Multiethnic Literatures in the U.S.

Biography

Chang-Rae Lee (born July 29, 1965) is a first-generation Korean American novelist.Lee was born in Korea in 1965. He emigrated to the United States with his family when he was 3 years old. Raised in Westchester, New York, Lee attended Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire. He graduated from Yale University with a degree in English and from the University of Oregon with a MFA in writing. He worked as a Wall Street financial analyst for a year before turning to writing full time.

Chang-rae Lee, the first Korean-American novelist to be published by a major press, focuses on the experiences of first-and second-generation immigrants. His novels explore the nuances of intergenerational relations, the problems of assimilation, and the relationship of culture and memory to identity. While these concerns link him to other contemporary Asian-American writers, Lee’s fiction also draws heavily on other influences.

Lee experiments with form in his first novel, Native Speaker (1995), which won the PEN/Hemingway Award and centers around a Korean American industrial spy. The novel explores themes of alienation and betrayal as felt or perpetrated by immigrants and first-generation citizens, and played out in local politics. It is part detective story, part minimalist chronicle of a failing marriage, reminiscent of John Updike. His prose style has been compared to that of both John Cheever and Kazuo Ishiguro. In 1999, he published his second novel, A Gesture Life. This elaborated on his themes of identity and assimilation through the narrative of an elderly physician who remembers treating Korean comfort women during World War II. His 2004 novel Aloft received mixed notices from the critics and featured Lee’s first protagonist who is not Asian American, but a disengaged and isolated Italian-American suburbanite forced to deal with his world. Lee teaches writing at Princeton University, where he has served as the director of Princeton’s Program in Creative Writing. He is taking a sabbatical to serve as writer-in residence at Punahou School.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chang-Rae_Lee

http://biography.jrank.org/pages/4525/Lee-Chang-rae.html 

Bibliography 

Native Speaker – Publisher: Penguin Group (USA). March 1996

A Gesture Life – Publisher: Penguin Group (USA). October 2000

Langue natale - Publisher: Editions de l’Olivier. French. March 2003

Aloft – Publisher: Penguin Group (USA). March 2004

Turbulenzen - Publisher: Fischer Taschenbuch Vlg. April 2006

The Surrendered – Publisher: Riverhead Hardcover. April 2008 

Annotated Bibliography 

Belluck, Pam. “Being of Two Cultures and Belonging to Neither.” New York Times, July 10, 1995, B1.This article is a book review of Native Speaker, which has prompted similar soul-searching among some Koreans and other Asian-American readers. It has explored the same confusion of many Asian-American people. 

Homans, John. “Soft Aloft - Chang-rac Lee’s new novel of the Long Island suburgs, Aloft, is billowing and insubstantial, like a cloud on a summer afternoon.” New York Book Review, Mar 1, 2004.It is a book review of Aloft. The author compared Aloft with Lee’s first two novels, and described the meaning of the title of the book. 

Kakutani, Michiko. “BOOKS OF THE TIMES; Fitting In Perfectly on the Outside, but Lost Within.” The New York Times. April7, 2008.Review of Change-Rae Lee’s novel, “A Gesture Life.” This article compares “A Gesture Life” with “Native Speaker” by comparing belonging, assimilation, self-knowledge, and genuine emotional connection.  

Cooper, Rand Richards. “Excess Identities.” The New York Times. April 9, 1995A review of a novel, “Native Speaker,” which focuses on the character of the book, Henry, and how he is almost a reflection of the “American immigrant.” 

Weesner, Ted. “Some-thang to Behold.” Powel’s Books. September 17, 2006.Review of “Aloft.” The review goes into intensive description of the main character of the book, Jerry. Also the review focuses on the language style that it is written in.

Biography 

In 1969 in New York City, Colson Whitehead was born.  He grew up in Manhattan.  He attended Trinity School, eventually attending Harvard College, the undergraduate college of Harvard Universtiy.  He graduated in 1991.  After graduating, he returned to New York and is now residing in Brooklyn.

            Following graduation, Whitehead worked as an assistant editor for Village Voice.  He then became a pop culture critic where he had the duties of writing reviews for books and music.  Eventually he became the magazines television columnist.  His other writings have been featured in Vibe, New York Times, New York Magazine, and Newsday. 

