Category Archives: China
Toni Morrison, Maxine Hong Kingston, Leslie Silko: The Chinese Connection
February 6, 2012 In 1985 Toni Morrison, Maxine Hong Kingston, and Leslie Silko traveled together to China, going up the Li River in a boat. Kingston and Silko have now come out with new books — Kingston, I Love a … Continue reading
Ralph Ellison, Marianne Moore: Yams and Nectarines
January 16, 2013 The yams are as real as anything in Invisible Man. The mere smell of them sends a “stab of swift nostalgia” coursing through the protagonist. The years of his life seem so many yams eaten: candied, … Continue reading
Children’s Books, Children’s Songs: Gertrude Stein, Paul Robeson
September 5, 2012 Last year Yale University Press brought out Gertrude Stein’s To Do: A Book for Alphabets and Birthdays, never published in her lifetime. Stein had written it as a follow-up to her first children’s book, The World is … Continue reading
All Saints Bookstore, Beijing
June 13, 2012 We were in Hong Kong on June 4, the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown. A candlelight vigil had been held in Victoria Park for the past 23 years. This year, 180,000 people showed up. There … Continue reading