The write stuff

Two writers who have been named National Artists in the field of literature this year represent contrasting sensibilities of Thai letters. Life talks to Sopark Suwarn and Win Lyovarin

Tales of the exotic

Many Thai women last year daydreamed of romantic love like that between Arab military doctor Colonel Sharif and Asian-French teacher Michel De La Roni. They are the leading couple in the TV drama Fah Jod Sai (Where The Sky Meets The Sand). Back in 1986 and 1995, people were glued to the TV to witness love amidst wartime between the brave soldier Khun Krai and the young lady Dao Ruang before the fall of Ayutthaya in Sailohit (Heritage). For decades, many of the students who read the novel Pulakong have been inspired to contribute to the world like Pol Capt Sakorn (Khem) and social worker Supara (Nutoon) do.

All this happened due to the power of the pen. Novelist Sopark Suwarn wrote those three novels, and a hundred others, and her service to letters has just earned her the status of National Artist in the field of literature.

Sopark's trademark is that her novels are often set in foreign countries and her works reflect her ideology about love for the nation, family and righteousness.

"Novels set in foreign countries are the uniqueness of my work. But whether or not they can be good examples for other people is at their discretion. I am proud to have created works which are like my signature using my own knowledge and imagination," the 69-year-old author said.

Among her dozens of novels, Fah Jod Sai is her most famous — the story of romantic and patriotic love set in the desert of a fictional Arab kingdom. This classic has been published 23 times and became a popular TV drama series twice, and even a Broadway-style musical in 2007.

Sopark Suwarn — the pen name of Rampaipan Suwarnasarn Srisopark — is especially proud of her novel Sailohit, which is based on the fall of Ayutthaya due to the foes' guerrilla warfare. It was translated by Krittayawan Boonto and a team of editors and rewriters into English under the command of Her Majesty the Queen in 1996. The Queen gave copies of this limited edition to the heads of state of other countries hoping to reflect the deeply-rooted civilisation of Thailand.

Sopark has always had a very good memory. She loves reading and transforms her experience and feeling of what she sees and remembers into some of her works. Her favourite types of books are travel literature, world history and the biographies, especially of the Lord Buddha and Mahatma Gandhi. Her writing icons are her grandfather, Kun Parivat Warawijit (Pote Wasantasing), who wrote The Secret Of Balkan Peninsula, and her father, Sunthorn Suwarnasarn, who published several novels under the pen name, Kanasai Sunthorn.

The writer was born in Bangkok in 1944 to a diplomat father and an art-loving mother. As a girl, she followed her father to study in Myanmar for more than four years and returned to study at Assumption Convent School and Saint Joseph Convent School in Bangkok. She obtained a Bachelor of Science in music therapy (first-class honours) from Akademie Fur Musik Und Darstellende Kunst, University of Vienna, Austria, in 1964. She is the first and only Thai to obtain a bachelor's degree from that university and also the first Thai to study psychiatric music therapy.

After graduation, she married psychiatrist Dr Mongkol Srisopark and returned to Thailand and started working at Srithanya Hospital. She became the head of the psychiatric hospital's music therapy department as an expert in this field. She is now a widow and lives in the US with her three daughters and several grandchildren.

She began writing at the age of 11 and her first short story, My Best Friend, won an award and was published in Sarn Seri magazine. It was inspired by happy memories of her childhood when scores of schoolmates queued up every morning to read the next chapter of her novel written on the back of her notebooks.

In her teenage years, she wrote travel documentaries for the respected Or Sor Thor and Satrisarn magazines, including one about the official visit of Their Majesties the King and Queen to Austria in 1964.

At the age of 20, her short story, Siang Krasib Jak Rimhad (Whisper From The Sea), was published in Satrisarn and later turned into a radio drama series. A year later, her first two novels, Tawan Lub Fah (Sundown) and Kennaree Mayaree were published in Satrisarn. The former was also published as a book and turned into a Thai movie filmed in the US. Her most acclaimed novel Fah Jod Sai and another novel Rak Rae were published in Satrisarn and Kwan Ruen magazines when she was just 24.

So far, she has penned more than 100 books in genres including psychology, history, romantic love and comedy, as well as travel documentaries. Some of her works are based on true stories or are partly inspired by her happy childhood or her father's devotion to his diplomatic work despite hardships in the desert of Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

Her award-winning works include Pulakong, Sailohit, and Jodmai Theung Khunyai (Letters To Grandma) depicting the growth of her three daughters. In recent years, she has opted for a new theme about mental trauma suffered by war veterans, such as Chao Chai (The Prince), a novel about bio-chemical warfare. She loves all of her works equally since she has worked hard on all of them.

"Many more plots and details are waiting to be written down on paper," Sopark says, "The creation of characters depends on plots and themes. Whatever they are, I never forget my ideology to conserve righteousness, morality and goodness. I shall not give poison to readers but promote the sense of patriotism, love for all the three major institutions, and gratefulness."

What's your favourite genre of books?

I like world history and travel literature. I especially like stories from the Arab world.

What are your reading habits?

I read everything. I grew up reading books in the house, as well as greasy newspaper wrappers.

Do you remember the first book you read?

The Biographies of World's Famous Personalities. I think I was five.

Do you read for pleasure?

I have no time to read anything else except what I can use in my own writing.

- Pichaya Svasti

Universal truths

When other people are watching television, Win Lyovarin is writing his next best-selling novel. When they are drinking in bars, he's reading scientific research about the Big Bang and weaving a sci-fi tale. When he reads the news, he's plotting his next detective fiction. When he was still working in advertising, he wrote while eating lunch.

