stufarq wrote:I don't think there's any suggestion there of sexual buse, just physical.
"I did spend a year in Singapore when I was very small, but I don’t remember much about it. It might have left some vague traumatic impression… I’ve actually got cigarette burns on my feet. My parents told me it was the Chinese nurse, although I’m more inclined to believe it was my parents. I remember the voyage back home, we came back on, erm, a slow boat from China. I was apparently continually traumatised by monkeys, they where strangely attracted to me."
[...] Do you think of your childhood often?
"No, although I’m sure it’s all very relevant. I’m quite proud of it. What it taught me and the things I think I still carry from that time, but I think I tend to think a lot of that comes through in what I do. I don’t consciously go back and refer to it for material. I wouldn’t dream of going into analysis, for instance, to find out what happened one black night in 1963."
The one black night in 1963 seems, to me at least, refer to a separate incident from Singapore and the cigarette burns. It may be the same, or not. But something in it just gives out the impression he might've thought to have been molested at some point.
Of course there are personal reasons for me to read it that way, which have nothing to do with Von himself. But I digress.
stufarq wrote:Thinking about it, it's a surprisingly candid revelation considering he wasn't even asked anything remotely related to the subjects of family or childhood. He just volunteered it.
Well, he approaches the subject of Singapore through the topic of Hong Kong, sort of sliding towards his earliest memories from that part of the world. These sorts of things may rise to the surface of the subconcious given the convenient moment, and people have been known to sort of 'blurt' them out without giving it much thought. Passing mention through association, I'm not all that convinced he intended to make much of a point out of it.