Huang Yunte (Zhang Jinghui, the background is taken from the stills of the movie "The Dragon Girl")
Huang Yunte, born in Wenzhou, Zhejiang, is currently a distinguished professor of English at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and once taught at Harvard University , served as a chair professor at Lingnan University in Hong Kong. In addition to academic works, he has published three non-fiction writing monographs since 2010, all of which have received critical acclaim. They are "Charlie Chan: the untold story of the honorable detective and his rendezvous with american history, 2010), inseparable: the original siamese twins and their rendezvous with american history, 2018, and The Dragon Lady: Anna May Wong’s Encounter with American History. (daughter of the dragon: anna may wong's rendezvous with american history, 2023).
"The Dragon Girl" tells the story of how Chinese-American Anna May Wong (1905-1961) rose from a washerwoman's daughter to a world-renowned movie star in a world filled with narrow-mindedness, injustice and racism. She fascinates Americans because of her beautiful Asian face, and is also discriminated against in Hollywood because of her face. At that time, American law stipulated that white actors and actors of color could not kiss on screen, so she could only play supporting roles. Hollywood is catering to society's prejudice against Chinese people. She can usually only play women who have been abandoned by their husbands, erotic Mongolian slaves, Fu Manchu's daughter, vicious dragon girls, yellow darlings who are always abandoned by white people, and people who sell their bodies. prostitute. She was both talented and beautiful, but she never married. The Chinese looked down on her because she was a "lower class"; the whites were afraid of racial prejudice and could fall in love with her, but they were unwilling to marry her. She once resisted racism, but eventually died of alcoholism due to various pressures. She was only fifty-six years old. Her story symbolizes Americans’ love and hatred for the East, and is also a history of Asian Americans’ struggle.
daughter of the dragon: anna may wong's rendezvous with american history, by yunte huang, liveright, 400pp., $30.00, august 2023
daughter of the dragon concludes your rendezvous with america trilogy As a writer, was the trilogy planned in advance?
Huang Yunte: is not. Academic research is very accidental, so I just take it one step at a time. After writing "The Legend of Charlie Chan," I wrote "Inseparable," and now I've published "The Dragon Girl." Chinese people like the term trilogy, and I am not immune to this convention, so I combined these three books and called them a "trilogy".
Huang Yun's special book "The Legend of Charlie Chan: A Chinese Detective in America"
So, is there an inherent connection between these three books?
Huang Yunte: Of course there is . The first book I wrote was "The Legend of Charlie Chan", and the stories in the two subsequent books were actually already in the first one. It can be said that these three books take Asians as the protagonists, study the cultural history of the United States, and explore the image of Asians in American culture. Charlie Chan talks about the American imagination of the Chinese in the 20th century, Siamese Man presents the attitude of Americans towards Asians in the 19th century, and The Dragon Girl talks about the stereotypes of Asian women in Hollywood. These are stories about Asian Americans and their contributions to American culture.
Huang Yun's special book "Inseparable: Siamese Siamese Twins and American History"
I once read a book about Anna May Wong called "anna may wong: from laundryman's daughter to Hollywood legend" to hollywood legend), you also wrote a recommendation for the book back then. How is your new book about Anna May Wong different from this one?
Huang Yunte: I am very familiar with the author of this book, Graham Russell Gao Hodges. After my book on Charlie Chan was published, he specially invited me to give a lecture at his university. There is no doubt that he was the first person to write a biography of Huang Liushuang.The reason why he is interested in Anna May Wong probably stems from the special feelings white Americans have towards Oriental women. As he said in the "Acknowledgments" of the book: "I first encountered the charm of Anna May Wong in the autumn of 1999. It was there in Cecil Court, Charing Cross Street, London, that I saw an autographed photo of a beautiful woman for sale in the window of a bookstore. I couldn't help but be fascinated by it, so I rushed into the bookstore and framed it. I took the framed photo as my own. The photo was expensive, and I didn’t know what I was doing. After finding some brief introductions about Anna May Wong on the Internet, I became more and more obsessed with it, so I bought it on eBay. More of her other photos and documents. Within a few weeks, my interest in her turned into a hobby of research."
