it here for free.
Still, to compress a poetic message replete with imagery within the strict confines of the haiku form? That was a first for me. Till today I am still not sure what to call this thing I am doing. Translation-interpretation? Transcreation? Misinterpretation? Boredom? With that, Character Studies was born. Character Studies is a project to reinterpret as many Chinese words as possible into English haikus. With over 2,500 characters in the Chinese language, I’m spoiled for choice. Every one of these haikus riffs on the various parts—or radicals—that make up the chosen Chinese character; some go so far as to comment on the actual meaning of the word, or some event happening in the world. (Note: At the time of writing, countries are battling the Covid-19 pandemic as it ravages the world. One wonders what will be left of human society once this calamity passes. Chances are the human race will survive…but at what cost?) I will be uploading new and backdated pieces on this site in the coming days/weeks (it’s been over a month and the writing is still going strong), so stay tuned. Keep your social distance and wash those hands!
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