            Whitehead had his first novel, The Intuitionist, published in 1999 and won a Whiting Writers’ Award in 2000.  He was also praised as “Writer on the Verge” by the Voice Literary Supplement.  The novel was well-liked by many, including Boston Globe and San Francisco Chronicle, who named it the Best Book of the Year, and GQ, who named it one of the Top Twenty Books of the Millennium.  The next novel that was published was John Henry Days in 2001.  It was named one of the “Best 5 Books of the Year” by New York Times and was acclaimed by Newsweek, the Washington Post, and USA Today to name a few.  The novel was a finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award and won the Anisfield-Wolf Prize for its issues of race and the Young Lions Award.

            In 2002, Whitehead received the MacArthur Fellowship.  The following year his third book, The Colossus of New York, was published; his only nonfiction book to date.  Next to be published was Apex Hides the Hurt in 2006.  It was renowned as one of the New York Times’ 100 Most Notable Books of the Year and was well-received by Entertainment Weekly, the New York Observer, and the Charleston Gazette.

Sources

http://books.google.com/books?id=Sl5kaqcSSAcC&pg=PA333&lpg=PA333&dq=colson+whitehead+1969+new+york+city&source=web&ots=ZlaZ-ssfFY&sig=fyWWYxeN9YP1qSz1RDKgbzKnGJI&hl=en#PPA333,M1

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apex_Hides_the_Hurt

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colson_Whitehead

http://www.colsonwhitehead.com/biography.shtml

 Bibliography 

Whitehead, Colson. Apex Hides the Hurt. New York: Anchor Books, 2007.

Whitehead, Colson. John Henry Days. New York: Anchor Books, 2001.

Whitehead, Colson. The Colossus of New York. New York, Anchor Books, 2004.

Whitehead, Colson. The Intuitionist. New York: Anchor Books, 2000. Annotated Bibliography

1.) Aubrey, Bryan.  “The Intuitionist.”  Work Analysis on Colson Whitehead’s The Intuitionist. Magill’s Literary Annual 2000.  Salem Press, Inc. 

 Aubrey writes about Whitehead’s work, The Intuitionist and explores deep seriousness issues of racism and urban decay, as well as different ideas about ways of acquiring knowledge.

2.) Bérubé, Michael. “Race and Modernity in Colson Whitehead’s the Intuitionist.” The Holodeck in the Garden: Science and Technology in Contemporary American Fiction. Ed. Peter Freese and Charles B. Harris. Normal, IL: Dalkey Archive, xxviii, 2004. 163-178.

The essay examines the themes of race and modernity in the novel “The Intuitionist,” by Whitehead.  A plot overview is given of the novel along with a description of the physical and social setting.  The prominence of the main character’s disability is examined.

3.) Butler, Robert. “The Postmodern City in Colson Whitehead’s the Colossus of New York and Jeffrey Renard Allen’s Rails Under My Back.” CLA Journal 48.1 (2004): 71-87.

4.) Cassidy, Thomas.  “John Henry Days.”  Work Analysis on Colson Whitehead’s John HenryDays.  Magill’s Literary Annual 2002.  Salem Press, Inc.

 This is a review done of Whitehead’s novel, John Henry Days. Cassidy claim this book takes on a “serio-comic” view of race and the meaning in American life.  

5.) Liggins, Saundra. “The Urban Gothic Vision of Colson Whitehead’s the Intuitionist (1999).” African American Review 40.2 (2006): 358-69

This article discusses how Whitehead’s book, The Intuitionist, fits into contemporary African American gothic literature. Whitehead uses gothic landscape and conventions to show African American’s struggle for upward mobility and their bleak outlook on life. Liggins argues that the setting of the story illustrates the isolation African Americans face. Whitehead sets up a contrast with the poverty and prosperity of the characters, showing the racial and gender discrimination that took place in the 1950’s and 1960’s.

6.) Sherman, Suzan. “Colson Whitehead.” Bomb 76 (2001): 74-80.

Sherman writes about Whitehead’s metaphors for upward mobility, race, and religion in the book, The Intuitionist. She also writes about other works by Whitehead, including his ability to bring forgotten parts of history back into modern day in John Henry Days.  

