Speakers and Moderators
Find out more about our speakers this year by navigating the tabs below!
Anton Hur is the author of Toward Eternity and the translator of Bora Chung’s Cursed Bunny, Baek Sehee’s I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki, Lee Seong-bok’s Indeterminate Inflorescence, Kyung-Sook Shin’s Violets, and others.
He was double-longlisted and shortlisted for the International Booker Prize, a finalist for the National Book Award, and nominated for the Dublin Literary Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award. He resides in Seoul.
Arunava Sinha translates classic, modern, and contemporary fiction, non-fiction and poetry from Bengali and Hindi into English. He also translates fiction and poetry from English and Hindi into Bengali.
Over 95 of his translations have been published so far in India, the UK, the USA, and Australia. He has won or been shortlisted for various translation prizes in India, the UK, the USA, and Australia.
He teaches at Ashoka University, where he is also the co-director of the Ashoka Centre for Translation, and is the Books Editor at Scroll.in.
Boedi Widjaja (b. 1975, Indonesia; based in Singapore) explores migration through the conceptual frames of house, home and homeland, engaging with space and semiotics.
Trained in architecture and design, Boedi works across media—from bio art and performance to experimental photography and architectural installations—often combining scientific phenomena with poetic gesture.
Represented by ShanghART Gallery, Boedi has exhibited internationally at QAGOMA, Singapore Art Museum, Yuz Museum, National Gallery Singapore, FACT Liverpool and Katonah Museum.
His work has featured in the Asia Pacific Triennial, Singapore, Thailand, Yinchuan, and Venice Biennales, with solo presentations in Singapore and New York.
Playwright Hemang Yadav’s works include Radio for the Singapore Arts Festival Fringe (2008), a modern Noh play All the Crazy People (2010), Maya: Demon Architect for the Esplanade Raga Festival (2014), Letter to Juliet combining opera with theatre (2014), an audience-interactive performance Not 50, 700! (SG50), site-specific plays for Art Walk Little India (2017 – 2020), a trilingual ten-minute play Pongal (2021), a children’s play Ek Anokhi Duniya (2021), Death of An Artist uniting drama, dance and poetry (2021 and 2022), and The Good Teacher which continues to be staged successfully by Tamasha Theatre.
Hemang has also been transcreating the works of Kalidasa, Tagore and more recently Chekhov, whose short stories he adapted into short plays and whose play The Marriage Proposal he directed in the Hyderabadi Urdu context.
Jamie Chang is a literary translator. Her translation of Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-joo was longlisted for the 2020 National Book Awards in Translated Literature. She has also translated The Wizard's Bakery by Gu Byeong-mo, Concerning My Daughter by Kim Hye-jin, and Great Soul of Siberia: One Man's Quest for the World's Most Elusive Tiger by Park Soo-yong.
She is the recipient of the Daesan Foundation Translation Grant and a three-time recipient of the Literature Translation Institute of Korea Grant. She lives in Nova Scotia with her wife and their dog.
Since his debut full-length play in 2006, Johnny Jon Jon has transitioned from dissecting socio-political themes to delving into the depths of the human experience within the realm of minor literature.
Notable works such as Hawa (2015) and Potong (2018) have earned critical acclaim alongside pieces like National Memory Project (2012), Family Dinner (2017), and Punggah (2020). In 2022, Hawa and Potong were consolidated into the anthology Potong: To Care/Cut as part of Ethos Books’ Orbit series.
Jon Jon is currently working on Kentot. When not writing plays, Jon Jon writes short stories and facilitates design thinking workshops. He currently lives with his better half as they try to get their startups (children) to become unicorns. 🦄
Joshua Ip has written some books and won some prizes. His latest collection is ownself say ownself: new & selected poems (Landmark Books, 2024). He still wants to be a writer when he grows up. joshuaip.com.
Shaza Ishak is the Executive & Artistic Director of Teater Ekamatra, where she drives the company’s strategic vision and programmes its diverse artistic slate. She believes in the transformative power of theatre to effect social change and is committed to advancing the ethnic minority performing arts scene in Singapore and beyond.
Teater Ekamatra is dedicated to spotlighting artists of diverse ethnicities through compelling, socially engaged works, the nurturing of emerging talent, and the cultivation of greater diversity within the arts sector. The company has been commissioned by major international arts festivals and is a multiple recipient of Singapore’s highest theatre accolade, the Straits Times Life! Theatre Awards, including several wins for Best Original Script.
