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Jonathan Dee, associate professor of English and creative writing at Syracuse University, picked up Anthony Veasna So’s application from a pile of other applicants in January 2017. He remembers the application stood out for its storytelling — the passion So continued to grow during his time at SU.

“His writing is brilliantly funny, restless and smart. It’s very much like Anthony himself,” Dee said.

So’s book, “Afterparties,” has claimed national attention, including from four Syracuse professors, since its release this past August. Dana Spiotta, Jonathan Dee, Mary Karr and George Saunders all teach in SU’s English Department and contributed blurbs of praise to the back cover of So’s collection of stories.

Originally from Stockton, California, So attended SU’s Master of Fine Arts Program in Creative Writing and graduated in 2020. He died unexpectedly last December before the release of his book, which was then released posthumously. “Afterparties” is a collection of short stories influenced by So’s life as a Cambodian American in Stockton.

Both Dee and Spiotta said they exalted So for his book.

“It speaks to a lot of young people’s experiences,” Spiotta said. “We haven’t really heard from someone like Anthony before.”

His stories were original because he wrote about generational trauma, Spiotta said. So’s parents emigrated from Cambodia to the U.S. as teenagers as a result of the Cambodia genocide.

While So wrote about heavy topics, Spiotta said he infused humor, pop culture references and his queer identity into his work, which lightened its complexity.

She said that he was talented, determined and brilliant from the moment he arrived in Syracuse. No one was surprised when he first had a story published in The New Yorker or got his book deal, Spiotta said, because everyone could tell he was going to succeed.

So completed his master’s degree in Creative Writing at SU in 2020, and grew his passion for storytelling while a student. (from left to right: SU Creative Writing Professor Sarah Harwell, Professor Dana Spiotta, Anthony Veasna So)
Courtesy of Dana Spiotta

Zeynep Özakat was So’s classmate and best friend at Syracuse — they lived together for two of their three years at SU. The two met on Facebook when they messaged each other about graduate school acceptances and their decision to attend SU.

So’s writing reflected his life and personality: big, boisterous and funny ideas are on the surface of a deep tenderness and love for people and his characters, Özakat said.

“Just the way you interact with the world and the way you interact with people just comes up inevitably in your art,” she said about So’s writing.

Even in the first few pages of “Afterparties,” So paints a complex and artistic picture of his characters and of Stockton. In the opening story, readers immediately meet two sisters observing a man at a donut shop, and So’s simple and humorous descriptions hold deeper themes of familial relationships, a connection to Cambodia and a curious and inquisitive approach to storytelling.

“There’s so many layers to it and there’s such a deep tenderness and love for all the characters in that book,” Özakat said. “He deeply understood people in a way that was very unique.”

Özakat recalls So telling her that Syracuse has similarities to Stockton, specifically the feel of the city. She said being away from Stockton and his family let So reimagine where he was from.

“I thought about how frivolous and offensive my life was,” Anthony Veasna So wrote, about his college experience. “How Dad worked day and night to put me through Stanford so that I could fail my computer classes and then study art. So I could drop acid on a Tuesday afternoon and sit with my friend who wasted tears on searchable digital images of art. I stared at my hands, and Dad’s hands came to me in a vision. Their roughness. The way the calluses made you feel the years of working the rice fields, the decades of repairing cars, the continuous present of duplex renovations. I brought my palms together and let my fingers collapse into themselves. Here were my stupid hands, sheltered from real work. I should use my hands to immortalize the hands of Dad, I thought. I should photograph the duplexes for future generations to see. That’s the very least I could do.”

A photo posted by newyorkermag

Additionally, So played with sentence structure; he wasn’t afraid to write a really long sentence and then spend an hour making it beautiful, Özakat added.

Spiotta said she’s sad that So died at such a young age, as he was poised to succeed. It’s heartbreaking he’s not here, she said, but he will live on through his book.

“He had all these intersections of interesting experiences that he brought into his work. It made the work just so … fresh and exciting,” the English professor said.

Spiotta, Dee and Özakat all said that So’s experience in Syracuse not only gave him time to refine his writing skills, but also impacted his ideas.

So would regularly drop by both Spiotta and Dee’s office hours to chat, the two professors said, and he would stay for hours. They said his “brilliant” curiosity for books and the world stood out among other writers.

In the acknowledgements of “Afterparties,” So expressed his gratitude for Spiotta, Dee, Özakat and others from his time at SU, calling them his “Syracuse family.” He wrote that his teachers at the university changed his development as a writer, but Spiotta and Dee said that So also changed Syracuse.

Özakat said that So brought energy to the M.F.A program and his classmates.

“I couldn’t imagine what it would have been like without Anthony,” she said. “He was the type of person who would make connections everywhere he went.”

Published on September 13, 2021 at 10:12 pm