Over the past two decades or so, Win has produced more than 40 books. His first books Aphet Kamsuan and Samut Pok Dam Kab Baimai Si Daeng were published in 1994. His eminence as a writer of multiple genres has long been recognised by critics and awards — winning the SEA Write Award for Prachathipatai Bon Sen Kanan (Democracy, Shaken & Stirred), and Sing Mee Cheewit Tee Riak Wa Khon (That Living Thing Called Man) among many others.

The prolific writer has just been named a National Artist in literature, along with writers Mala Kamjan and Sopark Suwarn. But regardless of all the fame and recognition, Win persists in his exacting ways, ever cautiously, producing a remarkable average of four books a year since he left his day job and began writing full-time in 2003.

"I write every day, 365 days a year," says Win, sipping from a cup of green tea. "When I get bored I garden or go see a movie. In between those things, I'm always writing. When I'm sitting in a car, I'm thinking of a plot."

His garden is well-groomed, with a few little nooks tucked in shady areas, where the whispers of cascading water can be heard.

"If you want to survive on writing, you have to [publish consistently]. The books sales in Thailand aren't high. If I could sell as many books as a well-known foreign writer, I wouldn't have to write four books a year," Win says.

Because of the stamp of the SEA Write Award, Prachathipatai Bon Sen Kanan — essentially a history book of Thailand between 1932 and 1992 with an additional two fictional characters — on opposing sides, for fairness' sake — has been selling exceptionally well. But usually for the Thai book market, "a literary novel in Thai sells only 5,000 copies on average. Maybe almost 10,000 for a general fiction book", Win says.

After 16 years of writing on the side while working in advertising, he has built a name for himself and is able to live on the income from selling books alone. But that comes with necessary discipline — "if you can't produce, if you don't write, you'll starve".

This is where his versatility and boundless creativity comes in handy. He works on several projects at the same time, moving on to the next when he's stuck or bored with one, jumping from a detective story to a love story, then back again. He can write anywhere, anytime, and he's used to working with deadlines from his days in advertising.

"I don't write the first page till I have a solid framework. Sometimes I write the ending first. I guess it stems from my training in architecture," says Win, who studied architecture before spending a few years in New York working in a design firm. "I have to know what kind of house I'm going to build. I make an outline, a sketch. I might start with the second floor before the first, or I might start with the slanted roof," Win explains. He seems to have analysed himself and his own work process thoroughly.

Through his books, Win interests people in facts through works of fiction. He has a vast knowledge in science and history, the history of science and the science of history. His stories, across genres, explore the mechanism of humans through our heritage, culturally and scientifically.

He spends much of his time reading non-fiction texts on the universe and black holes, on physics and metaphysics, rather than general fiction novels whose plots, he claims, are contrived and predictable after the massive amount he's read. These science books are for entertainment, with the benefits of research. Reading keeps him questioning, he says.

On his interest in astrophysics, Win explains: "It's something to investigate, something very interesting that they don't teach in school. It seems so far removed from daily life. But how can you say that you know about human nature if you don't understand the universe and how we came about? How can we begin to explain human behaviour if we don't know that our atoms ultimately transpired from the Big Bang? We'd only be able to look at society from one angle, from the narrow perspective we have, from how we were raised."

Sing Mee Cheewit contains a collection of short stories that reflect on human conduct "through the origins of the universe", as Win describes. Through the lens of science, he brings up questions of nature versus nurture, proposes the influence of biology in determining moral codes and virtues a person lives by. Metaphysical and philosophical queries are ever present in his works.

He is working on a ghost novel, Prataid Pee Sing

(A Possessed Nation), a novel that uses the devices of a ghost story even though the "ghosts" in there are not really supernatural. In fact, it's a return to the start: when Win was 16, he wrote graphic pulp-novels with such titles as Haunted Mansion. He actually pitched science fiction, but the publishers said no and told him that the market demanded ghost stories. That was then, and maybe they still do now, though the meaning of ghosts might be different.

"I feel like it's an unfinished business. After 40 years, I'm writing a ghost story again, from a different perspective, with all my accumulated knowledge and experi ence." In the new novel, he uses elements of a ghost story to communicate deeper issues, like politics here as apparent in the title.

Achieving the title of a National Artist means Win will be receiving a modest monthly income, and it might boost sales momentarily, but the dismal state of readership in Thailand still won't afford him the time to write a long heavy novel, one like The Unbearable Lightness Of Being by Milan Kundera, or works by Herman Hesse, which Win loves and admires. He is pragmatic and critical.

Writing, while a delightful creative expression, is also a business, a source of income. And Thailand is not the best place for it.

"Here, it's not just that people don't read, but sometimes people read terrible books that are available in libraries all over the country. Like these sin absolution books. It's like planting poisonous seeds. People in Thailand are taught that reading is good — reading makes you smart. But then there are all these books misleading people, books by professors and doctors, which people read without discerning the credibility or the value," says the best-selling author.

"If you read bad books, I think you shouldn't read at all."

What books are on your bedside table?

Books on dharma by Bhudadassa Bhikku and other monks.

What are you reading now?

Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson, along with non-fiction books on science.

What are some books you've always wanted to read but haven't done so?

Lots of Haruki Murakami, like Norwegian Wood.

What are your favourite science fiction books?

Mostly books by Isaac Asimov and Arthur

C. Clarke. Especially 2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke and The Foundation Series by Asimov. I also like Robert Anson Heinlein.

- Pimrapee Thungkasemvathana