SOURCE: “The ‘Second Tongue’ Myth: English Poetry in Polylingual Singapore,” in Ariel: A Review of International English Literature, Vol. 15, No. 4, October, 1984, pp. 41-65.

In the following essay, Gordon traces the history of bilingual literature in Singapore and surveys the poetry of Thumboo, Lee Tzu Pheng, and Arthur Yap.

“It is unlikely that art forms indigenous to Singapore will be developed in the near future.”

—Lee Kuan Yew in interview with Agence French Presse, 22 June 1979.

“Every developing country has instituted some program, overtly or covertly, to repress minority languages in the guise of achieving unity.”

—R. Gunther Kress and R. Hodge, Language as Ideology (London: 1979), p. 141.

“Poetry as we have known it can be defined as the individual refracted through social convention. The poetry of the New Faith can, on the contrary, be defined as social convention refracted through the individual temperament. That is why the poets most adapted...