By Wong Kah Wei
In the afternoon of 1 Oct 2024, I received an email that informed me of Baba William Gwee Thian Hock’s passing.
William Gwee Thian Hock was widely known as author of books on Baba culture, composer of pantuns, songs, stage plays and a doyen of Peranakan culture.
The sudden sadness that descended on me took me by surprise.
I have never met Baba William Gwee nor have we ever communicated. But yet Baba William Gwee was very real, a fountain of knowledge to me.
I first “got to know” Baba William Gwee when I started on my journey of discovery – learning about the Peranakan culture. I read the memoirs of Peranakans we had in NUS Libraries’ collections. Each of the lives of these Peranakans added a jigsaw piece to the picture of understanding their social customs, rituals, food, material culture and so on.
Baba William Gwee wrote three memoirs – A Nonya mosaic: My mother’s childhood, A Baba boyhood: Growing up during World War 2 and A Nyonya mosaic: Memoirs of a Peranakan childhood. The book about his boyhood is unique because it is contextualized during the years of the Japanese Occupation. Here we read about how the Peranakans cope with the hardships, atrocities and loss. The details he included in his stories are not of the luxurious lifestyles of the Peranakans but of surviving with resilience. His memoirs of his mother are particularly enjoyable because the details show the closeness of his relationship with this mother. There are descriptions of taboos or pantangs, Chinese recipes handed down through the generations, the matriarch of the household, domestic helpers and not forgetting, match-making.
Through his vivid stories filled with minute details, Baba William Gwee opened the door wide for me to enter a three-dimensional world filled with color, forms, sounds and smells. He continued to fill this Peranakan world with many magazine articles written in The Peranakan (a publication of the Peranakan Association of Singapore). Each article was a story about a space and time kept alive through his writing. Particularly interesting are the letters Baba William Gwee wrote to the editor of The Peranakan. His comments add nuggets of information to further enrich the understanding of the topic. This shows his continuous engagement with stories written by other Peranakans, keeping the discussion of the topic alive.
When I progressed in my research work, translating Baba Malay to English, Baba William Gwee’s two books – A Baba Malay dictionary: the first comprehensive compendium of Straits Chinese terms and expression and Mas sepuloh: Baba conversational gems were reference sources I relied on heavily. The more I referred to these gems the more I was grateful to the man who deepen my understanding of Baba Malay and the Peranakan world he lived in. These were the two books sitting opened on my desk when the news of his passing came.
The writing and publishing of textual documents such as books, magazine articles, research papers, theses, stories is one tangible, valuable way to preserve the Peranakan culture in a recorded form.
As a librarian, I am thankful for the corpus of knowledge Baba William Gwee left in the form of these textual documents. Of course, he also left oral history interviews, pantuns, playscripts and mentored and encouraged many Babas and Nyonyas to press on to uphold their culture. Publications – books, magazines and scholarly works – which cited Baba William Gwee as a reference source, are just too numerous to list.
To thank Baba William Gwee for contributing prolifically to promoting and preserving the Peranakan culture in his written work, I have compiled a list of publications written by him sourced from NUS Libraries’ collections and from The Peranakan.
I hope you enjoy reading these as much as I always have.
Books written by William Gwee Thian Hock
A nonya mosaic : my mother’s childhood (1985)
Mas sepuloh : Baba conversational gems (1993)
A Baba boyhood : growing up during World War 2 (2013)
A Nyonya mosaic : memoirs of a peranakan childhood (2013)
Magazine articles and comments written by William Gwee Thian Hock
A reflection in The Peranakan, 1995 January, page 2
Comments on terms used by Babas and non Babas in The Peranakan, 1995 March, page 5-6
An expert’s opinion in The Peranakan, 1995 September, page 3-4
Letters “Of boxing and pantun” in The Peranakan, 1996, March, page 6
[Panton in “Peranakan Mass”] in The Peranakan, 1996 March, page 5
On suara Baba in The Peranakan, 1998 January-March, page 3
[Panton on cover of magazine] in The Peranakan, 2005 October-December, cover
[Panton] in The Peranakan, 2006 July-September, page 19
Remembering Baba Koh Hoon Teck in The Peranakan, 2007 July-September, page 19-20
Letters: Samak bukan sama in The Peranakan, 2007 July-September, page 3
Tales of a Chinese New Year fire in The Peranakan, 2008 January-March, page 15-20
Spirit mediums and the Baba community in The Peranakan, 2008 October-December, page 8-10. Also published in Beng Baba: selected articles from The Peranakan magazine (2015)
Baba and Nyonya mediums in The Peranakan, 2009 January-March, page 32
Letters [comments on musical instruments] in The Peranakan, 2009 July-September, page 2
Peranakan Tionghua Indonesia [book review] in The Peranakan, 2010, Issue 1, page 21
Letter from Baba William Gwee Thian Hock [in response to “At the Tok Panjang” and “Sambot Taon”] in The Peranakan, 2010, Issue 2, page 2
Chap Ji Ki and my mother: variations on an obsession in The Peranakan, 2010, Issue 4, page 17-18
Tauyu tales in The Peranakan, 2010, Issue 4, page 13
Embracing the Belanda in The Peranakan, 2011, Issue 1, page 5
A war to remember in The Peranakan, 2013, Issue 3, page 13-15
Mari makan minom, sama karang panton in The Peranakan, 2022, Issue 2, page 42
The Singapore Chinese mandarin school and its Baba connection in The Peranakan, 18 Sep 2023. Also published in The Peranakan, 2006, January-March, page 12-13,15