"Yao Shuang: From Laundress's Daughter to Hollywood Legend" by Hao Jisi
Huang Liu Shuang actually represents one of the American men. Complex, Hao Jisi fell in love with Huang Liushuang because of her image, and had the urge to research. In fact, his specialty is studying African history, but his wife is Chinese. He talked about Anna May Wong from a historical perspective, while I studied literature, with different training and perspectives. I paid more attention to how to tell her story well from a literary perspective.
What kind of complex does the average American have towards Chinese women?
Huang Yunte: Of course, was originally a curiosity. In their eyes, Eastern women have a sense of mystery. Yellow skin, as warm as jade. With a mini body and a docile personality, she is similar to the Japanese bride "Madame Butterfly" married by a U.S. Navy lieutenant in Nagasaki. In turn, Americans think that Chinese women are very insidious and are the so-called "dragon ladies". The most typical one is Ms. Soong Meiling. Although her speeches in the U.S. Congress during World War II had a great impact and she established a good relationship with Roosevelt and his wife, many Americans did not like her and considered her dangerous. During World War II, Soong Meiling's success in the United States was not only dictated by current circumstances, but also the result of manipulation by the media in China and the United States. Anna Wong's image in Hollywood at that time was mixed between "Madame Butterfly" and "The Dragon Girl".
In 1922, at the age of seventeen, Anna May Wong became an instant hit with "The Toll of the Sea," the first film shot with Technicolor technology and without the need for special machines. The film had a Madama Butterfly-esque plot.
Nineteen-year-old Anna May Wong’s Identity Certificate
What meaning are you pursuing when you title your book "daughter of the dragon"?
Huang Yunte: pursues an ironic meaning. "Daughter of the Dragon" is the name of a movie starring Anthony Wong (Daughter of the Dragon, 1931). It is one of her masterpieces, in which she created a representative image of "Dragon Girl". During my research, I discovered a characteristic of Anna May Wong that no one has mentioned before: although she has not even graduated from high school, she is a very good writer. Of course, this is not surprising. Many American writers are self-taught, such as Mark Twain and Jack London. Wong Lau-shuang often signs this sentence on her promotional photos: "orientally yours" (Oriental land belongs to you). This statement is ironic and shows that she is well aware of how American audiences view her. Her writing of this sentence not only represents her "demureness" to this stereotype, but it is also a "defiance". I learned this rhetorical device from her.
Poster of the movie "The Dragon Girl"
Americans have a strong sense of racial discrimination. It is a long-term cultural accumulation, accumulated over several generations, and cannot be easily eliminated. Many educated Americans usually dare not speak discriminatory language, but they still have this awareness in their bones. Racial discrimination is indescribable and exists everywhere. Just like children learning children's songs, through children's songs, they not only learn the language, but also learn the rhythm of the language, and at the same time, they also unintentionally accept the ideology behind the children's songs.
You said that Hollywood is not only a place, but also a state of mind. How should you understand it?
Huang Yunte: Hollywood is not only a place where movies are produced, but also a social and cultural mentality. As a means of entertainment, movies can have a huge impact on people's psychology. The 1930s was the golden age of Hollywood. Ninety percent of the world's movies were produced by Hollywood. It was a money machine. Many people in the American Midwest want to go to Hollywood, hoping to become famous overnight. But it will change people's view of reality and even affect a person's world view. For many people who watch American movies, the so-called "American Dream" is mainly created by Hollywood movies.
What’s interesting is that it was precisely because of Americans’ stereotypes of Chinese that white-dominated Hollywood needed to arrange Asian characters in movies, and Anna Wong had the opportunity to be on camera. Is this also an ironic phenomenon?
Huang Yunte: When Hollywood first started, the purpose of making movies was only to satisfy the audience's curiosity. This was also the reason why they started making Chinatown and China-related movies. But then Hollywood discovered that there was a market for putting beautiful faces on the screen, so it began to change its approach. The tragedy of Anna May Wong is that in order to create exotic scenes, Hollywood is willing to use Asia as a background, but is unwilling to use Asians as protagonists. It would rather use complicated makeup techniques or use white people to play Asians. Anna Wong is certainly lucky and is undoubtedly an exception among Asian actors. But even so, in most movies set in Asia, she can still only play a supporting role, and only in a few movies does she have the opportunity to play the leading role.
