Dr Antony Huen | People | School of English | Faculty of Arts

Programme Director, Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing in English

Dr Antony Huen

BA, CUHK; MA, B’ham; PhD Ebor

Programme Director, Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing in English

Dr Antony Huen

BA, CUHK; MA, B’ham; PhD Ebor

PROFILE

Antony Huen specialises in contemporary poetry. His main interests lie in Hong Kong poetry, contemporary British poetry, transculturalism and transnationalism, the intersection of poetry and the visual arts, and creative writing in higher education. He has received several awards for his research, including the 2021 Wasafiri Essay Prize, and came second for the 2022 Essay Prize of Women: A Cultural Review. His articles have appeared in Humanities, PN Review, Wasafiri, Women, World Literature Today, Writing Chinese: A Journal of Contemporary Sinophone Literature, and elsewhere. His research on Hong Kong poetry has been supported by a grant of HKD$694,470 from the Hong Kong Research Grants Council (HKRGC).

Antony’s poetry has appeared in Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, Quarterly Literary Review Singapore, Poetry Wales, PN Review, and elsewhere. His poetry is also included in anthologies such as A Personal History of Home (The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities, 2022), State of Play: Poets of East & Southeast Asian Heritage in Conversation (Out-Spoken Press, 2023), Orpheus Dreams of Eurydice (The City Museum of Rijeka, 2023), and Where Else: An International Hong Kong Poetry Anthology (Verve Poetry Press, 2023). His pamphlet Hi-yah! was shortlisted for the 2023 Poetry London Pamphlet Prize. He has been actively involved in various creative collaborations, including the HK-SG Digital Travel Bubble (Sing Lit Station and The Substation, 2021), World at the Climate Crossroads (CUHK Jockey Club Museum of Climate Change, 2023), and Ecopoetic Encounters (University of South Australia, 2024).

Before joining HKU, Antony lectured at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), the Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK), Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU), and Hong Kong Metropolitan University (HKMU), where he received one of the 2023 President’s Awards for Excellence in Inspirational Teaching. He also taught at the University of York, where he earned his PhD in English and received support from the F. R. Leavis Fund and a fellowship from the Humanities Research Centre. He holds a BA in English from CUHK and an MA in Creative Writing from the University of Birmingham.

Antony serves as an Examiner for the Hong Kong Arts Development Council (HKADC) in the categories of Arts Criticism and Literary Arts. He actively contributes to the art and literary communities at local and international levels. You can find more information about his community outreach here.

PUBLICATIONS

journals articles

Huen, Antony, and Felix Chow. “Cosmopolitan Hybridity, Cultural Memory and Curation in Hong Kong Poetry.” Writing Chinese: A Journal of Contemporary Sinophone Literature, vol. 2, no. 1, 2023, pp. 34-65. White Rose University Press, doi:10.22599/wcj.43.

Huen, Antony. “Transculturalism, Transformation and the Visual Arts in Contemporary British Women’s Poetry.” Women: A Cultural Review, vol. 33, no. 4, 2022 (published in Mar 2023), pp. 414-431. Taylor & Francis, doi:10.1080/09574042.2023.2183623. [runner-up for the Women Poetry Prize]

Huen, Antony. “Hong Kong Moment: A Diasporic Poetics within the British Poetics.” PN Review, vol. 49, no. 3, Jan–Feb 2023, pp. 59-63. ProQuest, https://proquest.com/scholarly-journals/hong-kong-moment-diasporic-poetics-within-british/docview/2781734550/se-2.

Huen, Antony. “Chinese and City Aesthetics: A Conversation with Jennifer Wong.” World Literature Today, vol. 96, no. 3, May–June 2022, pp. 49-53. Project Muse, doi:10.1353/wlt.2022.0121.

