On Friday 25th of November, we had an exciting visit from poet Mary Jean Chan, writer of Flèche, an award winning poetry collection and set text for our Year 13 English Literature students. Chan, a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at Oxford Brookes University, read from Flèche, as well as additional poems from their upcoming work. They answered questions from an engaged group of students, who were inspired by Chan’s work.
Chan spoke about the importance of language, particularly owing to their own experience of growing up in Hong Kong, speaking Cantonese at home and learning English at school. They said that “English was always the language of school, not the language of family; it created a safe space for me to explore my queerness.”
This is reflected in their poems, for example, ‘//’, called “Chopsticks” when read aloud on account of the visual appearance of the title, the significance of chopsticks in Chinese culture, and the associations of chopsticks with pairings: a key concern of the collection. Chan explained that their love of language stemmed from its ability to bring together different aspects of their identity, which was very inspiring to listen to and provided a particularly valuable contextual background for our coursework pieces. In addition, their discussion of homoeroticism in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night was exciting for Year 12 students who are currently studying the play, and Chan’s unique and enthusiastic perspective on it was relevant and insightful.
We all left the talk feeling very lucky to hear Chan discuss their work and to ask them questions, and especially grateful to hear some of their next collection.
Annie, Year 13