Ng Yi-Sheng (b. 1980)
BIOGRAPHY
Ng Yi-Sheng (b. 1980) is a Singaporean multidisciplinary writer, researcher and activist. He studied creative writing at Columbia College, the University of East Anglia and NTU, and has served as a creative writing instructor at NTU, LaSalle College of the Arts, and Yale-NUS, where he taught Singapore’s first ever university-level speculative fiction writing course.
He won the Singapore Literature Prize (English Category) in 2008 for his debut poetry collection last boy (Firstfruits, 2006), as well as for his speculative fiction collection Lion City (Epigram, 2018). He is also the author of the best-selling non-fiction work SQ21: Singapore Queers in the 21st Century (Oogachaga, 2006), the movie novelisation Eating Air (Firstfruits, 2008), the poetry collections Loud Poems for a Very Obliging Audience and A Book of Hims (Math Paper Press, 2016 and 2017), as well as the children’s history book Twisted Temasek and the historical fantasy novel Utama (both Epigram, 2025).
Yi-Sheng’s other works have appeared in numerous anthologies and literary journals, including Twin Cities, The Epigram Books Collection of Best New Singaporean Short Stories, This Is How You Walk On The Moon, CERIPH, QLRS, BiblioAsia, Clarkesworld, Strange Horizons, The Best of World SF: Volume 1, Sengkang Sci-Fi Quarterly, Speculative Insight and The Sunday Morning Transport. He has also co-edited publications such as GASPP: A Gay Anthology of Singapore Poetry and Prose (The Literary Centre, 2010), Eastern Heathens: An Anthology of Subverted Asian Folklore (Ethos Books, 2013), Heat (Fixi Novo, 2016) and A Mosque in the Jungle: Classic Ghost Stories by Othman Wok (Epigram, 2021). Additionally, he has translated Wong Yoon Wah’s poetry collections The New Village (Ethos Books, 2012) and Homecomings (Global Publishing, 2023).
Having previously co-organised the multidisciplinary art event SPORE Art Salon and IndigNation: Singapore's Pride Season, he has collaborated with theatre and dance companies to create a diverse range of performance works. These include 251 (Toy Factory Theatre, 2007), Georgette (Musical Theatre Ltd, 2007), The Last Temptation of Stamford Raffles (W!ld Rice, 2008), Reservoir (TheatreWorks, 2008), Bird Call (Arts Fission, 2009), The Lan Fang Chronicles (Choy Ka Fai, 2012), Perfection of 10 (Sean Tobin, 2012), Painted Shadows: A Queer Haunting of the National Gallery (The Substation, 2016), Ayer Hitam: A Black History of Singapore (2019) and Desert Blooms: The Dawn of Queer Singaporean Theatre (Centre 42, 2019).
He has written theatre and dance criticism for The Straits Times, The Substation Magazine, Fridae, The Flying Inkpot and The Online Citizen, and has been a reporter for the children’s newspaper What’s Up: News For Kids. He has also contributed essays on sexuality and gender for Why Not Magazine, and served as a documentary blogger for the Flying Circus Project (2007, 2010, 2013), the Singapore International Festival of the Arts (2010, 2015, 2016) and Curators Academy.
His website is ngyisheng.com and he tweets and Instagrams at @yishkabob.
Author Photo and Biography © Ng Yi-Sheng. All rights reserved.
