Bright by Duanwad Pimwana

Abstract

Reviewed by: Bright by Duanwad Pimwana Janit Feangfu BRIGHT, by Duanwad Pimwana, translated from Thai by Mui Poopoksakul. San Francisco: Two Lines Press, 2019. 184 pp. $16.95 paper; $8.99 ebook. Bright, written in 2002 by contemporary Thai novelist Duanwad Pimwana and translated in 2019 by Mui Poopoksakul, portrays the life of a five-year-old boy named Kampol in a working-class community on the east coast of Thailand. After a violent argument between his parents leaves him abandoned, Kampol is watched over by his various neighbors in a tenement house belonging to Mrs. Tongjan. The original Thai title, Changsamran, translates as “joy” and is the family name of Kampol. Poopoksakul’s translation of the name and title as “bright” instead of “joy” shifts the focus from an emotion to a description of the main character’s personality and spirit. Despite this change, by the time readers finish the novel, they will realize that joy scattered throughout dark, sad incidents is a major part of the story. Poopoksakul introduces readers to the world of Kampol with a map of Mrs. Tongjan’s community and a list of primary characters at the beginning of the book. This visual opening and the brief descriptive list give the context of a close-knit working-class community and transport readers to an unfamiliar place inhabited by characters who find joy in their predicaments and the mundanity of their hand-to-mouth lives. Poopoksakul brilliantly captures the precision of Pimwana’s style and the core of her novel from the opening sentence of the prologue: “The mundane has a hard time showing off its quiet allure” (p. 3). The prologue fuses a gentle touch of magical and social realism by having an unnamed woman from Mrs. Tongjan’s “ethereal house” climb on to the roof to look out over the tenement neighborhood with a bird’s-eye view (p. 5). On the third evening, “No one knows if she slipped off the roof or if she jumped” (p. 5). Pimwana’s expert hand establishes a whimsical yet realistic portrayal of a working-class community and invites the readers to follow along, look, and listen. Bright unfolds with an empathetic narrator who focalizes through the eyes of Kampol yet also observes the community from a narrative distance. The narrator’s delivery gives readers the autonomy to hear and interpret the voices of working-class Thai people at their best, worst, and everything in between. An early chapter, “Monopoly,” the longest one in the novel, lays the groundwork for the subsequent short episodes by showing that everyone in the community is involved with Kampol’s predicament. It presents Kampol metaphorically as a game piece being moved around his neighborhood by the dice of his neighbors’ good intentions. Their actions quickly become competitive kindness before souring once everyone realizes that Kampol will be in the care of the community for longer than [End Page 370] expected. Even so, the chapter ends with the giggling sound of Kampol and his friend, excited for their sleepover after the adults’ retreat to their respective apartments following a heated argument. Poopoksakul has done justice to the world that Pimwana created in Bright, accurately conveying the psychological complexities of her characters and contradictions in Thai society. The translator’s cultural sensitivity, keen perception, and creativity preserve the subtext embedded in the cultural background, characters’ conversational strategies, and the language itself. Her handling of personal pronouns and honorifics serves as a good example. Thai has a large number of these words that depend on relationships between speakers, their place in the social hierarchy, differing situations, and even emotional states. The nuance conveyed by these varying registers is not easily replaced by the personal pronouns available in English. Poopoksakul has done an exceptional job handling the translation with a precision and creativity that helps readers see beyond the surface of what is being said. Her explanations of proper nouns, Thai words left in the text, and complex cultural and linguistic situations enhance the readers’ experience. In an example from the chapter “Crickets,” Kampol receives two pairs of crickets to raise for potential income, but he names them and keeps them as pets instead...