Norman Erikson Pasaribu

Norman Erikson Pasaribu was born in Jakarta in 1990. His debut poetry collection Sergius Seeks Bacchus (also published by Tilted Axis) won first prize in the 2015 Jakarta Arts Council Poetry Manuscript Competition and was shortlisted in the 2016 Khatulistiwa Literary Award for Poetry. We are delighted to announce an exclusive event with Norman in Bath.

Playful, shape-shifting and emotionally charged, Happy Stories, Mostly is a collection of twelve stories that queer the norm. The book has been longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2022 and is on the Republic of Consciousness 2022 Shortlist. 

Inspired by Simone Weil’s concept of ‘decreation,’ and often drawing on Batak and Christian cultural elements, these tales put queer characters in situations and plots conventionally filled by hetero characters.

The stories talk to each other, echo phrases and themes, and even shards of stories within other stories, passing between airports, stacks of men’s lifestyle magazines and memories of Toy Story 3, such that each one almost feels like a puzzle piece of a larger whole, but with crucial facts – the saddest ones, the happiest ones – omitted, forgotten, unbearable.

A blend of science fiction, absurdism and alternative-historical realism, Happy Stories, Mostly is a powerful puff of fresh air, aimed at destabilising the heteronormative world and exposing its underlying absences.

The publisher, Tilted Axis, are a non-profit press publishing mainly work by Asian writers, translated into a variety of Englishes. They describe their mission as an “ongoing exploration into alternatives [to imperialism] – to the hierarchisation of certain languages and forms, including forms of translation; to the monoculture of globalisation; to cultural, narrative, and visual stereotypes; to the commercialisation and celebrification of literature and literary translation.”