Journal Kyaw Ma Ma Lay - Literary Career

Literary Career

Ma Ma Lay wrote nearly 20 books and many articles and short stories in the monthly magazines. Many of her contemporaries and even younger writers describe her as a genius who could make simple everyday matters into readable, interesting books which reflected the lives and concerns of her readers.

Her famous works are:

• Thu Lo Lu (Like Him) (1947)
• Seik (Spirit)
• Mone Ywa Mahu (Not Out of Hate) (1955)
• Yin Nint Aung Hmwe (Right to the Core of the Heart)
• Twe Ta Saint Saint (A Slow Stream of Thoughts and Burmese Medicine Tales) (1963)
• Thway (Blood) (1973)
• Images of My Life (2002) (Collections of her articles about her life, republished by her son)

Ma Ma Lay won two top Burmese Literary Prizes for "Not Out of Hate" and "A Slow Stream of Thoughts and Burmese Medicine Tales".

• Like Him was about her husband Chit Maung, and their married lives. Contemporary writer Dagon Taya wrote, “The success of Journalgyaw Ma Ma Lay reached its peak with this novel. The wife wrote a biography of her husband, an editor. It was the combination of love and art, and that combination made the book unique and interesting.”

• Not Out of Hate explores the impact of the West on Burmese culture, and it has been translated into other languages (English, Chinese, French, Uzbek and Russian).

• Blood addresses relations forged between the Japanese and the Burmese during World War II. A young Japanese woman visits Burma to find her half-brother, the child of her father, an officer in the Japanese army, and a Burmese mother. Her half-brother initially refuses to have anything to do with her because he believes that his father raped his mother. A joint production with the Japanese turned this novel into a film which had its 2003 premiere in Japan.