A renowned writer and poet from Taiwan, Tzemin Ition, is serialising his autobiographical fiction. Part one , the Foreword, as Special Feature,  exclusively for Different Truths .

Foreword

My hometown, Taiwan, located in the west of the Pacific Ocean, is a beautiful island with picturesque scenery.

In the 1950s, it was an agricultural society. At that time, the family economy was generally poor. However, in rural areas, life was simple and there were not so many complicated things in modern society.

He was born in a backward but simple fishing village near the sea in southern Taiwan.

The stories told in this novel collection all happened here. The male lead in the story is a young boy, named Tzemin Tsai who suffered from Asperger’s syndrome and Fantasy symptoms. He was born in a backward but simple fishing village near the sea in southern Taiwan. Most of the residents here live on fishing and the economic conditions are generally poor. Almost every household must carefully calculate the daily expenses.

The child who is guilty of “Asperger’s disease” is not good at making friends. Often, the whole day, do not say a word, such as being isolated from the world and unable to escape. In the formal education system, such children were often regarded as developmental deletion or mental retarded with IQ problems. In the processes of growing up were often subject to discrimination in the social environment at the time. Tzemin just belongs to this category of children who “live in a glass bottles and could not escape”.

…after growing up, the little boy recalled the past and the growth process. He wrote this book in the first person.

Fortunately, the little boy met a pair of well-meaning and kind parents. Under their careful cares, the children like Zemin were able to take a breather moderately on the road of life. However, after growing up, the little boy recalled the past and the growth process. He wrote this book in the first person. There are filled with the fantasy of this little boy and the yearning sensations about parents, relatives, and classmates in this book.

In this book, the young boy’s growth stage is cut into four sections, each of which can be regarded as an independent short story, which can be read separately. The individual articles are related to each other, so they can also be linked into a long novel, and the main axis of these stories is the Illusions of Tzemin’s life.

There are realistic profound depictions about the little boy who is innocent and ignorant, but has an “angel heart” by nature, how to sustain the wide variety of trials of growth.

In the first section, it describes the interesting stories of Tzemin’s early childhood, especially during his study time at kindergarten. In total, “Only No. 1”, “My Angel Hen”, ” The Duckling, A Life from the Paddy Fields” and ” The Selling Busker” are included. There are realistic profound depictions about the little boy who is innocent and ignorant, but has an “angel heart” by nature, how to sustain the wide variety of trials of growth.

The second section, with the largest number of articles, is based on the interaction stories between the boy, his teachers and classmates during the elementary school to the middle school. There are ten stories in total in this section. Namely, “Two Teachers”, “Bug Crisis”, “Our Secret Base”, “Snake! Snake! Snake!”, “Pig Testicles”, ” Little Minds Think”, “The Bride”, “Hertz Tactical Planning”, “An Amazing Journey on a Small Train” and “Surrounded by Dangers”. All of them are full of memories and fun.

The third section describes the story of the boy’s family.

The third section describes the story of the boy’s family. There are “The Moonlight Bird”, ” Blood-Meat, Sea Rice Flour and Bird Lime”, ” My Grandfather’s Shouting “, ” Drowning “, “Rubik’s Cube”, etc. Introducing the boy’s family to the reader, the family is almost equal to the whole inner feelings of the boy, especially his parents.

The fourth section describes what the young boy saw and heard from he went to high school until he came out of the society, accepted the baptism of society and humanity, and finally became a university teacher. It contains “The Murder”, ” Those People In Chiayi Winery”, “My Silent Angel”, “Keep Going”, ” The Fifth Lane”, ” My Little Tai-Chi” and ” The Multi-hearted Man”.

Yes, the little boy in the story has grown up, the little boy has grown old, and the little boy is still looking for the “angel heart” in society. I hope this is a work full of love. More hopeful, its poetic and picturesque purity, through the depiction of words, can be maintained forever and completely, rejecting any pollution.

(To be continued)

©Dr Tzemin Ition Tsai

Photos from the Internet