Translational Aesthetics: Asian Transnationalism and Wena Poon's Chang'An: A Story of China and Japan

Abstract

This article examines the vision of Asian transnationalism depicted in Chang'An: A Story of China and Japan (2016) by Singapore‐born writer Wena Poon. Informed by theories about transnationalism, particularly Laura Doyle's notion of inter‐imperiality and Kuan‐Hsing Chen's suggestion of ‘Asia as method’, which privilege dialectical method and inter‐referencing, I analyse Poon's portrayal of multilingual subjects in her sprawling, multi‐plot novel premised on the fictionalised, translated diary of a Manchurian‐born, Japanese imperial army doctor who passed for Chinese following Japan's defeat in World War II. Crucial to her investment in a historically grounded Asian transnationalism is Poon's translational aesthetic emphasising translation as both practice and trope. Translation between languages is depicted as fraught yet necessary for inter‐cultural understanding and ethical memorialisation. At the same time, material conservation inspired by and functioning as a form of translation also becomes the productive site for an Asian transnationalism that affirms translocal affiliations and cultural commonality.