Sarah's Reading Biography

When I was a child, my mother used to take me and my siblings to the library on weekends. I recall gleefully filling the basket with books from my favourite series at the time, “Amelia Bedelia.” It was about a maid (the title character), who often got into trouble with her employers because she took their instructions too literally. When she was told to “dress the chicken,” she would put clothes on it instead, and adorn the steak with lace trimmings when told to “trim the fat”. However, no matter how angry her employer got at her ignorance, all would be forgiven once she had a taste of Amelia’s lemon meringue pie. Upon hindsight, I probably enjoyed the series so much because I was often getting into trouble myself at that age for being “blur,” and the thought of everyone forgiving you so easily for your mistakes appealed to me greatly. “Amelia Bedelia” probably also sowed the seeds of my life-long obsession with lemon meringue pie.

In Primary school, I loved reading so much that I joined the library CCA. The perks included being allowed to borrow more books, enjoying air-conditioned comfort in the afternoons and being in charge of stamping the Date Due on books being borrowed. I enjoyed books by Enid Blyton, especially her “Malory Towers” and “St. Clare’s” series, which painted such a rosy picture of boarding school (complete with midnight feasts and sneaking out to the town at night). However, one of the series that had the biggest impact on me was probably “Animorphs.” The language was simple and dynamic, with sound effects (of lasers and animal roars, no less) being literally spelt out as “TSEW! TSEW!” and filled with (now horribly dated) pop culture references. It was basically about a bunch of teenagers who were given the power to transform, or “morph” into animals by a good alien, in order to battle the evil aliens who had come to invade Earth. The series was fairly daring for its time, as it put a time limit on the kids’ powers, (which if they exceeded, they would remain that animal permanently) and even had the gall to have their initial mission to defeat the evil aliens end disastrously, with one of the kids being stuck as a hawk for (almost) all time by the end of the first book. The series went on to span 54 books (of which I stopped after 30+, because some of the ghostwriters were just too terrible), and remained true to its unorthodox roots by killing off one of main teenage protagonists at the finale. One thing about “Animorphs” that really resonated with me was that despite its seemingly simple premise, it challenged the reader’s notions of “good” and “evil,” and portrayed all the ambiguities that lay in between the two.  

 During Secondary school, I was introduced to the magical realm of Fantasy by my sister. Unlike many others my age, my first foray into the genre wasn’t influenced by Harry Potter, but instead by Mercedes Lackey’s “Heralds of Valdemar” series.  Come to think of it, the series was pretty obviously pandering to typically angsty girls (like myself) since it featured ordinary individuals (mostly teens) being Chosen by Companions (telepathic pretty white horses), developing magical powers and being called upon to serve the kingdom as Heralds (medieval policemen). It was also the first series I read which featured a homosexual male protagonist, and would bash the reader over and over in the head with the message that “being gay is ok.” I also enjoyed some of the texts we read in school for Literature lessons, including “The Silver Sword” by Ian Serraillier and “Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry” by Mildred D. Taylor, which will always remain the book which first really opened my eyes to the evils of racism and prejudice.

In Junior College, I struggled with the Literature texts we had to deal with at first, especially Evelyn Waugh’s satire, “Decline and Fall.” The problem was that our class could not really pick out the irony and dry humour in the situations and characters, so much of the book fell flat for us in the beginning. Things were made even worse when our teacher tried to explain why it was funny, as everybody knows, once a joke is explained, it loses most of its humour. Still, he persevered, and one day, out of the blue, everything just clicked into place. In fact, I had a hate-hate relationship with most of my prescribed JC texts at first: John Donne, Sylvia Plath, “Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf,”… However, when I recited Donne’s poems over and over in order to memorise quotes for the exams, I actually started to appreciate his work more. I was also exposed to some wonderful plays, as a result of doing Theatre Studies and Drama. My favourite were the Greek tragedies, “Oedipus Rex” and “The Oresteia.” Though the language seemed ponderous and alien at first, once we did choral readings in class and watched some videos, the scenes appeared much more vividly in my mind, and I reveled in the plays.  


Just like many others, University days saw a decline in my reading habits. I had enough trouble reading the assigned texts as it was, much less read for pleasure! Although some may find him tedious or overly dramatic, I really enjoyed reading Thomas Hardy’s “Tess of the d'Urbervilles” and “Jude the Obscure.” And to some extent, I enjoyed them exactly because they played out like what would in modern times be a Korean drama. I was disappointed that the Sci-fi & Fantasy module was no longer offered during my time, but thankfully “The Gate’s to Women’s Country” and “Glory Season” from the Utopia & Dystopia module did not disappoint. In terms of 18^th century women’s literature, I preferred some of Jane Austen’s more obscure works like “Northanger Abbey” and Elizabeth Inchbald’s “A Simple Story.” I especially loved the first chapter of “Northanger Abbey,” where it set up Catherine Morland as character who was refreshingly quite plain in looks, ordinary in talent and had never suffered any particular trauma and/or hardship, as a way of turning the conventions of the 18^th century novels on their head.