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When the Barbarians Arrive is a selected works from Singaporean poet Alvin Pang's five previous collections, including Testing the Silence (1997) and City of Rain (2003). Wry, sensitive and intelligent throughout, the selection ranges from unsentimental love poems to sharply satirical writing. They mock, celebrate and unsettle, at once recognisably national and international in reach, offering a fresh edge and energy to the wave of urban poetry emerging from Singapore.

Alvin Pang was born in Singapore in 1972. A Fellow of Iowa University's International Writing program, his poetry has been translated into more than fifteen languages, and he has appeared at major festivals and in anthologies worldwide. He has edited the anthologies No Other City (2000); Over There: Poems from Singapore and Australia (with John Kinsella, 2008), and Tumasik: Contemporary Writing from Singapore (2009). Pang was named the 2005 Young Artist of the Year for Literature by Singapore's National Arts Council, and was received the Singapore Youth Award (Arts and Culture) in 2007.

CONTENTS Initiation, Fly-Fishing Friction, The Scent of the Real, Homecoming , Shades of Light in Holland, Village , What to Write About in Cold Storage, circa 2000 AD , What it Means to be Landless , Absences , Poem for an Engineer , Merlign , The Meaning of Wealth in the New Economy , Other Things , Patience , Salt , Aubade , The Burning Room , Incendium Amoris , Candles , Rain , To Go to S'pore , Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Snowscape , Loaded , Upgrading , Made of Gold , When the Barbarians Arrive , Biographical Note

Alvin PANG (b. 1972, Singapore) is a poet, writer, editor, anthologist, and translator. His poetry has been translated into over fifteen languages, and he has appeared in major festivals and anthologies worldwide. A Fellow of the University of Iowa's International Writing Program (2002), his publications include Testing the Silence (1997), City of Rain (2003), What Gives Us Our Names (2011) and Waiting for the Barbarians (forthcoming 2012, in Croatian translation). The anthologies he has curated include No Other City: The Ethos Anthology of Urban Poetry (2000); Over There: Poems from Singapore and Australia (co-edited with John Kinsella, 2008), and Tumasik: Contemporary Writing from Singapore (Autumn Hill: USA, 2009). He is a founding director of The Literary Centre - a non-profit initiative promoting interdisciplinary capacity, multilingual communication, and positive social change. Pang was named the 2005 Young Artist of the Year for Literature by Singapore's National Arts Council, and was conferred the Singapore Youth Award (Arts and Culture) in 2007.