"It was an impish concoction, and things were bound to get fervid once hydroxy-alpha-sanshool and capsaicin hooked up." That's how the opening line of the inaugural edition of MaLa, Chengdu's English-language literary-arts magazine, sets the tone, almost daring the reader to sample this potentially nerve-tingling, taste-bud-numbing spicy, hot punch - so endemic to Sichuan cuisine.
Editor Peter Goff, who launched the magazine in June, christened it MaLa (meaning "numb and hot") - "a title that is a bow to creativity, passion and originality", "a doffing of the cap" to the paper's "East and West collusion".
The magazine emerged, primarily, from the weekly outpourings of the writing group that would turn up every Wednesday evening at the bookstore-cum-caf in Chengdu's Bookworm.
"A lot of solid writing came out of those meetings," says Goff, who runs the Bookworm franchise in Chengdu and Suzhou. The idea to anthologize these works was a natural progression.
What began as a vehicle to give permanence to some of the well-honed literary voices in Chengdu soon turned into an anthology with an international flavor. It included contributions by celebrity writers from across the globe - Pulitzer-prize-winning novelist Colum McCann from New York; poet, aesthete and arts magazine editor Alberto Ruy Sanchez from Mexico; Indian musician, novelist and teacher of creative writing at University of East Anglia, Amit Chaudhuri.
The second issue, planned for a March 2011 release, has an even wider canvas and a more pronounced Chinese slant. Heavyweight Chinese writers - Qiu Xiaolong, the creator of the bookish sleuth Inspector Chen; poet Han Dong and novelist-screenwriter Bi Feiyu, the last two in English translation - will contribute to the issue.
The magazine will also run a complete package on local artists like Zhang Dawei, including artworks, an interview with the painter and his musings/jottings, in English translation. Works by local photographers and short interviews with them will also feature.
Katherine Platt, who has helped compile a couple of anthologies of Chengdu-based poets, published in English translation, and writes a column in the local Chengdoo magazine, is putting together the poetry-in-translation section.
"Each issue will feature a major Chengdu poet like Bai Hua and Ma Yan, in translation, plus an interview with the poet," Platt informs.
The theme for the second issue of MaLa is "fault-lines", in an obvious reference to the quake that ripped through Sichuan on May 12, 2008, affecting at least 15 million lives.
"But we are also trying to look at emotional, psychological fault-lines, schisms across families, for example," Goff says.
There was a deluge of overseas submissions after the magazine invited entries for the second issue. "We are hoping to have a wider Asian presence," he says.
"The challenge now is to retain an identity," he says.
"The focal point will always be writers from within China and China-related themes. We are aiming to have not just voices from China but a China voice."
Going by the spate of submissions, that voice is resonating across the world.