Dave McAndrew
Eng 113
Aloft

Throughout the book Chang-rae Lee shows the Jerry only fly’s his plane alone to think about everything that has gone on. Jerry flying his plane alone is like his get away from everything in the world. The passages I am writing about have Theresa in the cockpit with Jerry, making it both of their getaways. She has been going with him to her Brother Jack’s house every time he fly’s there. This trip is significant because Theresa is asking her father to let Jack and his family move in with him, which surprises him at first. Jack is apparently losing his home and almost everything he owns. Jerry is assuming he will be moving into a condo that he can afford, but Theresa is convincing him to let them move in to his home.
Theresa states Jerry has enough room for Jack’s family and should consider calling Jack to tell him to move in. Jerry soon finds out that this was all planned out from the start, and basically everything was set before her father made the decision. She was just helping him make the decision in an easier fashion. Everything during the plane ride was going fine until they hit a storm that didn’t look like much. Jerry warned Theresa about the turbulence that could come about, and she obeyed his directions. Jerry was particularly scared because he never wants anyone on the plane with him. They flew through the storm and made it safely, although something was wrong with Theresa. Her water had broken and it was spilling all over the ground, at first glance her father said “I hope you peed,” but he knew there was something else wrong.
Sure enough Theresa needed to be rushed to the hospital at Yale. Her hospital was in a different direction of the way they were flying. Jerry had to make a quick decision to call into the tower and get clearance to land on the runway. He then blamed himself for what was happening because he should have said no to her when she asked to get on the plane. Jerry ended up landing the plane and getting her to the hospital where she died because of her conditions. If you read the book or any passage written on the blog you will see that Theresa was not being treated for her cancer because she wanted to have the child first. This makes for NOT a happy ending at all. It turns out that Jack’s family moves in with Jerry after all.
I did kind of enjoy the part when Jack built the pool and Jerry stands in it once or twice a day. I think it is a binary opposite because he loves to be in the plane way up in the sky to think about everything. Now he is in the ground standing in a hole that would soon be his pool thinking about things. It was kind of interesting I really don’t know why.

The passage I’m going to look at is from page 298 of Aloft by Change Rae Lee. It is something Paul says referring to Theresa, but which also applies directly to Jerry. In this passage, we can see the similarities between the two and also perhaps why Jerry treated Daisy the way he did.

“There’s no respect anymore. People want what they want and they want it now. Nothing comes before them…They think they can go anywhere and do anything, as if none of their actions has any bearing except on themselves, like they’re in their own mini-biosphere, all needs self-providing, everything self-contained, setting it up like God would do himself. It doesn’t matter that there are people the the ourside tapping at the glass, saying, ‘Hey, hey, I’m here. Look out here.’”

Theresa refuses to talk about her cancer and avoids the subject at all costs. Everytime Jerry got into his plane, he was up in the air in his own little world. By doing this, he shut out all the people that he claimed to love, especially Rita. He could have taken Rita with him on any number of occasions, but chose instead to leave her home because he needed his “Jerry time.” Similarly, Theresa won’t talk about her illness with anyone including her husband. She has made up her mind about deciding to wait for the baby before treating it. If you read the book, you know this results in her death.

The question then is when has a person gone too far? When do they pass the point of no return? When does a person stop caring about what other people want and only listen to the voice inside their heads? For Jerry, the day he changed is when he started treating Daisy like she was some maid/housewife where she took orders and got an allowance. Instead of trying to figure out what was wrong with Daisy, he assumed she needed a little tough love to get her back to normal. Instead of looking at the situation from all angles, he saw the recent shopping sprees as Daisy being disobidient.

Jerry passed the point of no return the day he yelled at Daisy. Once he “scolded” her for her behavior and decided to put her on an allowance, he ruined their relationship. Had she lived, maybe they would’ve been able to fix it. Jerry stopped thinking about his wife and started thinking about some “perfect” wife that does exactly what her man says. He tried to shape Daisy into this woman and ignored her crys for help like swinging naked in the park.

