Pira Sudham(1942 - )

•Born in a remote Esarnvillage in Thailand

•  First language Lao

•  Temple boy in Bangkok at 14

•  Thailand’s top university

•  Scholarship to New Zealand to study English

•  30-year odyssey through New Zealand,    Australia, Hong Kong, the UK, Germany, andSwitzerland 

•  Retired to a solitary life in his homevillage in 1997, helping needy students and teachers in a private school withfunds set up by himself

His Works

•Siamese Drama(later renamed Talesof Thailand)(1983) 

•People of Esarn(1987)

•Monsoon Country(1988)

•The Force of Karma(2002)

Essay based on an interview

uInterviewer: the author

uuInterviewees: a farmer and his wife

uuTopic: life in the country

lUrbanization and resistance?

llIndustrialization and the death of traditional handicrafts? 

llDevelopment and the loss of tradition?

•Colloquialism–

Small and simple words

Shortsentences

Straightforward language

•Figures of speech used to achieve vivid, expressive and appropriate description

–Simile

–Metaphor

–Personification

–Zeugma

•Simile:

…itis like aknife piercing my heart.

•Metaphor:

…this bag of bones dressed in rags canstill plant and reap rice from

 morning till dusk.

•Personification:

     Our piece of land is small, and it is nolonger fertile, bleeding year

 after year and, likeus, getting old and exhausted.

•Zeugma:

    The soil is not difficult to till whenthere is a lot of rain, but in a bad 

year, it’s not only the ploughsthat break but our hearts,too.

    More examples?