The English language, by her own admission
(if not in so many words), is Lim’s primary, almost
obsessive, concern, and there is no doubt that she
employs it well. The foreword toMonsoon History,
in the form of a poem, sums up the dislocations
and the relocations that English has engineered in
her life: ‘‘It was like learning / to let go and to hold
on: / a slow braking, shifting / gears...carrying
the child / to foreign countries.’’ Fittingly enough,
the first section traces a return to the land of origin,
as an adult, with all the adult burdens of memory
and guilt and exhilaration that are born out of the
yoking of two worlds. Upon her return, the second
section locates her within her ‘‘Malay-ness,’’ an
essence that she struggles to retrieve in order that
she may evaluate her history. Understandably, it is
difficult for her to find a stable point of reference in
the world of her childhood, long abandoned. The
third section witnesses another crossing, this
time to her adopted homeland. Lim poignantly
expresses in her poetry the complexities of dia-
sporic identity entwined with her disappointment
with the present-day politics of her original home-
land. The subsequent three sections record her
responses to those ideasand issues which crowd
and confront her adult existence: Western art, lit-
erature and culture, elements of the natural world,
and women.
Although Lim’s poetry is sensitive to the
problematics of her place in history, there is a
tendency to oversimplify the solution to dia-
sporic fracturing by privileging the English lan-
guage, adorning it with near-divine powers of
unity and healing. It appears that to justify her
‘‘voluntary exile,’’ Lim transcends the realities of
location and space to find her ‘‘calling’’ in a
language: ‘‘I make my living teaching it to native
speakers, I clean up the grammar of English
professors, I dream in its rhythms...Reading
it and writing it is the closest experience I have
ever had to feeling infinity in my presence.’’ One
wonders whether the native speakers themselves
might squirm in the face of such devotion!
Source:Brinda Bose, Review ofMonsoon History,in
World Literature Today, Vol. 70, No. 4, Fall 1996, pp.
1033–34.
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emy of Sciences, Vol. 1087, November 2006, pp. 370–83.Further Reading
De Bary, William Theodore, and Irene Bloom, eds.,
Sources of Chinese Tradition, 2 Vols., Columbia Univer-
sity Press, 1999–2000.
These texts are a good resource for information
about Chinese philosophy and religion as well
as Chinese culture in general.
Johnson, Kay Ann,Wanting a Daughter, Needing a Son:
Abandonment, Adoption, and Orphanage Care in China,
Yeong & Yeong, 2004.
This book explores the interaction between
China’s efforts at population control and the
country’s social practices, which place greater
value on the birth of a son.
Morton, W. Scott, and Charlton M. Lewis,China: Its
History and Culture, 4th ed., McGraw-Hill, 2005.
This text details China’s history from the Neo-
lithic period to the modern period, including
the country’s scientific, political, and economic
history.Pantoun for Chinese Women