| Conversations with Maxine Hong Kingston Contributor(s): Skenazy, Paul (Editor), Martin, Tera (Editor) |
|
 |
ISBN: 1578060591 ISBN-13: 9781578060597 Publisher: University Press of Mississippi OUR PRICE: $29.70 Product Type: Paperback Published: June 2014 Annotation: In a fascinating collection of interviews, renowned author Maxine Hong Kingston talks about her life, her writing, and the role of Asian-Americans in our history. As her books always hover along the hazy line between fiction and memoir, she clarifies the differences and exults in the difficulties of distinguishing between the remembered and the re-created. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Biography & Autobiography | Literary Figures - Literary Criticism | American - General |
| Dewey: B |
| LCCN: 98-6741 |
| Series: Literary Conversations |
| Physical Information: 0.82" H x 6.06" W x 9.03" (1.07 lbs) 266 pages |
| Themes: - Cultural Region - Chinese - Cultural Region - Western U.S. - Cultural Region - West Coast - Ethnic Orientation - Asian - Geographic Orientation - California |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: n 1976 Maxine Hong Kingston burst into American literature with the publication of The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts. Since then her subsequent works--China Men (1980) and Tripmaster Monkey: His Fake Book (1989)--have startled readers with their complex projections of Asian-American life as a bicultural and bilingual adventure filled with contemporary confusions and ancient legends, inherited values, and new loyalties. Kingston has written of her family upbringing in Stockton, California, of the stories her mother told her as advice and warning, of her father's illegal arrival in the United States, of the exploits of grandfathers who worked on the rails in California, of San Francisco street life in the 1960s, and of traditional Chinese legends. Whatever her subject, she claims America for herself and other Asian Americans whose histories are an essential part of the larger American tapestry. In this collection of interviews Kingston talks about her life, her writing, and her objectives. From the first, her books have hovered along the hazy line between fiction and nonfiction, memoir and imagination. As she answers her critics and readers, she both clarifies the differences and exults in the difficulties of distinguishing between the remembered and the re-created. She explains how she worked to bridge her parents' Chinese dialect with American slang, how she learned to explore her inheritance and find new relevance in her mother's "talk stories," and how she developed the complex juxtapositions of myths and memoir that fill her books. Always savvy, often provocative, constantly amused and amusing, Kingston provides a vivid commentary on her writing and offers insight into a body of her work. Paul Skenazy is a professor of American literature and provost at Kresge College, University of California, Santa Cruz. Tera Martin is completing her doctorate in American literature at University of California, Santa Cruz. |
Contributor Bio(s): Skenazy, Paul: - Paul Skenazy is a professor of American literature and provost at Kresge College, University of California, Santa Cruz. Tera Martin is completing her doctorate in American literature at University of California, Santa Cruz. |