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The post-colonial novel: an interview with Tash Aw.

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PIB: To what would you attribute the immediate and considerable enthusiasm that the appearance of your first novel elicited both in Britain and overseas?

TA: The idealist in me wants to believe that it is because publishers and readers alike are excited to discover innovative writing, particularly that which has its roots in non-Western cultures. Nowadays Western literary culture--particularly the Anglo-American publishing world--often feels jaded and cynical, and I would like to think that readers are moved by the idea that there still exists fiction that is not smug or parochial. I'd like also to think that my book does something entirely different from the other books that originate from Asia, that it hints at the vast areas into which fiction can venture. However, the realist in me knows that at least part of the attraction of my book is precisely that it can be marketed in this way, that certain people attach a certain novelty value to it. I try to ignore this--it is not a writer's job to get involved in the packaging and selling of the book.

PIB: The focus of The Harmony Silk Factory (1) is chiefly on events in the early 1940s, shortly before the Japanese invaded British Malaya. Yours is an English novel. What was the language of communication in the Kinta Valley in the 1940s and would people there tend to use English as their language of communication?

TA: Almost certainly it would have been a mixture of Chinese dialects, Hokkien, Haka, and Malay. The Chinese would have been able to speak all three languages, but the Malay probably did not speak Chinese. There were very few better-educated people who would tend to use English to talk to each other. They would have been bilingual. The same situation applies today too.

PIB: So would you say that English, then as now, would be the marker of social advancement?

TA: Yes, exactly.

PIB: How do you speak to your own family?

TA: I speak to them in a mixture of Chinese and English. We never talk to each other in Malay, even though I speak Malay just as well as Chinese, and Malay is the national language. We would, however, always use English for written correspondence.

PIB: Where do you see the main concern of The Harmony Silk Factory?

TA: A richly textured story that works well, intriguing, exciting, and moving without being too self-conscious about the need to promote local characters. When I started out I wanted to make sure that the entire cast of characters was Asian. That is the complete reverse of...

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