Symbols
I can see that the use of Chinese characters and symbols has become a consistent practice in my books so far. That trend started with the use of symbols for "water" (
) and its different aspects in a poem in The Colours of Heroines, my first book. It's a practice that affirms my Chinese background, although I didn't particularly warm to learning Mandarin as a child. Nowadays, I have a very modest grasp of the Chinese language, but I've come to appreciate the æsthetic beauty of these symbols.
This is the ancient symbol that preceded the modern version (
). I chose it for the website because I'm partial to its integrated meaning: "heart/mind". So often, there's this schism between the heart and the mind, as if they are meant to be separated. I'm interested in the mind or consciousness that's informed by compassion, and its connection to emotional integrity.
This is the symbol for "contemplation". The more common connotation of this Chinese character is "thought", but when I used it in This Place Called Absence, I very much wanted to evoke the nuance of reflective thinking, to echo the "heart" embedded within
this character. I thought it was really wonderful that this symbol includes the symbol for field (
) and the symbol for heart/mind ().
This is an early representation of the present-day character (
) for "transformation". This was the way it was represented on oracle bones. The bones of turtles or cows would be burned through until they cracked and then the fissures deciphered in terms of an answer to the question posed. Interestingly, the two ren characters (humans) are placed head-to-toe. I find this quite a powerful image, open to many interpretations. I use this symbol in The Walking Boy for many purposes. I wanted to "mark" the novel with a symbol, as a way of signalling a core of meaning that I explore through both the plot and characters. I also chose to use this symbol as the tattoo that one of the primary characters in the novel is branded with.