Tâigael: Stories from Taiwanese and Gaelic

by Hannah Stevens (Editor), Will Buckingham (Editor)

Overview

In a remote Taiwanese temple, a goddess of saliva vanishes without a trace. One Hogmanay in Inverness, a family party is disrupted by an unexpected guest. On the streets of Taipei, an elderly prophet foretells an attack on the subway. On the way home from her day in court, a woman finds a sheep tangled in the roadside brambles.

Four writers, four stories and four languages. Tâigael is a first-of-its-kind collaborative writing and translation project, bringing together writers from Scotland and Taiwan, to explore language, translation and culture. These four stories by Elissa Hunter-Dorans (Scotland), Kiú-kiong 玖芎 (Taiwan), Lisa MacDonald (Scotland) and Naomi Sím (Taiwan) cross between languages and cultures to speak of things unspoken, and to find new and surprising connections.

Taiwanese (Tâi-gí) and Scottish Gaelic (Gàidhlig) are languages that have been historically marginalised and suppressed. Tâigael presents two newly commissioned short stories in Gaelic, and two in Taiwanese, or Tâi-gí. And then it translates these stories between the two languages, via Mandarin and English. Each story is published in all four languages, to allow the largest possible audience.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781999376437
Publisher:	Wind&Bones
Publication date:	06/16/2025
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	128
File size:	535 KB

About the Author

Hannah Stevens is a writer from the UK, currently based in Taiwan. She is co-director of Wind&Bones Books. Hannah has a PhD in creative writing from the University of Leicester, and her first short story collection, In their Absence was published in 2021. She is currently working on her next collection, On the Bodies of Strangers, for which she was shortlisted for the W&A Working Class Writers' Prize 2022. Hannah has been writer in residence at the Sofia Literature and Translation House, and also at the Taiwan Literature Base.
Will Buckingham is a writer, philosopher and translator from the UK, currently based in Taiwan. Along with Hannah Stevens, he co-directs Wind&Bones Books. Will has a PhD in philosophy, and he writes fiction, nonfiction and for children. His most recent book is Hello, Stranger: How We Find Connection in a Divided World (Granta 2022), which was a BBC Radio4 Book of the Week. He, too, has been writer in residence at the Sofia Literature and Translation House, and at the Taiwan Literature Base. He is on the faculty at Parami University, Myanmar.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Stories

Naomi Sím

翠蘭ê情批 (台語)

Chhùi-Lân ê Chêng-Phoe (Tâi-gí)

翠蘭的情書 (華語)

Emerald Orchid Love Letter (English)

Litir-leannanachd Mhogairle Smàragach (Gàidhlig)

Elissa Hunter-Dorans

A' Chathair Fhalamh (Gàidhlig)

The Empty Chair (English)

空椅 (華語)

空椅仔 (台語)

Khang í-á (Tâi-gí)

Kiú-kiong

〈4：44：44〉(台語)

4 : 44 : 44 (Tâi-gí)

〈4：44：44〉(華語)

4 : 44 : 44 (English)

4 : 44 : 44 (Gàidhlig)

Lisa Macdonald

Saorsa (Gàidhlig)

Freedom (English)

解套 (華語)

自由 (台語)

Chū-iû (Tâi-gí)

Acknowledgements

About the Contributors

About Wind&Bones