Combining traditional storytelling with theatrical experiment, Epic Poem of Malaya presents a kaleidoscopic vision of a society in flux. In a constantly shifting stage environment, a multi-generational cast unfolds an expansive, big-hearted story of Singapore seen from the sea.
A boy leaves Singapore for life on the South China Sea. He loves it, but history has other ideas. In a 1956 painting by the artist Chua Mia Tee, a passionate young man is declaiming a vision of the future; and there isn’t much room in it for sea nomads.
Then there’s you. Somewhere in your experience, whether you know it or not, you carry the hopes of an earlier time, a dream of freedom, and a map of the Riau Archipelago.
Epic Poem of Malaya is the story of an island, but it is also a story about people: how they remember, what they forget, and how they shape and are shaped in turn by the place they live.
