Commonwealth

Theophilus Kwek
Paperback, 104 pages
9781800174832

One of Singapore’s oldest public housing estates, the name “Commonwealth” also gestures to the long tail of the British Empire and still-potent dreams of equitable distribution. Theophilus Kwek’s Commonwealth uncovers rich seams of history, replete with conquests, tragedies and shared visions of the future. Taking its starting-point as the massive Bukit Ho Swee fires of the 196os – an event as deeply seared into the history of the poet’s family as the nation’s own – Commonwealth traces the dislocations and relocations that have come before it, and in its wake.

Theophilus’s earlier poetry collections dealt with questions of personal rootedness and larger-scale displacement. With his signature adeptness in poetic form, Theophilus embarks on a new departure with Commonwealth, drawing on a wide array of documentary and oral history sources to address upheavals of individual and collective lives within our densely populated city.