Lolita Hu on TDM Talk Show: “Embrace the confusion of life”
Macau’s first literary festival kicked off this week and
Lolita Hu was one of the many top notch writers invited to participate
in ‘The Script Road’.
Originally from Taiwan, Hu writes about the
meaning of modernity in the context of urban life and the constant
struggle for identity living anonymously in the city.
Also the
former editor for big-name men’s magazines such as Esquire, Playboy and
Maxim, Lolita Hu was on the TDM Talk Show this week to talk about her
life as a writer, her traveling experiences as a global citizen and her
shifting identity as an Asian woman.
“I really enjoy the event just
because, although I did live in Hong Kong before and I came to visit
Macau several times before as a tourist, I never really had a chance to
get in contact with the Portuguese community here,” said Hu on her first
international literary festival.
Calling the Portuguese writers she
met in Macau a ‘big underground world hiding under a casino world’, Hu
said Taiwan and Portugal have a unique connection.
“Taiwan and
Portugal in some way are both so-called ‘small countries’, under the
shadow of bigger countries. So when we talk about the advantage or
disadvantage of being a small country writer, we totally can relate.”
With this connection, Hu said she sometimes prefers Portuguese writers over others.
“For
example as a smaller country, the good thing is we are curious about
other cultures, we learn and try to adapt and observe other people. For
big society writers, they tend to look to their own culture and own
country, they don’t speak other languages and they don’t really look
outside,” said Hu.
The ‘Asian Lolita’
Hu
wasn’t born with the name Lolita. She took on the name when she
graduated from the National Taiwan University and became the editor for
Taiwan’s Esquire Magazine.
“I kind of challenged people and said ‘call me Lolita if you dare’,” said Hu.
As far as she’s concerned, being ‘Lolita’ has its perks.
“It’s interesting – how you react to the name shows more about you and not about me,” said Hu.
After taking the name, Hu went on to be the editor for Esquire, Playboy and Maxim in Taiwan.
Working as a female editor for a men’s magazine, Hu said, also has its perks.
“I
always try to make those cover girls feel more comfortable. I will try
to give more dignity to the girls. And one thing I will try to do is to
use older models too – which is I guess something the male editor
wouldn’t do. I am more like a spy hiding on the other side, I’ll observe
the men’s ‘rules’, but (sometimes I can change the reality a little
bit),” said the writer.
The traveler
Having worked and lived in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing, Paris, New York and now in Japan, Hu is no doubt a ‘city girl’.
As torturous as city life can be, Hu wouldn’t trade it for anything else. She wrote it all in her first book ‘The Traveler’.
“In
the era of so called globalization (… ) I want to write a book about
that. Who I am, what I am doing – and when I am traveling around the
world, what’s my relationship with the world like? ”
And that book was Hu’s quest to break out of the ‘Chinese identity’.
“I
wrote that book, and then suddenly I tried to cross the border. For
Chinese people, especially Chinese in China – they have to be Chinese,
Chinese first (…) then I’m a woman, then I’m daughter.” Hu continued.
“But in modern society, the priority is reversed. I have to be a human
being, I have to be a woman, then I’m a Jazz fan, and then I’m a writer,
and then I’m a daughter, and so on. Then I am (Chinese). I call it
modernity. You are allowed to have individual identity first before you
become this big collective one.”
When asked if she has found her own individual identity, Hu said not having one is the biggest blessing.
“Being
confused, [not knowing] who you are, to have no clue, is a normal
status for modern human beings. We should be confused, because there is
so [much] information out there, there’s internet, there’s TV there’s
everything – every day you see someone, there are so many strangers
floating around you and you are strangers to other people. Every day is
exhausting, but it’s also called freedom – because you have to navigate
on your own.”
So for Hu, the way to deal with it all – is to embrace the confusion.
原文網址:
http://www.macaudailytimes.com.mo/macau/33430-Lolita-TDM-Talk-Show-Embrace-the-confusion-life.html