Prabda Yoon ( th, ปราบดา หยุ่น; ; born 2 August 1973 in

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estima ...

) is a Thai writer, novelist, filmmaker, artist,

graphic designer A graphic designer is a professional within the graphic design and graphic arts industry who assembles together images, typography, or motion graphics to create a piece of design. A graphic designer creates the graphics primarily for published, ...

, magazine editor, screenwriter, translator and media personality. His literary debut, ''Muang Moom Shak'' (''City of Right Angles''), a collection of five related stories about New York City, and the follow-up story collection, ''Kwam Na Ja Pen'' (''Probability''), both published in 2000, immediately turned him into "...the talk of the town..." In 2002, ''Kwam Na Ja Pen'' won the

S.E.A. Write Award The S.E.A. Write Award, or Southeast Asian Writers Award, is an award that is presented annually since 1979 to poets and writers of Southeast Asia. The awards are given to the writers from each of the countries that comprise the Association of S ...

, an award presented to accomplished Southeast Asian writers and poets. Prabda has been prolific, having written over 20 books of fiction and nonfiction in ten years, designed over 100 book covers for many publishers and authors, translated a number of modern Western classics such as

Vladimir Nabokov Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (russian: link=no, Владимир Владимирович Набоков ; 2 July 1977), also known by the pen name Vladimir Sirin (), was a Russian-American novelist, poet, translator, and entomologist. Bo ...

's ''

Lolita ''Lolita'' is a 1955 novel written by Russian-American novelist Vladimir Nabokov. The novel is notable for its controversial subject: the protagonist and unreliable narrator, a middle-aged literature professor under the pseudonym Humbert Humber ...

'' and ''Pnin'', all of

J. D. Salinger Jerome David Salinger (; January 1, 1919 January 27, 2010) was an American author best known for his 1951 novel ''The Catcher in the Rye''. Salinger got his start in 1940, before serving in World War II, by publishing several short stories in '' ...

's books,

Anthony Burgess John Anthony Burgess Wilson, (; 25 February 1917 – 22 November 1993), who published under the name Anthony Burgess, was an English writer and composer. Although Burgess was primarily a comic writer, his Utopian and dystopian fiction, d ...

's' ''

A Clockwork Orange ''A Clockwork Orange'' may refer to: * ''A Clockwork Orange'' (novel), a 1962 novel by Anthony Burgess ** ''A Clockwork Orange'' (film), a 1971 film directed by Stanley Kubrick based on the novel *** ''A Clockwork Orange'' (soundtrack), the film ...

'', and

Karel Čapek Karel Čapek (; 9 January 1890 – 25 December 1938) was a Czech writer, playwright and critic. He has become best known for his science fiction, including his novel ''War with the Newts'' (1936) and play ''R.U.R.'' (''Rossum's Universal Ro ...

's ''

R.U.R. ''R.U.R.'' is a 1920 science-fiction play by the Czech writer Karel Čapek. "R.U.R." stands for (Rossum's Universal Robots, a phrase that has been used as a subtitle in English versions). The play had its world premiere on 2 January 1921 in H ...

'' He has also written two acclaimed screenplays for Thai "new wave" filmmaker Pen-Ek Ratanaruang, "

Last Life in the Universe ''Last Life in the Universe'' (Thai title: เรื่องรัก น้อยนิด มหาศาล, ''Ruang rak noi nid mahasan'') is a 2003 Thai romantic crime film directed by Pen-Ek Ratanaruang. The film is notable for being t ...

" (2003) and "

Invisible Waves ''Invisible Waves'' ( th, คำพิพากษาของมหาสมุทร) is a 2006 crime film by Thai director Pen-Ek Ratanaruang, with screenplay by Prabda Yoon, cinematography by Christopher Doyle, and starring Tadanobu Asano – ...

" (2006). Prabda's literary work has been translated to Japanese and published in Japan regularly. He has exhibited his artworks (paintings, drawings, installations) in Thailand and Japan. He has also produced music and written songs with the bands Buahima and The Typhoon Band. In 2004, Prabda founded Typhoon Studio, a small publishing house with two imprints, Typhoon Books and Sunday Afternoon. In 2012, he opened Bookmoby Readers' Cafe, a small bookshop at the

Bangkok Art and Culture Centre Bangkok Art and Culture Centre (BACC; th, หอศิลปวัฒนธรรมแห่งกรุงเทพมหานคร) is a contemporary arts centre in Bangkok, Thailand. Art, music, theatre, film, design and cultural/educatio ...

