The Adventures of Holden Heng

Singapore Classics

by Robert Yeo

Enter the world of Holden Heng, the not-so-lucky-in-love protagonist of this comic realist novel that documents social currents transforming the Lion City. Described as the most Singaporean of Singapore writers, Robert Yeo presents an immensely entertaining story of a typical Singaporean man’s escapades with three very different women. Will he ever find true love?

Genres: Fiction

208 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1986

About the author

Robert Yeo has been described as “the most Singaporean of Singaporean writers.” He has written five volumes of poetry and five plays, dealing with issues ranging from political detention in Singapore to the Vietnam War and the Great Marriage Debate. He has also written a novel, a memoir and essays on cultural policy and theatre, compiled anthologies of Singaporean Literature, and co-written books on the teaching of Literature for secondary schools. In 1978, he attended the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program, and in 1995 was a Fulbright Scholar. From 1977 to 1994, he chaired two drama committees, the Drama Advisory Committee and the Drama Review Committee, which helped to develop English-language theatre in Singapore, and in recognition of his service, he was awarded the Public Service Medal in 1991.

His triptych of connected plays—Are You There, Singapore?, One Year Back Home and Changi—was collected in 2001 as The Singapore Trilogy. In October 2009, his libretto for opera titled Kannagi, a short chamber piece based on an Indian epic poem, was staged in Singapore’s Sri Mariamman Temple with John Sharpley as composer. Another libretto, a full-length work titled Fences (also with John Sharpley) was staged in August 2012. Epigram Books has re-released his 1986 novel The Adventures of Holden Heng in 2011, published his career-spanning retrospective poetry collection The Best of Robert Yeo in 2012, and released the playscript to his 1992 stageplay The Eye of History in 2016.

Yeo was awarded the SEA Write Award in 2011. Currently, he teaches creative writing at Singapore Management University and mentors for NAC’s Mentor Access Project.

Reviews

[Wendy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderfully humorous Singaporean novel portraying a young man navigating social changes in the 1960's/70's.

Holden Heng is a twenty-something average guy sick of everyone asking him about his unusual name. When he thinks he might have gotten the hang of what dating is all about, Holden decides to propose to his girlfriend and gets a "no." So, over the course of the novel, we read about his clumsy adventures in the world of dating as he goes out with three different girls:
- the rich ex who feels like she's better than Holden
- the French nymphomaniac who only wants Holden for his body
- the feminist who refuses to be picked up in Holden's (borrowed) car and might have a pretty unfortunate connection to his family.

Each of the characters is heavily satirized, and I think that understanding this fact is key to not getting offended while reading it in our times; feminism and casual dating was very new and controversial in Singapore when this book was written. There were some unbelievable elements, of course (that's why it's a satire), but "The Adventures of Holden Heng" was overall a great way for me to experience the Singaporean culture from fifty years ago.

I got the audiobook and found the narration simply brilliant. The narrator gets the Singaporean accent perfectly and exaggerates his pronunciation, often for comical effect, depending on the character.

[Akanksha · Rating 2 out of 5]

Feels so dated as to read almost like a farcical merry-go-round of encounters with stock female archetypes that just feels unrealistic. Perhaps this critique is more to do with how a story like this set (and presumably first written) in the 70s pales in relevance reading it amid the social dynamics of the 2010s, than it being bad writing. I can't think of a single reason why this text needed a reprint.

[Wan Ni · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book tells the tale of Holden Heng, a 20-something Singaporean male in the 1960s falling in and out of love and trying to fathom the female species. It would have been funny at the time of publishing, but now it feels rather distant and irrelevant.

[Howe-Siang Tan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ancestor of 'Teenage Textbook'.