5 Questions with May Ngo
May Ngo is an academic and writer of Teo Chew–Cambodian origin whose essays and fiction have been published in the Sydney Review of Books, The Lifted Brow, ZineWest and Mascara Literary Review, amongst others. She is currently working on completing a novel.
No.1
When did you begin to show an interest in writing criticism?
I think it came from reading a lot and then beginning to write fiction myself; I started being curious about taking a book apart, analysing what makes it work and what doesn’t. I’m interested in approaching a work of art as a contemplative act, especially through thinking about its style or form and focusing initial attention towards asking the question “what game is this piece playing?” (Garth Greenwell).
Figuring this out avoids judging the work by the rules of a different game. Greenwell notes that after having seen what the story is trying to do and the aims it has set for itself, we then might judge: 1) whether it meets those aims, and 2) whether it’s possible that it should be setting this aim higher, or have entirely different aims.
Criticism therefore is an act of paying attention, a way of looking—before it is a judgment or evaluation.
No.2
Tell us a bit more about what you will explore and write about as Kill Your Darlings 2021 New Critic.
We live in a globalised world, yet what we read and watch seems to come predominantly from US and European culture. In addition, there is a link between how we see the “Other” here in Australia and the “Other” on the global stage, particularly when those “Others” out in the world migrate “here”. I’m excited to focus on translated fiction and how it might offer us different ways of storytelling and of seeing the world. [This is especially noteworthy] because within Australian literary criticism there is a distinct lack of attention on translated works, particularly those from non-western countries.
My approach as a critic will try to follow on from Flannery O’Connor’s contention that fiction is one of “mystery and manners.” The mystery is that of our human condition and the vast experiences which make up this condition; the manners are from how great fiction explores this through the “texture of existence” and “those conventions which, in the hands of the artist, reveal that central mystery.”
I’m interested in interrogating how a writer uses novelistic conventions, style and form to express their particular vision of the world, their take on the mysteries of human existence, and how effective they are in doing so. A critical factor in translated literature is of course the ways in which the translator has worked with language and the politics of translation.
No.3
What was your first response upon receiving the email confirming your win?
I was over the moon. I can’t tell you how many rejections I’d already received this year for fellowships, awards and other publication opportunities, in the midst of what has been overall a terrible year of grief and loss personally but of course more widely.
Getting this gave me a supercharged boost; it was like rocket fuel and it will help me to keep going. Every writer should be given the chance to feel like this at least once a year.
No.4
What do you think your appointment as 2021 New Critic will do for you and your practice?
It will push me to read more books outside of the Anglophone world. It will also get me to think more closely about the art of translation and the art of criticism. Also, getting the chance to work with professional editorial staff will undoubtably help me become a better writer.
No.5
What are you reading at the moment? What authors or books inspire your work?
One of the novels I’m working on at the moment is a contemporary crime fiction story set in Parramatta and the surrounding western suburbs of Sydney. In essence, I’m trying to write an Asian-Australian migrant experience into the crime fiction genre, which in Australia is largely dominated by “rural noir” and is also frankly, very white.
So in that vein I have been devouring many crime and mystery novels. I love the way that the genre is able to convey such a strong sense of time and place, as well as how it can touch on wider issues of justice, race and class. I wanted to read less books from the US, but US crime fiction is so interesting right now in that there are many writers, especially writers of colour, who are writing incredibly compelling characters and telling diverse stories, and who have for me expanded the possibilities of that genre.
Ones that I’ve read recently and loved include Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha, all of the books by Attica Locke, Blacktop Wasteland by S.A. Cosby, and Hillbilly Hustle by Wesley Browne. In terms of Australia, I’ve been reading Emma Viskic’s Caleb Zelic series, and translated crime fiction have included the existentialist assassin novel The Plotters by Un-Su Kim (trans. Sora Kim-Russell), and the hilarious Auntie Poldi mystery series by Mario Giordano (trans. J. Maxwell Brownjohn).
In terms of translated fiction in general and not just from this year, the following have stunned and affected me in a deep way: Disoriental by Négar Djavadi (trans. Tina Kover); Seasons of Migration to the North by Tayeb Salih (trans. Denys Johnson-Davies); Waiting for God by Simone Weil (trans. Emma Craufurd); Palace Walk by Naguib Mahfouz (trans. William M. Hutchins and Olive E. Kenny); War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (trans. Anthony Briggs) and My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante (trans. Ann Goldstein).
The KYD New Critic Award is an annual award, running since 2017, that assists the vocational development of an early-career critic across all artforms.
Find out more here.