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Dakota
Dakota 达哥打 by Wong Koi Tet, winner of the 2020 Singapore Literature Prize (Chinese Creative Non-fiction), meets readers in an English translation by Shanna Tan.
Dakota is a sharp and whimsical work of literary creative non-fiction about coming-of-age in the 1970-80s in an iconic Singapore neighbourhood lost to urban renewal named Dakota Crescent. The deeply personal vignettes stitch together a mosaic of Singapore’s urban history. Humorous with a touch of melancholy, Wong Koi Tet’s evocative writing makes us reflect on place as an anchor of history, heritage and home.
‘Dakota is about a place that has expired, about distant memories and forgotten things, but writing it enveloped me in a comforting intimacy. – Wong Koi Tet
(Note: This edition is only available in Singapore)
PUBLICATIONS IN LITERARY MAGAZINES
"The Longkau's Name" originally appeared in The Common.
“My Take on Pantheism,” “21 Grams,” and “The Neighborhood Zoo” originally appeared in The Southern Review (Autumn 2022)
“An Instant,” “Because of Cod Liver Oil,” and “Zipping Up” originally appeared in The Georgia Review (Winter 2023)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Wong Koi Tet (Singapore, 1973) is an esteemed writer in the Singapore Chinese literary scene and has worn many hats in his writing career: a journalist with a local Chinese newspaper, an editor of literary magazine Afterwards in the 1990s, a drama scriptwriter for the local television channel and now, a part-time creative writing lecturer at Nanyang Technological University. Since 1995, he has published several books of prose, poetry, short stories, and cultural commentary. Dakota 达哥打 was first published in 2018 and clinched the 2020 Singapore Literature Prize in Chinese Creative Non-fiction.
ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR
Shanna Tan is a Singaporean translator working from Korean, Chinese and Japanese into English. She translated the bestselling Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-reum (Bloomsbury, 2023) and is working on a few more projects at the moment.
Dakota is a sharp and whimsical work of literary creative non-fiction about coming-of-age in the 1970-80s in an iconic Singapore neighbourhood lost to urban renewal named Dakota Crescent. The deeply personal vignettes stitch together a mosaic of Singapore’s urban history. Humorous with a touch of melancholy, Wong Koi Tet’s evocative writing makes us reflect on place as an anchor of history, heritage and home.
‘Dakota is about a place that has expired, about distant memories and forgotten things, but writing it enveloped me in a comforting intimacy. – Wong Koi Tet
(Note: This edition is only available in Singapore)
PUBLICATIONS IN LITERARY MAGAZINES
"The Longkau's Name" originally appeared in The Common.
“My Take on Pantheism,” “21 Grams,” and “The Neighborhood Zoo” originally appeared in The Southern Review (Autumn 2022)
“An Instant,” “Because of Cod Liver Oil,” and “Zipping Up” originally appeared in The Georgia Review (Winter 2023)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Wong Koi Tet (Singapore, 1973) is an esteemed writer in the Singapore Chinese literary scene and has worn many hats in his writing career: a journalist with a local Chinese newspaper, an editor of literary magazine Afterwards in the 1990s, a drama scriptwriter for the local television channel and now, a part-time creative writing lecturer at Nanyang Technological University. Since 1995, he has published several books of prose, poetry, short stories, and cultural commentary. Dakota 达哥打 was first published in 2018 and clinched the 2020 Singapore Literature Prize in Chinese Creative Non-fiction.
ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR
Shanna Tan is a Singaporean translator working from Korean, Chinese and Japanese into English. She translated the bestselling Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-reum (Bloomsbury, 2023) and is working on a few more projects at the moment.
260 pages, Paperback
Published April 6, 2024
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July 18, 2024mostly poetic, many a times nostalgic, and often times vague and hormonal. dakota is a collection of pudgy memories from wong koi tet’s coming of age in the southern corner of singapore.
“last time there was no such thing as molest molest la if they like (someone), they will touch. love was simple back then.” is something my older colleagues would say when confronted on the rise of sexual assault cases within the company, or at least in this day and age. said older colleagues are probably of the same age range as the author. with how different things were back then and considering how he was a hormonal teenage kid when these stories were set, i pushed aside judgement. (this is often the case with stories written earlier/ by men from patriarchal societies.)
alas, this isn’t the main point of my review. wong koi tet shared many stories of his childhood spent in dakota. the many changes he had witnessed, the little myths spread around from student to student, the time he first felt a feeling akin to romantic love, and wild, humorous episodes with his family. i cooped myself in kino reading his collection of adolescent memories. it was breezy fun.
“last time there was no such thing as molest molest la if they like (someone), they will touch. love was simple back then.” is something my older colleagues would say when confronted on the rise of sexual assault cases within the company, or at least in this day and age. said older colleagues are probably of the same age range as the author. with how different things were back then and considering how he was a hormonal teenage kid when these stories were set, i pushed aside judgement. (this is often the case with stories written earlier/ by men from patriarchal societies.)
alas, this isn’t the main point of my review. wong koi tet shared many stories of his childhood spent in dakota. the many changes he had witnessed, the little myths spread around from student to student, the time he first felt a feeling akin to romantic love, and wild, humorous episodes with his family. i cooped myself in kino reading his collection of adolescent memories. it was breezy fun.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review