A letter to Les
Mike Freeman
The Australian poet Les Murray remembered
Category: Free to read
Shifting sands
Tim Pelling
Sand, once inexhaustible, is disappearing faster than ever
Quiet cruelties
Preeta Samarasan
Moral standards should not depend on public opinion
A judicial killing
Teerapon Anmai
When reading books was deadly
Kun Khmer
Robert Starkweather
Thai fighters are once again Kun Khmer’s number-one foil
Back to democracy
Tyrell Haberkorn
Five years after the coup, Thais go to the polls
Missing in Adelaide
Mina Bui Jones
A world music festival in Australia skips Asia
Mixed model
Tran Le Thuy
Be wary of Vietnam’s hybrid economic model
Anti-university
Thongchai Winichakul
Thai universities are no longer places of learning
Direct line
Paul Wedel
Tracing the career of Anand Panyarachun
Culture shock
Pim Wangtechawat
Thailand’s problematic relationship with hip-hop
Comforting truths
Theophilus Kwek
The stories Singaporeans tell themselves
Robert Turnbull (1957–2018)
Aaron Carpene
Music was his passion and his legacy
Monsoon Saigon
Jake Lloyd Jones
The monsoon is the most poetic of seasons
Justice at last
Alex Hinton
For all its imperfections, the Khmer Rouge tribunal has delivered where it counts
Wall of sound
Cuong Pham
The multilingual, multicultural beats of Vietnamese musician Linh Ha
Incomplete decolonisation
Prabhakar Singh
The curious case of Chagos
Champa gems
William B. Noseworthy
Finally, a book to showcase the best of Cham art
Interviewing Mahathir
Ben Wilson
Interviewing Mahathir’s interviewer
Rich experience
Pim Wangtechawat
Watching others enjoying Crazy Rich Asians was as enjoyable as watching the film itself
True believer
Carlyle A. Thayer
Bui Tin (1927–2018) fought against the French, the Americans and, in the end, his Communist comrades
Cubes of Heaven
Mark Robinson
Japan’s kintsuba sweetshops blend informal spontaneity with old-world elegance
Nostalgia for Ayutthaya
Pim Wangtechawat
It has been fashionable for Thais to visit the old capital Ayutthaya
Hanoi after the war
John Ramsden
The Vietnam of 1981 was a very different place
Looking for Bao Ninh
Michael Karnavas
In 1994, Michael Karnavas went in search of the great Vietnamese writer
Farewell, sweet sodomy
Ann Lee
A generation of Malaysians have grown up on a rotten law
Curb your enthusiasm
Hun Sen's Eye
Don’t fall prey to dangerous, undemocratic and possibly traitorous pessimism!
Roh Hoe-chan (1956–2018)
Geoffrey Cain
Roh Hoe-chan campaigned stoically against corruption
Ramen dreams
Mark Robinson
Finding a daytime high in a perfect bowl of hot noodles
Stationed in Myanmar
Nick Freeman
Over 860 stations operate on what’s now known as the Myanmar Railways network
Vote early, vote often
Hun Sen's Eye
As Cambodia goes to the polls, here are seven surefire tips for a fun-filled election day.
Four generations
Sharon W.H. Ling
A family scattered by politics
Covering Up Violence
Pim Wangtechawat
The #DontTellMeHowDress exhibition challenges Thai attitudes to gender violence.
Gilgit-Baltistan
Kit Yeng Chan
Pakistan’s mountainous north
Contami-Nation
Parthiban Muniandy
The impurity of blended cultures is what makes Malaysian food — and society — unique.
Fried and fabulous
Pim Wangtechawat
Aharn sin kid— “the meal we fall back on when we can’t think of anything else to eat.”
Return to the Archetype
Hassan Abd Muthalib
Malaysia’s electoral narrative conforms to a universal storyline.
Up-market
Nick Freeman
Once the beating heart of commerce in Myanmar, wet markets are under threat
Street artistry
John Ramsden
Bùi Xuân Phái, perhaps the artist of his generation, struggled for acceptance and paint in Vietnam.
Walking the talk
Marina Mahathir
Malaysia’s opposition delivered a startling victory in May’s elections by going house-to-house.