The Bagri Foundation presents The Bottom Drawer, a series of interviews with writers and journalists that explores their early efforts, inspiration and current projects.
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This is the fourth in the series, an interview with writer Nguyẽ̂n Phan Quế Mai - author of A New York Times Editor’s Choice book The Mountains Sing - interviewed by Bagri Foundation's Head of Arts, Chelsea Pettitt on 19 August 2020.
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Born in North Việt Nam in 1973, Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai grew up in the last years of the war and witnessed its devastation on her country. She moved to South Việt Nam at the age of six and worked as a street seller and rice farmer before winning a scholarship to attend university in Australia.
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She is the author of eight books of poetry, fiction and non-fiction published in Vietnamese, and her writing has been translated and published in more than 10 countries, most recently in Norton’s Inheriting the War anthology. Her work has received the Hanoi Writers Association ‘Poetry of the Year’ Award (2010). She lives with her family in Jakarta.
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Chelsea and Quế Mai discuss her early years and its influence on her love of poetry, the Vietnam war, the impact on her family and the importance of empathy in the modern world. A truly fascinating insight into the making of The Mountains Sing and success over adversity.
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