. In 2015, Prabda wrote and directed his first feature film, " Motel Mist", which was selected to premiere and compete at the International Film Festival Rotterdam in 2016. '' The Sad Part Was'', a collection of twelve short stories mostly taken from Prabda's ''Kwam Na Ja Pen'' in English, translated from Thai by Mui Poopoksakul (who won an English PEN Award for her translation), was published by the London-based independent publisher, Tilted Axis, and released in the UK on 3 March 2017. It is said to be the first translation of Thai fiction to be published in the UK. He received the 2021

Fukuoka Prize The is an award established by the city of Fukuoka and the Fukuoka City International Foundation (formerly The Yokatopia Foundation) to honor the outstanding work of individuals or organizations in preserving or creating Asian culture. There are ...

in Arts and Culture.

Family and education

Prabda is the son of the well known Thai media personality Suthichai Sae-Yoon, cofounder of ''The Nation'' newspaper, and former magazine editor and novelist Nantawan Sae-Yoon, both of Bangkok. He has one younger sister, Shimboon "Kit" Yoon, who lives with her family in the US. Prabda completed his elementary school education in Bangkok, then attended high school at the

Cambridge School of Weston The Cambridge School of Weston (also known as CSW or The Cambridge School) is an independent, coeducational high school in Weston, Massachusetts. Currently, the school has 325 students in grades 9 to 12, with approximately 70% day students and ...

in Weston,

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...

. He went to

Parsons School of Design Parsons School of Design, known colloquially as Parsons, is a private art and design college located in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. Founded in 1896 after a group of progressive artists broke away from established Manhatt ...

in Manhattan, New York City, for two years, studying communication design, and four more years at the

Cooper Union The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art (Cooper Union) is a private college at Cooper Square in New York City. Peter Cooper founded the institution in 1859 after learning about the government-supported École Polytechnique in ...

, where he studied graphic design under Dan Friedman and

Milton Glaser Milton Glaser (June 26, 1929June 26, 2020) was an American graphic designer. His most notable designs include the I Love New York logo, a 1966 poster for Bob Dylan, and the logos for DC Comics, Stony Brook University and Brooklyn Brewery. In 1954 ...

and film with

Robert Breer Robert Carlton Breer (September 30, 1926 – August 11, 2011) was an American experimental filmmaker, painter, and sculptor. Life and career "A founding member of the American avant-garde," Breer was best known for his films, which combine ...

. He graduated from Cooper Union in 1997. Prabda returned to Thailand in 1998 for military service.

Works

Short stories

* Right-angled City * Probability * Flood in the Eyes * The Moving Parts * This Really happened * The Shoulders of Mountains * Cleaning the Dead * Ancient Planet * *

Novels

* Chit-tak!, 2002 * Panda, 2004 * Lessons in Rain, 2005 * Under the Snow, 2006

Essays

* Unstill Pictures * Water for the Skull * Please Don't Read, Carefully * Alive: On the Breath of Words * Imagined Landscapes * Page Zero * Hitting the Eyes * Writing to Japan * Music with Tears

Screenplays

* Last Life in the Universe, with Pen-Ek Ratanaruang, 2003 * Invisible Waves, 2006 * Motel Mist, 2015

References

External links

Teh, David, "Picking up the pieces", ''Bangkok Post'', (2005-12-24)

Typhoon Studio
*

RMA 2016 interviews Prabda Yoon on ''Motel Mist''

Prabda Yoon speaking at Creative Morning, Turin, 2018
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yoon, Prabda

Prabda Yoon Prabda Yoon ( th, ปราบดา หยุ่น; ; born 2 August 1973 in Bangkok) is a Thai writer, novelist, filmmaker, artist, graphic designer, magazine editor, screenwriter, translator and media personality. His literary debut, ''Muang Mo ...

1973 births Living people S.E.A. Write Award winners Cooper Union alumni

20th-century novelists 21st-century novelists 20th-century translators 21st-century translators