In 1929, Anna May Wong starred in her last silent film "Piccadilly" (Piccadilly), which was her first British film starring. The film caused a sensation in the United Kingdom. However, she was still unable to kiss her sweetheart in the film, and the originally scheduled kissing scene was cut before the film was released.
Stills of "Chinatown Dreams"
At that time, if Anna May Wong was the protagonist, it might be difficult for Hollywood movies to get high box office, and the audience would want to watch movies in which white people were the protagonists. What is the relationship between box-office pursuits and racial discrimination?
Wong Yunte: It was difficult for a movie starring Anna Wong to become a blockbuster at the time, but don't forget that Hollywood has a huge influence and can change reality and change people's ideas. Hollywood can actually make Anna Wong famous. Even if one movie is not enough, as long as there are a few movies, it can achieve the effect of changing reality, so why doesn't it do it? This is the fact that Hollywood is fully aware of the reality of racial discrimination in the United States, but it is unwilling to change this situation. In order to please the market, it deliberately caters to American stereotypes when making movies, and these movies in turn reinforce this stereotype.
After Anna May Wong, actors such as Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Michelle Yeoh, and Zhang Ziyi are all very successful in Hollywood, but they all seem to have become stars, mainly making martial arts films. What do you think of this phenomenon?
Huang Yunte: Every field of has some kind of tradition that has been passed down from generation to generation. The stereotypes formed by American audiences towards Chinese actors are deeply ingrained and cannot be easily changed. It was not that Anna Wong was unaware of the problems with these roles when she starred in roles that were so-called "uglifying" or even "insulting" Chinese people. She was very willing to get rid of this stereotype and once told her friends privately that the characters she played were all "bullshit". However, in that era, even if Anna Wong was unwilling, she could only accept the roles assigned to her by Hollywood. After all, actors are usually very passive. Asian actors in Hollywood have a different image than white people, and because they speak English with a Chinese accent - some of them can't even speak English well. Usually, as soon as a beautiful Asian actress speaks English, her image as a beauty may be lost. ——The producers can only ask them to speak less lines and mainly rely on showing exotic scenes, such as Chinese Kung Fu, to attract American audiences.Bruce Lee had no chance to play a leading role in the United States in the 1970s, and there were even very few film offers, so he came to Hong Kong to make movies. The reason why there is no chance in the United States is that Hollywood believes that American housewives will not be willing to watch a movie starring a Chinese who speaks English with a strong accent. This situation has certainly changed a bit today.
Huang Liushuang was photographed on November 17, 1937. Shortly thereafter, "Daughter of Shanghai" (Daughter of Shanghai) was released. The script of the film was tailor-made for Huang Liushuang.
Michelle Yeoh won an Oscar in 2023. Why is she winning now? Will her win change the fate of Asian actors in Hollywood?
Huang Yunte: Why she won the Oscar, it is difficult to explain clearly. It can only be said that this is a result of the long history of evolution and an unstoppable trend of the times. Her award was due to many factors. In addition to the efforts of leftists in the United States to advocate for the rights of ethnic minorities, China's increasing national power and influence are also important factors. Of course, movies also have their own internal development path and are not completely influenced by the outside world. Some stereotypes still cannot be shaken off. Michelle Yeoh's win is a big breakthrough, but there are still many unresolved issues in Hollywood.
When I read your book, I found that you spent a lot of space talking about the background of Huang Liushuang's life. Why spend so much time explaining the background?
Huang Yunte: Most books about Huang Liushuang are written around her alone, but I don't think this is a good way to write a biography. One of my advisors in graduate school was an anthropologist. One thing I learned from him is that in addition to caring about what kind of story you write, you should also care about who tells the story. For me, rather than saying that I care about Wong’s story, I care more about the era in which Wong’s story took place. What I'm trying to find out is how did this story happen, when did it happen, and in what era did it happen? Sometimes the context in which a story takes place may be more important than the story itself.
