Chinese immigrant Da Chen uses the `most romantic language' to tell his life story Elizabeth Taylor, Tribune literary editor
Published March 31, 2002
Writer Da Chen was born in China in 1962, referred to by some as the Year of Great Starvation, to a family that was part of the despised landlord class. With eloquence and humor, Chen recalled his childhood of poverty and pain in his critically acclaimed 2000 memoir, "Colors of the Mountain." The book closes as Chen heads to Beijing for college. In the second installment of his life story, "Sounds of the River" (see accompanying review), Chen tells of that time and of his determination to reach America. He arrived with $30 and a bamboo flute in Lincoln, Neb., before heading to New York, Columbia Law School and, eventually, Wall Street. Returning to the Midwest recently, he spoke with Tribune literary editor Elizabeth Taylor about his journeys:
Q. How did you start writing?
A. First of all, I write in English. At the very beginning of my writing career I looked at my legal pad and just stared at the first few words I wrote. I think I got stuck with the word "the" for a long time. Then I usually locked myself into this one little spare bedroom at night. In that nightly solitude I was visited and joined by laughter and cheers, and of course, tears of the past. That was when the memories began to come, and I think that really propelled me into this cause of writing.
I think my first book really taught me how to write, and that was a book that . . . just leapt out of me. It gave me the chronological structure and the colors, the density, richness, all the cast of people that I adore. It seems that these two books, as I reflect now over the course of writing them, I just really begin to realize there's only one word that really captures the spirit of writing both of them, which is the word "love." And I think these works are really for those who love me and for those who I love. And in doing so I want to remember them.
The thing about having poverty and humiliation in your childhood, as you recall the stories I told in "Colors of the Mountain," is that you have a lot of bad memories, but through writing this I realized that good people who helped me during that time now look extraordinarily good. They became giants in my head.
Q. So writing about the pain of your childhood eased the pain?
A. Not only that, it gives you joy. And now I begin to understand why ["Angela's Ashes" author] Frank McCourt thanks his father for poverty; not just that he was writing about poverty and became well-known and all that, but because that writing gives you a sort of a joy and almost a privilege that nobody would ever have. I think that was the point.
Q. How do you write so vividly in English about China?
A. I just see this unique opportunity to be able to combine both literary traditions within me, if I may say so. I grew up in these two cultures. It usually takes a second generation to make that happen, but I feel so blessed that I'm able to stand on the verge of both cultures and try to take the best from them, to tell the tales from that distant, that faraway land.
People tell me, "You know, Da, I really really love what you write about China. You have a China that is political, and you have an inner China that you love, that we share the love with you. That you bring us to really see the China that is not quite seen through some other writings." There are people who write about China and they hate it.
Q. You describe China as a colorful place, so how did it feel to be on Wall Street?
A. Still a country man, a country boy. I tell you, my first day on Wall Street, at Rothchild's Inc., . . . I bought a pair of nice leather shoes. And it rained on me. So the first thing I did was I took off my shoes and I hid them under my jacket because I really don't want the rain to rain on my shoes, on my new shoes. That was my first day on Wall Street.
Wall Street was a strange place, very. [E]verybody dressed so beautifully and so wonderfully, but it's a strange world for me. You know, the distance, the journey I have taken from the muddy field in Yellow Stone and then to arrive in the hallways in Wall Street, in a hallway that was basically a field with all those Rothchild brothers staring at you, is strange. It's like: "Mmm. What are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be doing some plowing somewhere?" So it was a journey.
Q. You did take a detour through the Midwest, stopping in Lincoln, Neb.
A. That was my first stop [in America]. . . . I instantly connected with the land, that prairie. It just opens you right up. The sweet air. I was so glad when I arrived that the airport was not like Denver, you know sprawling and with so many planes, but it was just like a bus station. And that, to me, looked like a destiny, like a destination. There's something final about it, the smallness. You know it's a very little, small station. And you say, "Honey, this is home." When you are in the middle of New York, you say: "This is not home. This is something still happening."
And I remember my first trip to a Supersavers in Lincoln, a big superstore, looking at the food and wondering why they have to have so many types of beef. And instantly I realized I had arrived in a food heaven. There were so many foods--watermelons, fruits, all kinds of them, begging for you to have them. When someone took me--realize I was still quite skinny then--to a Kentucky Fried Chicken for a treat, they bought me a bucket of drumsticks. I, of course, gobbled them up. The first question I asked was, "How many legs do American chickens have?" because in China, legs are very precious; all those chicken drumsticks are very precious, and here I have a bucket of legs.
I saw the miracle of college girls, my classmates, in Lincoln wearing matching earrings with matching scarves, all the way to the socks. And those are just melodies. You know, I'd be happy in China to have a shirt on my back, but here there's this music that flows through, that something makes sense, nicely tossed together, but it's there. And boys wearing matching ties with their socks and everything, sometimes boyfriends and girlfriends. You know, little miracles that we don't notice so much, like that road that connects all the way from the network of highways all the way to that dot of a farmhouse in the middle of Nebraska where an old farmer lives and they have a refrigerator, big TVs. Those are miracles. And you could really live a very secluded life but be connected with the world.
Q. As an artist, how does your calligraphy and flute music fit together with your writing?
A. I'm known for playing a soulful mountain song on my bamboo flute, a Chinese melody that I [learned] through my father, who taught me.
I talk about learning how to play flute in "Colors of the Mountain." The music that took me away from the misery, bounced off the river and hitting--eventually echoing against--the mountain. It brings me back to where I was.
I just really enjoy sharing this message of love, of unconditional family affection, that beauty of China. In my [book tour] talk, I speak again and again about the soul, about redemption, about fate and the significance of being a son and being a father.
Q. There's a line that you're told, "Don't forget where you come from little brother." And as I hear you talk I wonder, how could you ever forget where you come from?
A. It's not so much that I will forget it, it's just that each time you remind yourself it gives you that strength and lifts you up. Once I remember where I am from, I start from zero again. I'm back home in that little village. Once I'm there, I feel empowered because I feel like I'm again facing this monumental challenge. . . . Remembering where I come from gets me to revisit all those dreams, and that's the powerful part.
Q. Was it difficult to learn how to write?
A. I cherish that opportunity because I studied English, first of all, as a form of signs. You know, "I--am--Da--Chen--from--the--province--of . . ."--that sort of thing. The English language, to me, is just sort of calling. It's very much like in an opera. I'm learning how to sing an opera, and it gives me great satisfaction when I can pronounce certain words right. It sets me free.
It sounds like such a cliche, but I think it's the most musical and most romantic language. Of course, it's the language that I fell in love with my wife with and that I wrote many love letters to her with too.
I would not have become a writer had I not written in English, because I was just really composing these sad, sad but happy memories with this musical language called English. I think English itself, the language, is very generous, as well. I mean, I enjoy reading people like Arundhati Roy, the Indian writer, and I enjoy reading Frank and Malachy McCourt. And I enjoy reading South African writers who write in English. I enjoy reading British English. And everybody can contribute to it. It's very much like an ocean that is the power. People just become sources adding to it.
Q. Are there any memoirs that you particularly admire?
A. "Speak, Memory," by Nabokov, I admire greatly. I admire Jack London. I relate to him because he always uses phrases like, "I labor for 18 hours." That country boy, that boy who knows nothing but labor, I think there are times I feel like that too. I relate to him. And I love James Michener, his exuberance. Nothing is too little for him to be happy about. It gives me hope just to read his books. . . .
These are the kinds of things that inspire you to write.
Copyright ¿ 2002, Chicago Tribune