Maxine Hong Kingston

On a Friday afternoon in early winter, Maxine Hong Kingston sips a cup of green tea at a table in her kitchen and ponders the fluidity of her work. Outside, the light is hazy, white-blue and diffuse. Down the hill there's a stunning bay view, the water choppy and alive. At moments such as this, sea and air, land and sky seem to blend, as if vision alone were insufficient to frame the borders of the world. Kingston's seventh book, "I Love a Broad Margin to My Life" (Alfred A. Knopf: 232 pp., $24.95)

On a Friday afternoon in early winter, Maxine Hong Kingston sips a cup of green tea at a table in her kitchen and ponders the fluidity of her work. Outside, the light is hazy, white-blue and diffuse. Down the hill there's a stunning bay view, the water choppy and alive. At moments such as this, sea and air, land and sky seem to blend, as if vision alone were insufficient to frame the borders of the world. Kingston's seventh book, "I Love a Broad Margin to My Life" (Alfred A. Knopf: 232 pp., $24.95)

Maxine Hong Kingston blends personal memory, family history and fantasy in this impressionistic autobiography, which won a National Book Critic's Circle Award in 1976. A first-generation American, Kingston describes the conflict between her emerging Western identity and the submissive behavior her Chinese-born parents expected.

Compiled by Grace Krilanovich. SUNDAY Maile Meloy : The author of "Both Ways Is the Only Way I Want It" will discuss and sign her recent collection of short stories as part of the Autry Book Club. Autry National Center, 4700 Western Heritage Way, L.A. 2 p.m. Free for book club members; $15 for non-members. (323) 667-2000, Ext. 391. Poetry Behind the Fence: Poets Prison Panel : Luivette Resto will host an evening of readings by Robert Juarez, Rolando Ortiz, Hugo Machuca, Melinda Palacio and Luis J. Rodriguez.

Standing amid the messy stacks of literature at Dutton's Books, back to the cash register, author Maxine Hong Kingston was facing her readers in Brentwood. She crinkled her eyes at them, smiling as she sized them up. They were men and women, a mix of young hip and middle-aged settled, and most were clutching a newly autographed copy of "Tripmaster Monkey." Many of them, too, were toting Kingston's earlier books, "China Men" and "The Woman Warrior." Some of them sipped champagne from plastic glasses, and all of them were sizing up Kingston, the diminutive storyteller-myth maker-novelist in their midst.

"Got no money. Got no home. Got story," says Wittman Ah Sing in this fantastic novel by Maxine Hong Kingston. Ah Sing is an unemployed writer who encounters the '60s on a cultural rebound, a Chinese American determined to complete an ancestral Gold Mountain trunk with his wild stories. "I can't die until I fill it with poems and play-acts." He lives in San Francisco as a splendid incarnation of the Monkey King from the popular 16th-Century fiction, "The Journey to the West." Kingston is the author of "The Woman Warrior," which won the National Book Critics Circle Award, and "China Men," winner of the National Book Award for nonfiction.

'When I think of commitment," says writer Maxine Hong Kingston, "I think of decades." Which is a good thing, because it must have seemed as if it might take that long for "The Woman Warrior"--Deborah Rogin's adaptation of Kingston's award-winning semi-autobiographical books "The Woman Warrior" (1976) and "China Men" (1980)--to reach the stage.

Last spring, a small circle of writers and scholars eagerly pored over a new book by Maxine Hong Kingston, the best-selling author of "The Woman Warrior" and "China Men." They knew Kingston had wrestled with the manuscript for years. A few even had heard she wrote the book, in part, to defend herself against her longtime literary foe, Frank Chin, a combative writer and the first Asian-American to have his plays staged in New York.

This year's National Book Awards, taking place in New York on Nov. 19, will include a Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters to Maxine Hong Kingston. The Oakland-based Kingston, whose books include the memoir "The Woman Warrior," was awarded the Robert Kirsch Award for Lifetime Achievement at the Los Angeles Times Book Festival in April. The awards also will recognize Barney Rosset, former publisher of the Evergreen Review and Grove Press, with the Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community.

I am sad to learn about the warfare between these two Asian-American literary giants. Ever since they immigrated to America, Asians have not had an equal footing with whites. This situation is even more pronounced in the literary world. Since Frank Chin and Maxine Hong Kingston have achieved success and have won acceptance (as writers), they ought to act as role models for the young Asian-Americans and encourage them to pursue a career in this less popular field among Asians. It is unhealthy for Chin and Kingston to continue bickering.

This year's National Book Awards, taking place in New York on Nov. 19, will include a Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters to Maxine Hong Kingston. The Oakland-based Kingston, whose books include the memoir "The Woman Warrior," was awarded the Robert Kirsch Award for Lifetime Achievement at the Los Angeles Times Book Festival in April. The awards also will recognize Barney Rosset, former publisher of the Evergreen Review and Grove Press, with the Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community.

"The Fifth Book of Peace," Maxine Hong Kingston's first new book in more than a decade, is a hybrid of memoir, fiction and (the last term comes less fluidly) writing-group-verging-on-group-therapy reportage.

A journalist recently asked me in an interview, "What is your inspiration as a California writer?" Unhesitatingly I answered, "Jack's pigs." "What do you mean, Jack's pigs?" "Come with me, I'll show them to you." I drove the puzzled journalist across the Golden Gate Bridge into the deep country, where high atop a knoll studded with oak trees stands a formidable stone house, now a museum. Inside, a scratchy old home movie was playing on a video monitor.

'When I think of commitment," says writer Maxine Hong Kingston, "I think of decades." Which is a good thing, because it must have seemed as if it might take that long for "The Woman Warrior"--Deborah Rogin's adaptation of Kingston's award-winning semi-autobiographical books "The Woman Warrior" (1976) and "China Men" (1980)--to reach the stage.

I am sad to learn about the warfare between these two Asian-American literary giants. Ever since they immigrated to America, Asians have not had an equal footing with whites. This situation is even more pronounced in the literary world. Since Frank Chin and Maxine Hong Kingston have achieved success and have won acceptance (as writers), they ought to act as role models for the young Asian-Americans and encourage them to pursue a career in this less popular field among Asians. It is unhealthy for Chin and Kingston to continue bickering.

Last spring, a small circle of writers and scholars eagerly pored over a new book by Maxine Hong Kingston, the best-selling author of "The Woman Warrior" and "China Men." They knew Kingston had wrestled with the manuscript for years. A few even had heard she wrote the book, in part, to defend herself against her longtime literary foe, Frank Chin, a combative writer and the first Asian-American to have his plays staged in New York.

Gov. George Deukmejian will recognize nine California artists, arts patrons and community leaders for significant contributions to the arts with the first Governor's Awards for the Arts, the California Arts Council announced Wednesday. The annual awards, sponsored by the council, will be presented by the governor and Mrs. Deukmejian at a black-tie fund-raiser on Nov. 2.