It is interesting because had Daisy gotten the appropriate medical care she probably would’ve lived a longer life. Maybe this is why Jerry feels the need to get into his plane everytime he has a problem. The last time he reacted to a problem, he let Daisy die. But what does shutting someone out do? Nothing. It makes them feel like they’re not even important enough to talk to. Rita probably felt like Jerry only cared about Jerry and not about the stability and love that they shared. He didn’t have enough faith in himself to not make the same mistake again.

Jerry loves his plane, but I also think he loves his family. He just doesn’t know how to communicate those feelings. He doesn’t want to directly confront a problem because he killed Daisy the last time. So, he aviods at all costs any discussion of problems by flying his plane. By the time he comes down, the problem has most likely blown over and things are back to normal with no resolution ever really coming.

A “Plane” Personality

            The first half of the novel “Aloft”, by Chang-rae Lee, starts off fairly slow, and most of the text seems to extensively describe suburban family life observed through the eyes of a middle aged man named Jerry. Many of the details discussed towards the beginning of the novel seem to be extremely unnecessary, that is, until we realize that this extensively descriptive and superficial narration is a key insight into Jerry Battles personality (which I believe is the focal point throughout the novel). Although most of Jerry’s long-winded narration seems unnecessary, we begin to realize that Lee uses Jerry Battle’s narration to represent the superficial personality and the behavior of most American’s today. We also notice that Lee might portray Jerry this way to show the consequences of a culture that only relies on observing what is shown on the surface without addressing the underlying factors; some of these consequences that arise include racism, sexism, and other shallow narrow-mindedness throughout society. Any person who has the same superficial viewpoints as Jerry will find it extremely hard not to judge others by their skin color, or gender.

                The biggest symbol Lee uses to highlight Jerry’s superficial observations is his recently bought, and frequently used, airplane in which he always chooses to fly alone. To me, this symbol presents the idea that in Jerry’s personal life, he prefers to be in control, or in the “cockpit”. This symbol is also present to emphasize Jerry’s “Plane Personality” which shows just how much he loves to observe others by only what he sees on the surface; Jerry’s “plane personality” resembles how Jerry uses his plane to skim the surface of the earth, while always observing sights from afar. It is no question that Jerry is a simple man with simple pleasures, and obviously would rather base his descriptions—and viewpoints of others—on the first idea that comes to mind. Jerry proves this when he states “like most people in this country I’m hopelessly obsessed with race and difference and can’t help but privilege the normative and fetishize what is not.”  By stating this, Jerry illustrates that his superficiality comes naturally, and he finds it impossible to act differently.  

            Throughout the novel, Jerry seems completely consumed with other people’s race, gender, and physical features. We first notice this when Jerry goes to visit the man in which he plans to purchase the used plane. During this meeting he makes it clear that the man is black, and mentions this even though he says “I should probably not so parenthetically mention right now that Hal was black.” By stating this, Jerry obviously realizes that he cannot help but obsess in anything other than what his acquaintances show on the surface. Jerry also shows this part of his personality as he describes his children, as well as his female companions. In all of these descriptions, Jerry uses physical qualities in his narration.

            Jerry also shows his shallow personality when he finds out his daughter has cancer. When Paul reveals that the available treatment may hurt the baby, the first thing Jerry says is “she can have another baby”. Although this type of dreadful news can make anyone speak irrationally, this extreme circumstance still proves Jerry’s superficial thought process. When Jerry makes this statement, he fails to realize that this baby might mean the world to his daughter; even more so than her own life. Nevertheless, Jerry’s instinctive response illustrates his selfish opinion which doesn’t factor in the feelings of his daughter. This confrontation with Paul definitely supports Jerry’s shallow, and sometimes selfish, personality.  

In the last section of the book, Cynthia Kadohata begins to summarize the message of her book. “Besides, I was no longer going to school from hope but from fear. I was not going because there were classes I was interested in or things that I wanted but because there were things I did not want”(p. 179). This summarizes how everyone usually goes about life. People go to work or school because of hope or fear. People work with the hope that they can make good money and provide for themselves and their families. On the other hand, we also go to work because we fear that we may end up without enough money and fall into the lower class. We go to school because it is a step towards getting a job. We also go because we fear that we will not get a good job and struggle throughout life. To put this in terms of the book, people go to work and school with the hope of being part of the upper class of Los Angeles in the 2050’s, or the fear that they may end up being blocked off the nice parts of the city.