In 2019, Shaza earned her MA in Creative Producing from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama (UK), supported by three scholarships, including the National Arts Council Singapore Postgraduate Scholarship. She is a fellow of the Singapore International Foundation’s Arts for Good Fellowship, the International Society for the Performing Arts (USA), and the Eisenhower Fellowships (USA), where she was the youngest fellow in the programme’s 68-year history.
In 2021, she was awarded the inaugural Tunas Warisan (Special Mention Award) by the President of Singapore, in recognition of her contributions to the arts and heritage sector. Most recently, she received the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office’s Chevening Scholarship and completed her second Master’s, with Distinction, in Race, Media, and Social Justice at Goldsmiths, University of London (UK).
Shelly Bryant is a translator, poet and writer. She has translated work from the Chinese for Penguin Books, Amazon Crossing, Epigram Publishing, the National Library Board in Singapore, Giramondo Books, HSRC, Rinchen Books, and Maclehose Press.
Her translation of Sheng Keyi’s Northern Girls was long-listed for the Man Asian Literary Prize in 2012, and her translation of You Jin's In Time, Out of Place was shortlisted for the Singapore Literature Prize in 2016.
Wan Wei is a globally recognized AI futurist specialising in how generative AI and large language models (LLMs) transform content creation and cross-cultural communication.
With 15+ years of experience as a keynote speaker (100+ tech conferences) and founder of the AI Visionary Society, she bridges cutting-edge technology and real-world language applications—helping founders and professionals use Generative AI and digital twins to create content and build lasting influence for themselves.
Sung Ryu is a literary translator working from and into Korean. She is the translator of Shoko’s Smile by Choi Eunyoung and Tower by Bae Myung-hoon, and the co-translator of I’m Waiting for You: And Other Stories by Kim Bo-Young (with Sophie Bowman).
Her forthcoming translations include Teddy Bears Never Die by Cho Yeeun and The Legends of MeoShín'Ké: An Illustrated Guide to Korean Monsters and Mythology by Hwa Hwa Studio. She has called many places home, including South Korea, the United States, Canada, and now Singapore.
Zoea Tania Chen is a playwright, translator, and performance-maker trained in English Literature with a scholarly focus on esotericism and poetics. Her creative work spans theatre, screenwriting, installations, and experimental storytelling, often taking the form of intimate, speculative rituals. As a translator, she has worked across contemporary drama, poetry, and children’s songs, with an emphasis on lyrical cadence and cultural resonance. Her practice explores grief, memory, and myth through poetic language and visual dramaturgy, seeking forms that resist easy classification while opening encounters with the invisible.
Daryl Lim Wei Jie 林伟杰 is a poet, translator and editor from Singapore. His latest collection, Anything but Human, was a finalist for the Singapore Literature Prize. He conceptualised two anthologies: Food Republic: A Singapore Literary Banquet, which received a Special Award at the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards; and The Second Link, a collection of Singapore and Malaysian writing about the unique relationship between the two countries, shortlisted for Best Literary Work at the Singapore Book Awards. In 2023, he was awarded the Young Artist Award, Singapore’s highest honour for young art practitioners. He is currently working on the video gaming anthology, Free to Play. www.darylwjlim.com
Photo credit: National Arts Council
Li Khee enjoys learning new languages. She interprets and translates between English and Mandarin, while working hard to hold conversations in Japanese and Thai. She also writes about life and travel in a regular column for Lianhe Zaobao’s Fukan.
When not honing her literary craft, Li Khee can be found tinkering with devices and working with metals and measurements as a manufacturing engineer.
Maisie is a Human Connection Architect who is deeply fascinated by the hidden architecture of relationships and the spaces between us. Maisie teaches people how to build bridges — between themselves and others, by educating people on authentic communication in relationships. Her work is to design the conditions where honesty and kindness can meet, so we can build empathy and create healthier, deeper connections.
Outside of her work, Maisie is also a happy librarian at community library Casual Poet Library where she facilitates regular book clubs and ogles books. She is also a lover of languages and an aspiring polyglot who enjoys translated works, which she sees also as a kind of bridge-building.
Zulfadli Rashid is a bilingual playwright who delights in juggling English and Malay with theatrical flair. His works range from the award-nominated musical Alkesah to a Malay-language reimagining of A Clockwork Orange—ultraviolence, but with a Nusantara twist. His debut anthology Kolong reveals a writer equally at ease with bold experimentation and playful shifts in style.
Ever curious and endlessly collaborative, Zulfadli crafts art that entertains, enlightens, and occasionally sneaks in a cultural plot twist—bridging languages, genres, and audiences with humour and heart.
