Notes For July 29th, 2009
This Day In Writing History
On July 29th, 1965, the writer Chang-Rae Lee was born in Seoul, South Korea. When he was three years old, Lee's father moved the family to the United States so he could finish his training and become a psychiatrist. The family moved first to Pittsburgh, then to New York.
As a young Korean-American boy, Chang-Rae Lee struggled to learn English. His parents only spoke to him and his older sister Eunei in Korean, so they could learn to speak English without a Korean accent. In his mind, Chang-Rae found himself caught between two languages. He didn't speak at all when he entered kindergarten. But by the time he was ten years old, he had become fluent in both languages and served as a translator for his mother, who had even more difficulty learning English.
Chang-Rae Lee's experiences as the son of Korean immigrants would shape his future writing career. He attended Phillips Exeter Academy, an exclusive East Coast prep school, then went to Yale. Instead of following the path of most children of Korean immigrants and study medicine or law, Lee majored in English. During college, he began writing fiction.
After graduating, he became an equities analyst for Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette, a Wall Street investment bank, while writing part-time. He found his job unfulfilling, so, taking a cue from his old friend and prep school roommate, novelist Brooks Hansen, he quit to become a writer. His unpublished early novel, Agnew Belittlehead, won him a scholarship and entrance to the creative writing program at the University of Oregon. After graduating in 1993, he was hired as an assistant writing professor by the University. That same year, he married his wife, Michelle Branca. She bore him two daughters.
In 1995, Chang-Rae Lee's first novel, Native Speaker, was published. In Lee's offbeat tale, Henry Park is a young Korean-American man who suffers from identity issues, alienation, and an inability to express grief over the sudden death of his seven-year-old son, who was accidentally killed by his white playmates in a freak mishap. The novel opens with Park's wife, who is also white, leaving him.
In an intriguing twist, Henry Park works as an operative for a shadowy detective agency whose clients hire it to dig up dirt on people. His psychological problems begin to affect his job, so he seeks therapy. Henry suffers from alienation because he was unable to fit in with either his parents' Korean culture or mainstream American culture. As he struggles to find himself, he asks his employers for a second chance and is assigned to infiltrate the campaign of John Kwang, a popular Korean-American politician and candidate for mayor of New York City - a task made difficult by the fact that Kwang reminds Henry of his father.
Native Speaker earned Chang-Rae Lee both the prestigious PEN / Hemingway Award and the distinction of being the first Korean-American novelist ever published by a major American press. His second novel, A Gesture Life, also dealt with identity and immigrant issues. It told the story of Doc Hata, a Korean who served in the Japanese Army during World War 2. As a child, he had been adopted by a wealthy Japanese couple. As a soldier, Hata falls in love with a Korean woman, who, like over 200,000 others, was forced to become a "comfort woman" for the Japanese soldiers.
After the war, Hata moves to America, where he fits in with his neighbors because he had become a successful businessman, but he is unable to connect emotionally with anyone. He suffers from a crisis of identity and is always at odds with his rebellious, mixed-race adopted daughter, Sunny. He adopted her when she was seven. Now a pregnant teenager, Hata forces her to have an abortion, hoping to save her from the failure that his life has become.
Chang-Rae Lee's third novel, Aloft, was published in 2o04. His latest novel, The Surrender, will be released soon. He still teaches creative writing.
Quote Of The Day
"The truth, finally, is who can tell it." - Chang-Rae Lee
Vanguard Video
Today's video is a film school student's fake trailer for a feature film version of Chang-Rae Lee's novel, Native Speaker. Enjoy!
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