AlliterAsian Read Online Free Page A

as the “Father of the Sun Jar” or for his artistic antics like the pop-up shop that never opened or the wedding registry for his “marriage” to his straight male companion, it’s clear that his memory will live on through friends, family, and fans, but mostly through the collection of work he has left behind. — Alan Woo, 2015
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â  A BOUT THE A UTHOR
    Alan Woo started as a volunteer with Ricepaper magazine, editing the bi-weekly online newsletter RiceBeta listing Asian-Canadian art events across the country. He went on to write numerous articles for the magazine, including interviews with high-profile names such as Margaret Cho and Wayson Choy, while also profilingup-and-coming artists in the community. He has since written a children’s book, Maggie’s Chopsticks , which won the Christie Harris Illustrated Children’s Literature award at the 2013 BC Book Prizes. His next children’s book, Chinese Skip , is currently in development with Kids Can Press.

The First Lady of Film: Anna May Wong
    Ricepaper 10, no. 1 (2005)
    Anthony Chan
    Hollywood studio moguls could not ignore her sensual, intelligent allure. China’s government both censored and celebrated her films; Europe’s high society hailed her as a figure of exotic fashion. In a world where recognition for any actress of colour was rare, Anna May Wong defied racism to become a legend in her own time. This month, Ricepaper celebrates the centenary of this pioneer Chinese-American screen siren.
    In an age when Hollywood offered only Charlie Chan and Little Lotus Flower roles, a strong willow sprang to life. Her grandfather, Leung Chew Wong, arrived in the United States during the 1850s. Anna May was born in 1905, the second daughter of California-born parents, Sam Sing Wong and Gon Toy Lee, and the second of their seven children. She was given the name Liu Tsong Wong, which means “frosted yellow willow.” Her father ran a laundry outside of central Chinese Los Angeles.
    Young Anna May Wong was fascinated with the movie shoots in her neighbourhood. At the age of eleven, Wong began cutting classes so that she could sneak off to the sets of the “moving pictures” that were being filmed on location in Chinese Los Angeles.
    Wong later reminisced, “I would worm my way through the crowd and get as close to the cameras as I dared. I’d stare and stare at these glamorous individuals, directors, cameramen, assistants,and actors in greasepaint who had come down into our section of town to make movies.”
    Enter Ms Wong
    Wong began with marginal roles in a handful of films, and then in 1922, at the young age of seventeen, she had her first starring role in The Toll of the Sea . In this adaptation of Madame Butterfly, Wong played a young Chinese maiden named Lotus Flower who is abandoned by her European-American husband. Many critics responded to Wong’s performance with great enthusiasm and praise.
    The New York Times was laudatory, exclaiming: “Miss Wong stirs in the spectator all the sympathy her part calls for … She makes the deserted little Lotus Flower a genuinely appealing, understandable figure. She should be seen again and often on the screen.”
    But this role would come back to haunt Wong, as many Chinese came to perceive her characters as demeaning to China and to Chinese people in general. Some Chinese journalists claimed that Wong “lost face” for China. In fact, when Anna May’s half-brother first saw Anna May on film in China, he warned their mother: “Take her out [of the pictures], quick.”
    An American Asian in Europe
    Undaunted by her critics, she continued her career. German director Richard Eichberg made Wong an un-refusable offer to star in five pictures abroad. In Hollywood, she had no major contracts and no real recognition. She was eager to try her luck elsewhere.
    Working in Europe’s film industry was challenging.