Yuen Chung Yip, aka Charlie Jang, was born in Kaiping (Hoiping) County, Guangdong Province, China in 1927. He emigrated to Canada in 1950 via Hong Kong and settled first in Coaldale, Alberta where he attended a high school for one year in order to improve his English. Finally, he settled in Lethbridge, Alberta where he was a grocer for fifty years. The Lethbridge Historical Society post on Facebook on 23 April 2019 reprints information from his obituary published in the Lethbridge Herald on 16 June 2004, he owned and operated owned and operated Danny’s Grocery at 431 18 Street North and he was also a writer and painter. Between 1959 and 1962 he published four short novels and some short stories all in Chinese in Hong Kong.
Fiction
The Tears of Chinese Immigrants
Translated and introduced by Sheng-Tai Chang. Translation of: Huaquiao leihen.
Dunvegan, Ont.: Cormorant Books, 1990.
Publisher’s Synopsis
The Tears of Chinese Immigrants presents a broad view of life in a Chinese community in western Canada in the late 1950s. Told by the first-person narrator, Charlie, the novel comprises four major subplots, exploring themes such as racial relations, education, maintenance of Chinese culture, and the seamy side of the Chinese community.
Written in the traditions of literary realism and social idealism, Tears has special value as a rare literary documentation of Chinese-Canadian life. It reflects the influences of both Chinese and Western literary traditions and is an important landmark in Canadian ethnic writing.
Selected Criticism and Interpretation
Chang, Sheng-Tai. “Literary Realism and Social Idealism in The Tears of Chinese Immigrants.” Canadian Ethnic Studies 19.1 (1987), p. 87-95.
Lim, Huai-Yang. “Representations of Class Identity in Chinese Canadian Literature.” Ph.D. diss., University of Alberta, 2005.
Available from Proquest Dissertations and Theses
Links
Publisher Cormorant Books