These two themes are present in many parts of book. For example, Aunt Annie constantly writes letters to anyone that has information about Rohn. She has hope that he is still alive or that she can get him out of jail. Francie also has hope with Rohn. “I was so certain Rohn would return that my worry now was not whether he could come back, but what he would be like and how he had changed”(p. 219). Francie assumes that he is coming back and assumes that he is different. Even the small actions in the book are made because of hope or fear. Every time Francie and her friends leave their homes, they bring Mace or guns with them. Francie constantly grasps the Mace in her pocket with the fear that she may be attacked or robbed. She also keeps it in her pocket with the hope that it will protect her if those events ever occur. These two themes seem to compliment each other throughout the book.

Another theme that is also shown throughout the book is love. Aunt Annie obviously loves Rohn and shows it by staying with him throughout his troubles and searching for him when he was nowhere to be found. Jewel and Teddy were a more complicated couple. She stayed with him, bailed him out of jail, and defended him even though he beat her because she felt that she loved him. At the end of the book, she leaves to go east because there were no reasons to stay. She obviously did not love Teddy anymore. Then there is Francie and Mark. They go through good and bad times together and never seem to think about not having each other. They act as if to say if they are going to get through the rough times in that city, they are going to do it together.

With all the changes, destruction, and chaos in the book, three themes are held constant throughout the book. Even in the end of the book when Francie decides to stay in Los Angeles she does so because she is in love with Mark, she fears that she may lose that love if she goes somewhere else, and she hopes that things will get better. One of the messages Kadohata tries to send is that these three things can be present no matter how bad the world is. The only bad thing about this book is that it portrays no solution to the problems going on throughout the book. Kadohata warns the readers that this may be how life is like in the future if things don’t change now. There will be unbalanced social classes, riots, and chaos. Living with hope, love, and fear will not solve these problems.

            On page 190 Francie takes a moment to reflect on the present word situation.  Like in the Parable series the USA is being dominated by a dictatorship government that is more interested in itself then its citizens.  Political, social, and economical chaos is all the byproducts of the government in the Heart of the Valley of Love that Francie talk about in her passage.  Another thing that the government does is that it provokes fear in it citizens by arresting anyone for the pettiest to the most horrific crimes committed.  The government would even arrest a person if that thought that those people worked with the criminals. 

            Francie’s Auntie Annie is distort after Rohn is taken away by the police and does not return.  Annie writes daily to anyone that might have some information as to where Rohn is and if she could bail him out of jail.  Francie fears that all if her aunt’s letters will get her aunt in trouble with the police too. 

            The police and the rest of the government rule made everyone live in fear of doing anything wrong.  In the beginning of the passage Francie sees a helicopter searching for someone in the night.  When she sees this helicopter she is not sure how ot feel about it, which is interesting.  Normally people would be delighted that the police are keeping people safe.  Instead Francie wonders if she should side with the person the police are looking for because he might have done nothing wrong.  Francie, along with many others, are divided against trusting their government and thinking that the government is corrupt and evil.  Since people are not sure whether to trust the government or not many resort to living secret live to survive and live a moderately normal life.  A moderately normal life allows the citizens to get more water, food, and gas than the government gives them.  The government seems to spend most of its money on providing order to the citizens with law, rather then providing public good, which is something that the citizens really need. 

            Since the government tells its citizen how much of the resources they can have, resources are given in small rations and are expensive to buy from privately own companies.  The high prices and the small rations many people must resort to stealing in order to live.  All the stealing is making most of the people petty thieves.  The few that Francie says are not thieves are the rich.  This distinction makes a large gap between the rich and the poor.  However Franice say in the passage that she does not hate the rich for being rich.  They actually fought with the poor for change. 

            Francie also mentions that she believes that even though the world is corrupt and thinks that the corruption is coming to an end.  She states that she is not sure what would happen at the end of the corruption or when it will finally end, just that it will end someday.  She says “something was ending, which also meant that something was beginning.” Maybe Francie is waiting for an almost revolutionary change, a revolt against the government. At this point she just wants to be free from the fear. 

