{"id":1863,"date":"2015-01-19T19:04:47","date_gmt":"2015-01-19T18:04:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/?p=1863"},"modified":"2015-05-20T15:34:21","modified_gmt":"2015-05-20T14:34:21","slug":"review-of-tan-twan-eng-event-by-jessica-wortley","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/?p=1863","title":{"rendered":"Review of Tan Twan Eng event <h6>by Jessica Wortley<\/h6>"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Acclaimed novelist Tan Twan Eng joined William Fiennes at Newcastle University on 3rd December, to discuss and read an excerpt from his latest book<em> The Garden Of Evening Mists<\/em>, which was long-listed for the Man Booker Prize.<\/p>\n<p>Set in Malaya, <em>The Garden Of Evening Mists<\/em> tells the story of retired judge Teoh Yun Ling as she attempts to come to terms with her past, as the sole survivor of a prisoner of war camp, where she was held &#8216;as a guest of the emperor&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>There are many strong themes running throughout the novel, the most central of which is memory, with the garden serving as a metaphor for this, &#8216;all of us&#8230;who we are&#8230;we are made of our memories. What are we without memories?&#8217;<\/p>\n<p>A warm and thought provoking speaker, Tan refused to be drawn on characters&#8217; actions, saying, instead, that the reader must make up their own mind. On his characters&#8217; morals, he said simply, &#8216;it&#8217;s more interesting to read and write about unlikeable characters, than to write about a character who is perfect&#8230; that&#8217;s real life. Except for me, nobody here is perfect!&#8217;<\/p>\n<p>His views on the north east were evident &#8216;Newcastle is so beautiful&#8230;the people are so friendly!&#8217; Let&#8217;s hope that means he comes back soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Acclaimed novelist Tan Twan Eng joined William Fiennes at Newcastle University on 3rd December, to discuss and read an excerpt from his latest book The&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1838,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1863"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1863"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1863\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1865,"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1863\/revisions\/1865"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1838"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/archive.nclacommunity.org\/content\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}