Huen, Antony. “The ‘old Hong Kong’ and ‘a gold-sifting bird’: Hong Kong and Chinese Ekphrasis in Contemporary British Poetry.” Wasafiri: International Contemporary Writing, vol. 37, no. 1, Mar. 2022, pp.14-22. Taylor & Francis, doi:10.1080/02690055.2022.1999653. [winner of the 2021 Essay Prize]

Huen, Antony. “Photographs, Photography and the Photographer: A Conversation with George Szirtes.” Wasafiri: International Contemporary Writing, vol. 34, no. 3, Sept. 2019, pp.59-63. Taylor & Francis, doi:10.1080/02690055.2019.1613016.

Huen, Antony. “Tamar Yoseloff as Ekphrasist, and Her Hidden Sweetheart.” Humanities, vol. 8, no. 2., June 2019, pp. 77. MDPI, doi:10.3390/h8020077.

Huen, Antony. “Questions of the PhD.” Hong Kong Studies, vol. 1, no. 2, Sept. 2018, pp. 179-183.

BOOK CHAPTERS

Huen, Antony, and Jason Eng Hun Lee. (in press) “Institutional and Communal Creativity: Local Discourse and English-Language Creative Writing in Hong Kong.” In Magdalen Ki and Wayne Liang (Eds.), Hong Kong Discourse. Leiden: Brill.

Quah, Helen, and Antony Huen. “Common Ground.” In Eddie Tay and Jennifer Wong (Eds.), State of Play: Poets of East and Southeast Asian Heritage in Conversation (pp. 65-81). London: Out-Spoken, Oct. 2023.

Huen, Antony. “Texts for Teaching Poetry Writing for Language Learning.” In Graeme Harper (Ed.), Exploring Creative Writing (p. 133-146). Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars, May 2016.

REVIEWS

Havolli, Dan, Antony Huen, and Sarah Pyke. Review of Teaching Literature in the Real World: A Practical Guide by Patrick Collier. English: Journal of the English Association, vol. 71, no. 273, July 2022, pp. 175-187. Oxford Journals, doi:10.1093/english/efac014.

Huen, Antony. Review of Painting Words: Aesthetics and the Relationship between Image and Text (edited by Beatriz González-Moreno and Fernando González-Moreno). Early Popular Visual Culture, vol. 20, no. 1, Nov 2021, pp. 85-87. Taylor & Francis, doi: 10.1080/17460654.2021.2001735.

Huen, Antony. Review of As Slow as Possible by Kit Fan and Letters Home by Jennifer Wong. Hong Kong Review of Books, Aug. 2020, https://hkrbooks.com/2020/08/10/as-slow-as-possible-and-letters-home.

Huen, Antony. Review of Mama Amazonica by Pascale Petit, Joy by Sasha Dugdale and Shrines of Upper Austria by Phoebe Power. The Compass Magazine, no. 7, Mar. 2019.

Huen, Antony. Review of Cain by Luke Kennard. Eborakon, vol. 1, no. 3, Jan. 2017, pp. 42-44.

Huen, Antony. Review of Steep Tea by Jee Leong Koh and The Ground I Stand on Is Not My Ground by Collier Nogues. Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, no. 29, Sept. 2015, https://asiancha.com/content/view/2195/515.

SHORT ARTICLES

“Cantonese Songs of Experience: Cantopop and the Western Canon.” Hong Kong Review of Books, Sept 2021, https://hkrbooks.com/2021/09/29/hkrb-cantonese-songs-of-experience.

“A Defence of Ekphrasis.” New Defences of Poetry, Jul. 2021, http://nclacommunity.org/newdefences.

“Odes to Touch.” The Oxonian Review, no. 44, Aug. 2020, https://oxonianreview.com/articles/odes-to-touch.

“Reflections on Poetry as Portraiture.” Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, Nov. 2018, https://chajournal.blog/2018/11/07/maryknoll-convent-school.

CREATIVE WORK

“Chinese Blackbirds.” Ecopoetic Encounters: Manipulating Linguistic Voice to Unsettle Anthropocentric Assumptions, Mar. 2024, p. 24. doi:10.25954/43hp-tk10.

