Originally published in 1945 and now reissued with a new introduction by the author, Jade Snow Wong's story is one of struggle and achievements. These memoirs of the author's first twenty-four years are thoughtful, informative, and highly entertaining. They not only portray a young woman and her unique family in San Francisco's Chinatown, but they are rich in the details that light up a world within the world of America. The third-person singular style is rooted in Chinese literary form, reflecting cultural disregard for the individual, yet Jad Snow Wong's story also is typically American.
We first meet Jade Snow Wong the child, narrowly confined by the family and factory life, bound to respect and obey her elders while shouldering responsibility for younger brothers and sisters - a solemn child well versed in the proper order of things, who knew that punishment was sure for any infraction of etiquette. Then the schoolgirl caught in confusion between the rigid teaching of her ancestors and the strange ways of her foreign classmates. After that the college student feeling her was toward personal identity in the face of parental indifference or outright opposition. And finally the artist whose early triumphs were doubled by the knowledge that she had at long last won recognition from her family.
"A sensitive and revealing story of a Chinese American girl's coming of age in America. It is unique." - New York Herald Tribune
"A fascinating narrative, not only because of the courage and humour which shine through every page of the book, but also because it shows how the members of a typical Chinese family can adapt themselves to American conditions and take their part in the national life of the United States without losing the essentials of the cultural heritage which they rightly prize." - Times Literary Supplement
"A sensitive and revealing story of a Chinese American girl's coming of age in America. It is unique."--New York Herald Tribune

Wong, Jade Snow

Buffalo Bill Historical Center

United States, United States of America

Seattle, Washington State, 1989

Repr. 3rd print, Seattle, 1991

Reprint., Seattle, 1989

Reprint. Originally published: New York : Harper, 1950.

No well brought up Chinese girl refers to herself in the first person, so the author tells her charming story in the approved Chinese fashion. How, as the fifth daughter of a hard-working Chinese tailor, she and her sisters lived in a San Francisco basement, cutting, sewing, and sorting hundreds of men's overalls for the wholesale market. How she went to school and later, in face of parental opposition, to college. Of her quiet persistent struggle to use her knowledge and talents which finally lead to her father's acceptance of her as an Independent person.
But besides making us acquainted with her own attractive personality, Jade Snow Wong gives fascinating descriptions of Chinese ceremonies, festivals and customs, such as the treatment of the bride after the wedding ceremony, and the even more surprising one of Gathering the Bones.

Reprint of the Harper edition of 1950. The narrative shows how members of a typical Chinese family in San Francisco adapt themselves to American conditions.

SAP The memoirs of a young woman relate how she and her fmaily manage to keep their Chinese heritage alive while adapting to the American way of life.

2023-10-09