Aiswarya is a multilingual actor and has acted in various theatre productions in English, Hindi, Tamil and Malayalam Languages with T:>Works!, WildRice (part of Director’s residency program), Second Breakfast Company, Wisdom Of Monkeys, Raga@Esplanade etc.
She has appeared in various TV series and Government commercials. She has also been part of award winning short films and herself won awards for her performances.
She is also a trained dancer in various Indian classical dance forms.
Drake has had experience since primary school, ranging from chorus performances to musicals to stage plays and skits from school and amateur productions. He is also currently an active member in a flash mob group, namely Mission: Singapore, performing improvisational acting based on the flash mob activities (missions), recently completed a mission involving organizing and participating as a scare actor in a fright trail along Marang Trail, Mount Faber Park, successfully scaring the participants.
Faaiqah is a Deaf Interpreter and Singapore Sign Language (SgSL) Instructor with Equal Dreams, dedicated to promoting Deaf culture and accessible arts. She's led storytelling programmes like Tales of Sang Kancil by Malay Heritage Board and Start Small, Dream Big by National Library Board, and interpreted for local theatre works like I Am Seaweed at M1 Fringe Festival, and Escape to Batam by Checkpoint Theatre. Faaiqah also co-created What Was That?! — a Deaf-friendly workshop at Esplanade that engaged children through SgSL and foley play. She has also interpreted for international theatre works like FOOD by Geoff Sobelle.
Gillian Tan is an experienced practitioner and trainer in the fields of drama, theatre and performance. With over 15 years of acting and singing on stage, she now enjoys teaching and training different groups and schools, broadening her children’s horizons and deepening their enthusiasm.
She has also been writing and directing more plays and musicals over the last few years. Her works include original music and storytelling shows at the Singapore Writers Festival, the annual Pathey Nimidam festival performed in Tamil, and dinner theatre for the Singapore Association for Mental Health. She also volunteers for the latter and is a committee member.
Playwright Hemang Yadav’s works include Radio for the Singapore Arts Festival Fringe (2008), a modern Noh play All the Crazy People (2010), Maya: Demon Architect for the Esplanade Raga Festival (2014), Letter to Juliet combining opera with theatre (2014), an audience-interactive performance Not 50, 700! (SG50), site-specific plays for Art Walk Little India (2017 – 2020), a trilingual ten-minute play Pongal (2021), a children’s play Ek Anokhi Duniya (2021), Death of An Artist uniting drama, dance and poetry (2021 and 2022), and The Good Teacher which continues to be staged successfully by Tamasha Theatre.
Hemang has also been transcreating the works of Kalidasa, Tagore and more recently Chekhov, whose short stories he adapted into short plays and whose play The Marriage Proposal he directed in the Hyderabadi Urdu context.
Justine Devisse Mezrani, originally from France, is the mother of three children. She lived in Taipei and Shanghai before settling in Hong Kong, where she founded an online bookstore for French and English language children’s books. Passionate about theatre, she performed in French productions, improv shows, and co-directed a musical for the French May festival. Since 2022, she has lived in Singapore, acting with The Theatre Ensemble, performing at the Alliance Française, winning LIFA improv festival in Hanoi in 2025, and now exploring musical theatre and storytelling.
Environmentalist by profession, performer at heart.
Singapore opened up multiple avenues for Neeraj to explore his talent via stage giving him multiple opportunities to be part of productions in English and Hindi. He has done quite a few voiceovers in both English and Hindi, and considers it an honor to have had his voice featured at the Indian Heritage Center Hindi audio guide. Neeraj was featured in 2 short films made in Singapore, in addition to multiple TV advertisements for STB, HPB, NEA, and Sentosa Development Corp.
Roger Jenkins is an award-winning professional Singaporean storyteller with considerable experience of working bilingually, having scripted stories for telling with partners speaking in Mandarin, Malay, Tamil, Hindi, Vietnamese, French, Italian, Swahili and Singapore Sign Language.
For videos of him telling with a partner bilingually, visit www.rogerjenkins.com.sg.
Susie Penrice Tyrie is an actor, director and producer who trained at The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow. After a short time in theatre and radio in Scotland, she moved to London and worked behind the scenes at TVam and GMTV. Now in Singapore, she has come back to the theatre. Susie has been on stage in productions by Cantio, Drama-Arts, Open Stage, The O.P.E.N., Wag the Dog Theatre and Pachyderm Theatre. She has directed many productions including Calendar Girls, The Hound of the Baskervilles, Gruesome Playground Injuries, The Arsonists, Queers 1 & 2, and short Tamil plays for Pathey Nimidam.