“The Whale.” Voice & Verse, no. 75, Dec. 2023, p. 65.

“Amor.” In Orpheus Dreams of Eurydice: Meandering Cognitions, edited by Joost de Jonge, p. 122. The City Museum of Rijeka, Sept. 2023.

“Jumbo Kingdom.” The Oxonian Review, Aug. 2023, https://oxonianreview.com/articles/jumbo-kingdom.

“Bauhinia Blakeana.” In Where Else: An International Hong Kong Poetry, edited by Jennifer Wong, Jason Eng Hun Lee, Tim Tim Cheng, p. 44. Verve Poetry Press, May 2023.

“A Personal History of Hong Kong as 39 Everyday Objects.” In A Personal History of Home, edited by Jennifer Wong, p. 82-83. The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities, Jan. 2023.

Four Poems. PN Review, no. 268, Nov. 2022, p. 49.

“Icarus.” In Painted Poetry & Painterly Poetics, Aug. 2022, paintedpoetry.org/water-on-water/index.html#040-250.

“Horse Head.” Visual Verse, vol. 9, no. 2, Dec. 2021, https://visualverse.org/submissions/horse-head-huen.

“Brain Sea.” Poetry Wales, vol. 57, no. 2, Dec. 2021, p. 61.

Three Poems. In Voice & Verse 21/ 21 Anthology: Poetry from Hong Kong, edited by Chris Song & Tammy Lai-Ming Ho, pp. B47-B49. Musical Stone, Dec. 2021.

“Self-Portrait as a Steamed Whole Fish.” The Dark Horse, no. 43, Jul. 2021, p.61.

“Chinese Horoscopes.” harana poetry, Mar. 2021, https://haranapoetry.com/chinese-horoscopes-by-antony-huen.

“Neighbours.” In Listen to the World 2020: Neighbours, edited by Emilie Lauren Jones, p. 38. Positive Images, Feb. 2021.

Two Poems. In HK-SG Digital Travel Bubble. Poetry.sg, Feb. 2021, https://poetry.sg/travelbubble-3.

“Cantonese Proverbs.” amberflora, Jan. 2021, https://amberflora.com/issues/issue-10/antony-huen-cantonese-proverbs.

“Myo-pic.” Ink, Sweat and Tears, Oct. 2020, https://inksweatandtears.co.uk/day-five-of-vision-for-npd-jack-grady-lydia-kennaway-antony-huen.

“In the Banyan Forest.” In Mingled Voices 3, edited by Gillian Bickley & Verner Bickley, p. 61. Proverse, Apr. 2019.

“Notes.” Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, no. 42, Feb. 2019, https://asiancha.com/wp/article/antony-huen.

“Peach.” Quarterly Literary Review Singapore, vol. 17, no. 4, Oct. 2018, qlrs.com/poem.asp?id=1445.

“Remembering Hong Kong as 39 Everyday Objects.” Voice & Verse, no. 39-40, Mar. 2018, p. A66. (First published in Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, no. 33, Sept. 2016.)

“Felt Suit.” The Ekphrastic Review, Dec. 2017, https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-review/felt-suit-by-antony-huen.

“Missing Her (Fanling Babies Home).” The Shanghai Literary Review, no. 1, Jun. 2017, p. 113.

“The Houses.” In The Best New British and Irish Poets 2017, edited by Todd Swift, p. 63-65. Eyewear, Mar. 2017.

“Imagine I Go to a Pub.” Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, no. 32, Jun. 2016, https://asiancha.com/content/view/2402/550.

“Son to Father.” Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, no. 25, Oct. 2014, https://asiancha.com/content/view/1899/473.

TEL

3917-7274

E-MAIL

antonyh@hku.hk

OFFICE

Room 848, 8/F, Run Run Shaw Tower, Centennial Campus