            Lastly Francie talks about the rioters.  In the beginning the rioters rioted because they wanted change.  Now they rioted just to destroy.  Why would the rioters want to destroy instead of making a point to the government?  It seems as though through the destruction of physical things they wish to destroy an era or fear. 

In the second half of In the Heart of the Valley of Love, there is a strong sense of time and a pang of wanting to be remembered. From the mentioning of typing has become a lost art, the star-spangled banner being played on the tv, days spent by the lake in the boathouse, Auntie Annie’s shopping spree memories, and to Nadine’s speech on never forgetting because it makes who you are, everything has become ephemeral but everyone is still seeking some type of permanence.

When mentioning Aunt Annie, it was all about how it used to be when going to the shopping mall was the norm. Now though, remembering and trying to reenact those times just brings about a strong sadness that those times are gone. Even Madeline, with all her beautiful beads, creates beautiful beaded necklaces for herself only to be never worn. And those beads are counted continuously only to be inventoried and later sold off.

For Francie and Mark, they decide to get tattoos with Francie choosing a vine around her wrist. The wine visually is just a circle, which also represents infinity, with no end and no beginning. And when you think of tattoos, you think of permanence, but even Carl the artist remarks on how the color will eventually fade in ten years. Not even the tattoos will last. This goes to show that nothing lasts, not even the structure society collapses. However, it is interesting to note that while it is 2052 in LA, these stories could easily, tragically, have been told within present-day Los Angeles. Jewel is trapped in an abusive affair, people behind walls argue and brawl, the people on the street carry guns, random violence is rampant.

In the book, “In the Heart of the Valley of Love,” two relationships can be compared to that of Jewel and Teddy: Lily’s parents and Nadine and Geoffrey. Jewel is Francie’s friend who also works at the campus newspaper as the managing editor and Teddy is her boyfriend. Lily was Francie’s friend growing up in Chicago, whose father used to beat her mother until she left him. Nadine is Francie’s cousin and her boyfriend was Geoffrey.
It is known to Francie as well as others that Teddy had beaten Jewel in the past yet she still bailed him out of jail because she felt that she owed him. As she said, “sometimes he’s lent me money when I really needed it, and whenever I’ve been desperately unhappy he’s put aside what he was doing to be with me” (68). Despite the fact that he beat her, she still felt that she loved him. When talking about the situation of Lily’s parents, Francie talked about how she and Lily used to try and please Lily’s father after he beat her mother. They would clean the kitchen, hoping for some acknowledgment from Lily’s abusive father. She compared that to Jewel bailing out Teddy. Jewel tried to please Teddy, hoping for some recognition.
Later, after getting her tattoo, Francie, Mark, and Carl had a talk with Jewel because she was upset. Jewel suspected that Teddy was cheating on her with another woman. Mark was appalled because he felt that she was wrongfully troubled because he was hurting someone else rather than her. As they have the talk, Francie again remembers Lily and her parents. In her head, Francie said “I didn’t know what kind of world this was, where a violent man’s infidelity might hurt a woman more than his beatings” (133). Her thought reigns true for the situation that Jewel was in. She was sad that he beat her but even more sad that he was with another woman.
The way Francie saw the relationship between her cousin Nadine and her boyfriend, Geoffrey, was similar to Jewel and Teddy’s relationship. Nadine lived with Francie in Chicago when Francie was 11 and Nadine was 17. She was going out with Geoffrey, a boy three years older. One night, they were arguing and Francie wondered. She said, “Maybe they were falling out of love but didn’t want to. Maybe they were falling more in love and couldn’t handle it” (155). That can be compared to Jewel and Teddy. They said that they were in love with each other, but they didn’t act like it. Jewel said she stayed with Teddy because he had a mansion in his head and he said he liked the fact that it was a challenge to control her. It cannot be fully known whether they truly do love each other.

Biography

Cynthia Kadohata 

            Cynthia Kadohata was born in Chicago in 1956 to two Japanese-American parents.  However she did not live in Chicago for a very long time.  A few months after she was born, Kadohata’s father got a job in Georgia as a chicken sexer.  Again when Cynthia was two her father found another chicken tenant job in Arkansas.  The years following she moved from Arkansas to Michigan, then back Chicago.  Finally at age fifteen, Kadohata’s family settled in Los Angeles. 

