From A Garland of New Advice

Abstract:Anak Brah Bhiramy Bhasa U, born Uk U and popularly known as Krom Ngoy, was one of Cambodia's most influential bards of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Celebrated as a poet of the people, he went from festival to festival in the Cambodian countryside, singing his poems while plucking his collapsible one-string khsae diev for accompaniment. His moralistic verse—full of humor, wit, and vivacity—has struck a chord with Cambodian audiences for generations. These two excerpts from Ngoy's best-known composition, A Garland of New Advice, offer a modern take on the centuries-old tradition of didactic verse, or cpap. The opening excerpt (stanzas 1 to 10) introduces the violence and immorality of the colonial era. The second (stanzas 31 to 38), perhaps the most famous passage in all of Ngoy's poems, urges Cambodians to uphold Khmer traditions in the face of French domination. Ngoy's compositions were recorded in 1930, near the end of his life, thanks to Suzanne Karpelès, who invited him to the Buddhist Institute and asked Khmer scholars to transcribe his compositions. His work continues to influence Cambodian poets and chapei singers today. tw