Finding a distinctive voice through writing

By Faith Ng

Year 3, Theatre Studies and English Literature double major


FOR THE LOVE OF WRITING: Faith Ng

wo(men), a play written by Faith under the mentorship of playwright Huzir Sulaiman, will be the opening play at the NUS Arts Festival 2010. The play is a funny and poignant portrayal of a 'normal' HDB Singapore Hokkien family.

Like any freshman, I spent a great deal of time thinking about what I should major in after I 'survived' my very first semester in NUS. I panicked when I realised that I did not know what my next step should be. It threw me into a rather 'existential' deep hole- Why am I in NUS? What do I really want? Where do I go from here? I decided to spend my second semester doing only the modules which I was interested in as opposed to doing those which were mandatory.

It was during this time that I checked my NUS email and saw the application forms for the Introduction to Writing Prose Fiction and Introduction to Playwriting modules. “Why not?” I thought, “Sounds fun.” I put together a few of my previous writings and applied for them. By a stroke of good fortune, I managed to get into both modules.

During that semester, I was so involved in creating and writing various stories to the extent that I even dreamt of my characters when I was asleep. In conversations, I would think about what they would say or do. More importantly, I found friends who were just like me - hungry to explore, understand and express themselves through any medium, style and language - regardless of grammar, spelling errors and other writing 'rules'.

In writing, we could dig deep into our memories and replay, enhance or alter them. I talk as if writing instantaneously made us hopeless dreamers, but that is not true, for we became more aware of our bodies, the words we used, the world we live in and the events happening around us. I realised that I had a distinctive voice of my own; that I was passionate about certain issues and loathed certain topics. You could say I started to unearth my own sense of self.

During my first lesson of Introduction to Playwriting, our mentor, Huzir Sulaiman, gave us some advice to bear in mind. Students being students, everyone furiously scribbled it down. I do not remember everything he told us, but I do remember two of them and have lived by them even now: 1) Read as much as you can. Read books you usually would not read. Pick genres you usually would not pick. Broaden your mind. 2) Live. Live your life to the fullest. Go to the places that you have never gone before. Do the things that you have never done before. All these experiences will manifest themselves in your writing in one way or another. Have fun!