NVN Sunday: CANDLE GLOW IN UKRAINE AND HONG KONG
by C. J. Anderson-Wu
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We read books by candlelight whenever power is out after air raids We hold candles in the prohibited vigil for those nameless students killed more than three decades ago In the underground shelter we take turns to recite stories for one another At the park we mourn anonymously in order to protect one another We are in a war for our dignified identity We are in a war against the deprivation of memories By candlelight we relay ancestors' stories in our language By candlelight we pass on the history the regime is forcibly erasing We are in a war for hard-earned sovereignty We are in a war against thought control After the air raid alarm we briefly go home and our stories are to be continued As police approach we disperse into the night and our struggles drag on Reading, mourning, hiding and remembering with different forms of resistance we are in a war
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Author’s Notes:
The publishing industry in Ukraine experienced significant growth after the outbreak of the war, as reading became one of the few activities people could engage in during power outages caused by bombardments. Additionally, the invasion led the Ukrainian public to value their own culture, history, and language more deeply.
On June 4th each year, people in Hong Kong used to hold a candle vigil at Victoria Park for those who died during the Tiananmen Square Crackdown in 1989. However, since the implementation of the National Security Law by China in 2020, any event commemorating the slaughter of June 4th has become illegal. Several pro-democracy activists who persisted in continuing the vigil have been arrested and imprisoned without due process of law.
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C.J. Anderson-Wu (吳介禎) is a Taiwanese writer who has published two collections about Taiwan's military dictatorship (1949–1987), known as the White Terror: Impossible to Swallow (2017) and The Surveillance (2020). Currently she is working on her third book Endangered Youth—to Hong Kong. Her works have been shortlisted for a number of international literary awards including the Art of Unity Creative Award by the International Human Rights Art Festival. She also won the Strands Lit International Flash Fiction Competition, the Invisible City Blurred Genre Literature Competition, and the Wordweavers Literature Contest.