TBR (To Be Read): Dream small, or why indie magazines and poetry pamphlets matter

SINGAPORE – In 1838, German composer Robert Schumann compiled a set of 13 piano pieces, Scenes From Childhood, each around one page in length. He told his wife Clara Schumann, also a composer, that they were “small, droll things” – music inspired by her comment that he sometimes seemed “like a child”.

The papaya-green pamphlet before me, containing 13 poems, is Singaporean writer Zhang Ruihe’s Small Droll Things. Zhang is referencing the Schumanns, although I wonder if she is also gesturing to the pamphlet form – small enough to slip in the pocket, droll enough to while away a bus ride.