2008 Woodie Awards
Author celebrates poetry center
Brian Messenger
Issue date: 9/29/04 Section: News
The Lowell Lecture Series, in conjunction with the English department and the newly created Suffolk University Poetry Center, brought renowned author Maxine Hong Kingston to the C. Walsh Theatre on Tuesday, Sept. 28 to speak about her experiences growing up as Chinese-American woman, writer and activist.
Kingston, author of "The Woman Warrior," "China Men" and "The Fifth Book of Peace," among others, took the stage before a full theatre after being introduced by English professor and Poetry Center director Fred Marchant.
"I feel honored to help inaugurate the poetry center," Kingston said. "Poetry, I feel, is the highest endeavor of civilization. It might be civilization itself."
Born in Stockton, Calif. in 1940, Kingston was the child of Chinese immigrants. Kingston said she was able to feel the gift of poetry before she could give it a voice. Looking back on her childhood, she remembers her parents singing and reciting classical Chinese stories, stories that would provide a foundation for her future writings.
Kingston remembered specifically her mother's stories of the war between China and Japan in 1938, when she ran a makeshift hospital in a cave to treat the wounded.
"As a child I was aware of war," Kingston said, who recalled using her wishes after blowing out her birthday cake candles for spreading peace and ending war. "I made all these wishes for ending this war, ending that war," she said. "You make the wishes with words."
This innocent act of a young child proved to be a powerful lesson for her as a writer, however. Once Kingston began to question whether or not her birthday wishes were coming true she realized, "I put my wish for peace in words," an act that has since made her a world-renowned author and winner of numerous literary awards.
Kingston, who also described herself as a child feminist, then told the audience a story about herself and her siblings in "Chinese school," which they would go to each evening after "American school." The story also appears in her book "The Woman Warrior."