Best Storyteller
Shin Yu Pai’s Obsessions
by Micco Caporale (MA 2018)
Illustrations by Dani Knight
The rhythm of Shin Yu Pai's (MFA 1999) heart is poetry.
Growing up as the daughter of Taiwanese immigrants, she felt self-conscious writing prose. Poetry offered a lingual flexibility that defied strict grammar and allowed her to make images through text. Today she has 13 poetry books to her name, including the fall release Less Desolate, a collection of haiku comics made with artist Justin Rueff that explores quiet moments that bring calm amidst literal and figurative noise. Making poems for more than 25 years has helped Pai cultivate a varied, interdisciplinary practice that has included elements of museology, photography, filmmaking, and journalism. Today she's the host of NPR's Ten Thousand Things, a podcast where she uses everyday objects and interviews to tell stories about Asian American life. Below are some of her current obsessions.
90s Music
Music has always been important to me. When I was a kid, I wanted to be a music journalist, and I used to follow new wave bands and read music and style magazines like Spin, Rolling Stone, and The Face. Labor Day weekend in Seattle, I got to see this Brit pop shoegaze band I loved as a teenager called Ride at Bumbershoot. That rekindled my passion for live music. Andy Bell of Ride went on to be the bassist for Oasis. It's just interesting to follow those little musical networks and influences. I've been going deep revisiting those kinds of bands as well as learning a lot of local history about the ‘80s and ‘90s Seattle music scene.
Voice
I sang for a long time, so I think a lot about my relationship to the voice—on the page as well as the one I use on public radio and in performances. What is voice? What is an authentic voice? How does one embody authenticity through their voice? A public radio voice that always captures my attention is David Sedaris (BFA 1987). I have a particular fondness for Santaland Diaries and his rendition of Billie Holiday, and he's probably what got me listening to This American Life. I'm fascinated by singers that don't have the best singing voices—Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, or vocalists that speak/sing like Leonard Cohen.
Somatic Writing
Earlier this year, I started a somatic writing practice with my dear friend Tonya Lockyer, who's an internationally renowned choreographer and movement artist. We do movement together to get us—well, me especially—more in the body so I am not just writing from the neck up. It's deeply changed my awareness of time and helped me connect more to my senses. My ability to understand the body and space has transformed the poems I'm writing. I'm also thinking more about how space choreographs the individual and how that influences our relationships to public space, public art, and sacred spaces.
Australian Literature
I took a two-week trip to Melbourne this fall, so I've been reading a lot of Australian writers who are new to me. Jessica Au has this really wonderful novella called Cold Enough for Snow. It's about a daughter who takes a trip with her mother and the intimacy and mystery of making and excavating memories with someone you love. I'm also enjoying a book called City of Trees by Sophie Cunningham, which is an essay collection that uses trees as a recurring motif. ■
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