            Originally Kadohata had no plans to become an author while attending high school in LA.  Her dream job in high school was to be an astronaut.  There was one major problem with her dream, she had severe motion sickness.  Cynthia Kadohata finished high school early and started classes at Los Angeles City College.  After Los Angeles City College she attended the University of Southern California, where she received a degree in journalism.         

            A few months after graduating Cynthia Kadohata was hit by a car while crossing the street.  She broke her collarbone and severely damaged her arm and was unable to live on her own.  Cynthia Kadohata went to Boston to live with her sister while she recovered.  Kadohata began writing and submitting her stories to magazines and newspapers while she was healing.  After four long years of writing stories the New Yorker published one of her stories called Charlie O.  Shortly after getting her story published she was discovered by Andrew Wylie. 

            After joining Andrew Wylie, Kadohata grew tremendously as an author.  She wrote her first published novel, The Floating World and many of her other first few novels with Wylie.  He challenged her, even though she would not want to cooperate for the first few times.

            Later on in Kadohata’s career, she wrote her first children’s book, Kira-Kira.  After years of writing adult novels, Cynthia Kadohata was greatly praised for her children’s literature.  In fact, Kadohata won the 2005 John Newbury award for children’s literature.

            Cynthia Kadohata claims that much of her inspiration for her novels comes from her travels, both as a child and as an adult.  Kadohata said “just thinking about the American landscape and focusing on it, puts me in touch with what I think of as real, essential me.  I have to be in touch with the real, essential me whenever I sit down to write.”  Nothing inspires Cynthia Kadohata more than the road.

            Today Cynthia Kadohata is still living in Los Angeles but is making tours around the United States to promote her books.  Kadohata just released two books in the past two years Weedflower and CRACKER! The Best Dog in Vietnam.  Both of these books are children’s novels.

 Bibliography

28 Jan. 2008 <http://www.notablebiographies.com/news/Ge-La/Kadohata-Cynthia.html>.

 28 Jan. 2008 http://www.kira-kira.us/cyn.htm. Bibliography

Cynthia Kadohata Bibliography

• The Floating World (1989)
• In the Heart of the Valley of Love (1992)
• The Glass Mountains (1996)
• Kira-Kira (2004)
• Weedflower (2006)
• Cracker! The Best Dog in Vietnam (2007)

Annotated Bibliography   Works Cited Comer, Krista. “Western Literature At the Cnetury’s End: Sketches in Generation X, Los Angeles, and the Post-Civil Rights Novel.” The Pacific Historical Review 3rd ser. 72 (2003):  405-413. JSTOR. 12 Feb.  This work investigates how the writings of both Cynthia Kadohata and Sandra Ysing Loh comment on politics and culture of the “post-Civil Rights” era.  This work by Comer, in relation to Kadohata, states that she writes about new issues for Japanese Americans.  In particular, the writer describes the “post-internment scramble of Japanese Americans to survive and rebuild their loves” (Comer 408) in Kadohata’s works.  Comer also examines how class warfare, where nonwhites are considered the majority, brings about the “apocalyptic moment” in “In the Heart of the Valley of Love.”  Comer explains the loss of human attachment in Kadohata’s novel.  Comer also writes about the effect of consumer culture on American youth, as reflected in Kadohata’s and Loh’s writings. D’aguiar, Fred. “Review: the Diminutive Epic.” Third World Quarterly 1st ser. 12 (1990):  215-217. JSTOR. 12 Feb. 2008.  This work by D’aguiar discusses the influences of Kadohata’s writing from writers like Kazuo Ishiguro.  He examines the subject matter that is presented in Kadohata’s writing, such as the lives of Japanese Americans and their journey to survive in America. Matsumoto, Valerie. “Review: Pearls and Rocks.” The Women\_Review of Books 2nd ser. 7 (1989):  5-6. JSTOR. 12 Feb. 2008.  This article reviews “The Floating World” by Cynthia Kadohata.  Matsumoto comments on how the immigrant life of Japanese in America is reflected in this novel’s characters and their lives.  She writes about how Katohata shows “the struggles of generations coming to terms with their history.” (Matsumoto 6)