Wong Liushuang on the cover of "Liangyou Pictorial" in 1927
Let me give you an example. In 1936, when Huang Liushuang was in Shanghai, she wanted to enter an American club called "Columbia", but she was turned away because of her Chinese appearance. Some authors just regard this as an anecdote, but I pointed out the source of the story in the article: it actually comes from the records of the American female writer Emily Hahn. In her autobiography "Bad Girl Meets China" (China to Me), Xiang Meili wrote: "Our country club in the United States, Columbia, does not accept Chinese as members or customers. Some businessmen brought American citizen Huang Liushuang in and wanted to Bowling inside turned out to be a scandal. The club didn't allow it. "You have to be careful," and if you asked the club committee why, they would give you a vague explanation. meaningful. Wong Liu Shuang is a Hollywood star who has been discriminated against in Shanghai. Why don't any of the tabloids that make a career out of reporting scandals report it? If Xiang Meili hadn't left this record, we wouldn't have known that Huang Liushuang would have encountered such a thing in Shanghai. What is this indicating? At the very least, it can be proved that in that era, everyone was comfortable with white people's discrimination against yellow people and was accustomed to it.
beautiful autobiographies
In 2022, Anna May Wong became the fifth American woman to be engraved on the most commonly used twenty-five-cent coin in the United States. Why choose her?
Huang Yunte: because her story is representative. The American Women Quarters Program selects American women and places their faces on coins to highlight the achievements and contributions of American women. The women selected so far for this project are all temporary choices, such as African-American writers, social activists, educators, and physicists, and Anna Wong was selected as "Hollywood's first Chinese-American movie star."
Anna May Wong on the twenty-five-cent coin
Many media and scholars today talk about Anna May Wong and emphasize how hard she worked to challenge racial discrimination. Is this a bit exaggerated?
Huang Yunte: The reason why I admire her is because she fully knows that these movie roles are "shit", but she still needs to face the director, and the director will give her instructions and ask her to do only this. , can't do that. Under this structure, her resistance is actually limited. Many Chinese people complain that Chinese-American actors such as Charlie Chan and Anna May Wong do not resist enough when faced with racial discrimination, and even strengthen Americans' stereotypes of Chinese-Americans to a certain extent. But the question is, in the context of that era, what kind of resistance can you expect them to do? Walking away from the studio? Some people say that they don’t need to make this kind of movie! Such remarks are out of context and lack common sense.
Your book has attracted great attention from the media in the United States, and almost all mainstream media have reported on it. Is this related to the American media’s anti-Trump discrimination against Asians?
Huang Yunte: I don’t think about . To tell a joke, the New York Times was so interested in this book that they interviewed me and wrote a long book review. The main reason was that they found it incredible that such a beautiful woman could not get a leading role in Hollywood. That’s all. I don’t think the American media wants to use Anna May Wong’s image to criticize Trump. They are just willing to put her photos in the media to attract readers because of her charm.
Sino-US relations have undergone profound changes in recent years. Has this affected the image of Asians in the United States?
Huang Yunte: You can say that today is very liberal. This is a lesson Americans have learned from history. But according to my observation, the image of ethnic minorities is not static. It is always east of Hedong and west of Hexi for ten years, sometimes good and sometimes bad. Politics is a game that sometimes needs to use cultural factors to serve it, just like Hollywood uses cultural factors to serve the film industry. In the United States, the toxin of racial discrimination may have become less and less abundant today, but the toxin has always existed and has not disappeared. In order to achieve certain political goals, American politicians will use these cultural poisons to serve them. The wife of US Republican Senator and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is Elaine Chao, who is Asian. I don’t think they are truly anti-Asian, they are just using the topic to make anti-China articles. Today is the era of social media, and technological changes have a great impact on human beings. Voters' voting behavior often relies on just an impression of the candidate, which may not be based on facts. Influential opinions on social networks will affect voting results. Public opinion on the streets or on the Internet can change political reality. This is the complex relationship between China-U.S. relations and the image of Asians in the United States.
When we were colleagues, you told me that you were writing a book about Confucius. Why are you interested in Confucius?
Huang Yunte: I wrote about Confucius for two reasons. A relatively superficial reason is intrinsically related to the current book. Huang Liushuang actually has two mantras, one is "orientally yours", which has been mentioned before; the other is "and confucius didn't say this", "Confucius didn't say this", and then she will burst out her own famous sayings aphorism. I just want to write a book to tell Americans what Confucius actually said. But a more profound reason is that I am dissatisfied with the current status of American democracy today. Western democracy has reached this point and has become a mess. Democracy, simply put, is a way of bringing people together. Confucius of China once proposed another way of grouping people together, which is different from Western-style democracy. The book I am writing is to talk about how groups of people can be better combined from a comparative perspective of Eastern and Western cultures.
