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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “Circumnavigation Without Glory: Lav Diaz’s Magellan and the Violence of Discovery” by Oliver Farry Click HERE to read all entries in Cha on Magellan. Lav Diaz (director), Magellan, 2025. 165 min. Lav Diaz’s Magellan…
![[FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “Circumnavigation Without Glory: Lav Diaz’s 𝑀𝑎𝑔𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑎𝑛 and the Violence of Discovery” by Oliver Farry](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/review-22history-as-painting-lav-diazs-magellan22-by-alicia-izharuddin.png?w=795)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [ESSAY] “What is an Orange? Reading Gillian Sze’s An Orange, A Syllable” by Robert Black Gillian Sze, An Orange, A Syllable, ECW Press, 2025. 88 pgs. What Is an origin? A…
![[ESSAY] “What is an Orange? Reading Gillian Sze’s 𝐴𝑛 𝑂𝑟𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑒, 𝐴 𝑆𝑦𝑙𝑙𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑒” by Robert Black](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/https-ecwpress.comproductsorange-a-syllable.webp?w=663)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS Editor’s note: In Hongwei Bao’s new essay, Pillion (2025), directed by Harry Lighton and adapted from Adam Mars-Jones’s 2020 novella Box Hill, becomes a lens for exploring queer biker cinema, kink…
![[ESSAY] “Geared Up for Pillion” by Hongwei Bao](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/pillion-film-poster.jpg?w=1024)
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Editor’s note: In Matt Turner’s essay, he recounts organising and leading a Tuesday-evening reading group in November 2025 at Accent Sisters, a Union Square gallery with a Chinese and feminist focus. The group, composed largely of Chinese participants and socially…
![[ESSAY] “Debord at Union Square” by Matt Turner](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/the-society-of-the-spectacle.png?w=747)
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Editor’s note: In “Autoethnography of a Hermit Crab”, Mark Alden Arcenal traces a childhood friendship shaped by monsoon seasons, coastal rituals, and shared literary dreams, gradually unfolding into a meditation on queerness, faith, illness, and loss. Through the recurring metaphor…
![[ESSAY] “Autoethnography of a Hermit Crab” by Mark Alden Arcenal](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/hermit-crab.png?w=1024)
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Editor’s note: Llinos Evans’s essay traces the literary and linguistic significance of the One-Syllable Article through a detailed reading of Yuen Ren Chao’s “Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den”. Moving beyond its reputation as a phonetic curiosity, it argues for…
![[ESSAY] “Beyond the Stone Den: One-Syllable Articles as Literary Form—An Introduction” by Llinos Evans](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/poem.jpg?w=785)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [ESSAY] “Aesthetic Experiences: A Study of Anri Yasuda’s Beauty Matters” by Luca Griseri Anri Yasuda, Beauty Matters: Modern Japanese Literature and the Question of Aesthetics, 1890–1930, Columbia University Press, 2024. 304…
![[ESSAY] “Aesthetic Experiences: A Study of Anri Yasuda’s 𝐵𝑒𝑎𝑢𝑡𝑦 𝑀𝑎𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠” by Luca Griseri](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/https-__m.media-amazon.com_images_i_819sezp2oml._sl1500_.jpg.jpg?w=1000)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [ESSAY] “From Star to Performer-Worker: Rethinking Anna May Wong Through Labour” by Anna Nguyen Yiman Wang, To Be An Actress: Labor and Performance in Anna May Wong’s Cross-Media World, University of…
![[ESSAY] “From Star to Performer-Worker: Rethinking Anna May Wong Through Labour” by Anna Nguyen](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/yiman-wang-to-be-an-actress-labor-and-performance-in-anna-may-wongs-cross-media-world-university-of-california-press.jpg?w=1000)
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[ESSAY] “Maggie Cheung and the Refusal of Cinematic Immortality” by Anna Nguyen I have many confessions. I am exhausted by the discourse surrounding Wong Kar-wai’s In the Mood for Love (2000). I am exhausted by fandoms that fixate on aesthetic…
![[ESSAY] “Maggie Cheung and the Refusal of Cinematic Immortality” by Anna Nguyen](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/irma-vep-1996-maggie-cheung.jpg?w=1024)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [REVIEW] “Observation as Inheritance: iTim Fitts’s The People’s Island” by Jack Greenberg Tim Fitts, The People’s Island, Spuyten Duyvil, 2025. 175 pgs. The People’s Island presents itself as a coming of…
![[REVIEW] “Observation as Inheritance: Tim Fitts’s 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑃𝑒𝑜𝑝𝑙𝑒’𝑠 𝐼𝑠𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑑” by Jack Greenberg](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/tim-fitts-the-peoples-island-spuyten-duyvil.jpg?w=1000)
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Header artwork by Annysa Ng 茶 First Impressionsclick for information 茶 Essays click for information 茶 En Routeclick for information 茶 XI XI—Can We Sayclick for information 茶 Write to Powerclick for information 茶 Auditory Cortexclick for information
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