Tsering Namgyal Khortsa
Bhuchung D. Sonam is one of the most prolific poets, writers, and translators in the Tibetan diaspora. He has published nearly half a dozen books and edited two acclaimed anthologies of Tibetan writing: Muses in Exile: The Anthology of Tibetan Poetry, which appeared twenty years ago, and more recently, Under the Blue Skies: A Tibetan Reader.
He is also the publisher of the Dharamshala-based Blackneck Books, an imprint of TibetWrites, which has become an important platform for Tibetan writers, both young and old.
His nearly two-decade-long effort in promoting Tibetan writing was featured in The New York Times and earned him the prestigious Ostana Prize youth award for his translation work.
Sonam has now released his first collection of short stories, The Phallus, which consists of six short stories about Tibet and Tibetan life in both India and Tibet. The book can be read in just one sitting.
Like much of Tibetan fiction, or most fiction in general, the book is grounded in real stories and facts, particularly the history of China’s occupation of Tibet and the Tibetan exile in India. Bhuchung-la’s book, narrated in both first and third person, is largely autobiographical and based on true events.
In the title story, The Phallus, Sonam provides an account of his grandfather’s time in a Chinese labor camp in 1960, where, due to hunger, they were forced to eat worms out of their feces and later the carcass of a donkey when they found one.
“For a few days, fifty prisoners enjoyed the donkey, which not only kept them warm but also rejuvenated their emaciated bodies. However, they could not bite off its penis. They boiled it several times, but it remained rubbery and tough.”
The grandfather, a lama in a monastery, would later denounce the teachings of Buddha and praise the Party during his confession in order to be released.
The second story, Way of a Woman, recounts how a husband in Tibet decides to go on a journey against all advice and meets with an accident, drowning in a river along with his horse. The horse returns home without its rider. The widow shows no visible remorse, leading to various rumors in the village, but eventually sells all her horses and belongings and decides to become a nun. The husband, however, continues to appear in her dreams asking for his horses. In response, she says: “The dead have no rights.”
The third story, The Connection, is a remarkable piece of detective fiction. The author, while applying for his Indian Identity Certificate (IC)—a long and laborious process for Tibetans—is summoned by the police. He is questioned in connection with an old Indian Muslim friend from his college days, and based on his answers, they attempt to track the friend down. Later, the author reads in a newspaper that his friend was likely among those arrested as one of the masterminds behind the hijacking of an Indian Airlines plane from Nepal. “Five months later, my IC arrived. They had printed my name wrong.”
In Under the Shadow, Sonam takes readers on a journey to a Tibetan school in Manali where the principal, who has a penchant for religion, begins to chop down an old tree in the school courtyard to make way for a new Buddhist stupa. The author realizes that the tree was, in fact, planted by his grandfather, who may have once worked at the school. The author reflects on the life of trees and whether trees have souls. The story also touches on an aspect of Tibetan history in India that has rarely been discussed: the construction of roads by Tibetan refugees in the Himalayas during the 1960s and 1970s.
In News from Afar, the final story, a Tibetan refugee schoolboy recalls his life behind the Himalayas in Tibet as he retreats into the wilderness to read yet another letter informing him of a death in the family. “News of one death and then others, over the years, had hardened him somewhat,” Sonam writes. The story is filled with heartbreaking nostalgia. “Of all the things he missed about home, his grandmother’s stories and her homemade dried cheese topped the list. Elderly women he encountered often reminded him of his grandma, stirring memories of long evenings spent listening to her tales.”
When he hears of his father’s death from his uncle, tears roll down his cheek. “It was neither the intensity of sadness, nor the sharpness of his uncle’s narration, that prompted his eyes to flood. The tears were for his father’s youthfulness – a forty-two-year-old man, the head of a family, a good farmer.”
The book is full of anguish, dislocation, heartbreak, sadness, sacrifice, and above all, nostalgia for a time gone by. Most importantly, it expresses the lack of a home to call one’s own and the urge to use art and writing as a form of redemption.
Despite the somber themes, there is a lot of humor, especially dark humor, in the book, particularly in the title story. There is also a certain ingenuity and practicality in Bhuchung-la’s art that is refreshing. I especially liked the book’s format, which is perfectly suited for the Instagram age and can be savored in one or two sittings. Even after reading the book twice, I came away satisfied with the different facets of life in exile and Tibet that Bhuchung-la conjures in this slim but powerful volume.
What sets him apart as an author is his lack of authorial anxiety—he simply ends the story where it naturally ends and doesn’t feel the need to keep going if the narrative has concluded. His detailed and careful prose—his background as a poet shows—beautifully describes both nature and human expression. The book, which masterfully blends historical realities with personal narratives, evoking the hardships, nostalgia, and resilience of Tibetans, is a delight to read and is yet another important addition to the growing corpus of Tibetan writing in English.
(Views expressed are his own)
The author is the author of three books, including most recently Tibetan Suitcase: A Novel.
