For subscribers
‘The last time so many people died in Singapore was WWII’: Poet Gwee Li Sui on his pandemic epic
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox
Look How We’ve Already Forgotten by Singaporean poet Gwee Li Sui contains over 150 short poems written in the thick of the Covid-19 pandemic.
PHOTOS: CHONG JUN LIANG, LANDMARK BOOKS
Follow topic:
SINGAPORE – Open Gwee Li Sui’s Look How We’ve Already Forgotten to any page and you are guaranteed to be whisked back to a surreal, forgotten time.
Not just a generic period of mask wearing, SafeEntry check-ins and daily monitoring of news, but something much more specific: The exact moment Phase One of Covid-19 restrictions turned into Phase Two, the mooting of the Singapore-Hong Kong travel bubble, when panda Le Le was born despite it all, and when the Singaporean poet himself tested positive for the coronavirus while watching newsreels of Russia’s shock invasion of Ukraine.
