This Level is Both Ceiling and Floor

/ Foreword by Cheyenne Alexandria Phillips & Melizarani T. Selva

When you are on the highest floor of a building, and you look out at your view, there is a recognition; the elevator you were just on cannot take you any higher. You have reached the limit available to you and you would need something else, something new, if you wanted to climb to new heights. This level is both ceiling and floor. Precisely at this point, you have reached all you are capable of, and yet it is potentially a springboard for you to soar. 

Such is the thought that crossed our minds as we assembled this issue on translation and transcreation. Here, we explore what it means to move beyond our chosen mediums. With three feature articles and 20 poems, our contributors venture into new dimensions of creating and consuming stories, when all we have known limits us. 

On Level 4:

Cinephile, data scientist and poet Joses Ho pro-wrestles with the politics behind subtitles. Zeroing in on Marvel’s Shang Chi and The Legend of the Ten Rings, he reflects upon the fractured worlds Hollywood creates in its attempts to translate a mother tongue. 

On Level 3:

Emerging translator and senior moderator of SingPoWriMo 2021, Ho Zhi Hui reveals the action-packed Translation Week. She shares with us the complexities of curating a week of prompts that would inspire poets to go beyond their language of choice, reading text in other languages and trying their hand at translation.

On Level 2:

Poet and embroidery empress Jennifer Anne Champion finds growth in unexpected realms. In this feature, she chronicles her experiences with transcreation and illustrates a glimpse of weaving poetry with embroidery. 

On Level 1:

Selected by our poetry editor Harini V, the poems you will read were drawn from both SingPoWriMo 2021 and SingPoWriMo’s Tamil charter. These pieces challenge the common ideas of translation. They go beyond the act of converting text from one language to another, by using another language as a tool to push the articulation of an idea, further than we thought we could. Harini’s picks shine a spotlight on some incredible poems that translate ideas and introduce us to poets who are bold enough to take on the challenge. 

Regardless of which level you click to explore first, you will eventually return to this foreword, a ground floor. On this surface of earth and reality, we acknowledge that our editorial work presently exists at a turning point for the Sing Lit community. As editors, writers and women, we bear witness and stand in solidarity with the people who have been disempowered and harmed. We are consciously reflecting on the roles we play, and our capacity to affect change within our community. 

Whether you’ve hit a ceiling or found new grounds to stand on, we hope you’ll remember to take care of yourself in creative, meaningful and nurturing ways. 

May you enjoy the view,  
Cheyenne Alexandria Phillips & Melizarani T.Selva

/ Melizarani T.Selva is a Malaysian writer and spoken word poet. To date, she has performed in six countries with notable performances at StoryFest Singapore, ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival and TEDxGateway. Her first book, Taboo is a poetic exploration of her Masters’ thesis on the constructs and representations of the Malaysian Indian Identity. Her poems have been translated in French and Bahasa Malaysia. Presently, she co-runs If Walls Could Talk: Poetry Open Mic, the Malaysia National Poetry Slam and has co-published an anthology of 100 poems by 61 poets from Malaysia titled When I Say Spoken, You Say Word!

/ Cheyenne Alexandria Phillips is a writer, performer, educator, and Associate Artist with Checkpoint Theatre. Her writing and performance credits include Vulnerable (2021), A Grand Design – an audio experience (2020), In The Twine (Singapore Writers Festival commission, 2018) and For The Record (Centre 42’s Basement Workshop Residency 2017). She has hosted eco-literary walks around MacRitchie Reservoir in collaboration with the Public Utilities Board (PUB) as part of Singapore Water Month 2018. Cheyenne’s writings can be found in QLRS, Contour: A Lyrical Cartography of Singapore (2019) and Who are you my country? (2018). She is also a licensed Tourist Guide.