142 BC STUDIES

Paper Shadows: A Childhood Wayson Choy

Toronto: Penguin, 1999. 352 pp. $18.99 paper.

The Chinese in : The Pursuit of Identity and Power

Wing Chung Ng

Vancouver: UBC Press, 1999. 256 pp. $75.00 cloth; $29.95 paper.

LISA R. MAR University of

N TWO VERY DIFFERENT BOOKS, that Vancouver's Chinese population authors Wayson Choy and Wing developed five factions: older pre-1924 I Chung Ng contribute to our immigrants, postwar local-born Chinese, understanding of the forces that have postwar new immigrants, 1970s new shaped the development of ethnic immigrants, and 1970s Canadian-born. Chinese identities in . Each faction was shaped by its unique Recent scholarship on the topic has historical circumstances as well as by often focused more on how others its interactions and competition for imagined Asians rather than on how influence with the others. He studies Asians envisioned themselves. These this conflict among generations by two authors richly analyze the history looking at an extensive body of ori- of Chinese Canadian identity as seen ginal research data relating to Chinese from the inside. Choy and Ng see ethnic organizations, including copious Chinese identity in Vancouver as neither Chinese language sources and inter- a linear path to assimilation over time views with many important com- nor solely as the product of mainstream munity figures. opinion. Using a wealth of sources, Ng views Chinese organizations as they show how Chinese Canadian expressions of identity within a realm identities developed and evolved over that was controlled by Chinese. time in patterns far more interactive Though his main interest is in factions than one might assume. that competed to define the proper Both books add new dimensions to meaning of Chineseness, he grounds a central theme within immigration his discussion in histories of insti- studies: the conflict among generations tutions and their origins, practices, and of immigrants and their Canadian- internecine competition for cultural born descendants. Ng's The Chinese in power. The result is an ambitious Vancouver shows how different groups analysis of intra-ethnic conflict covering within the Chinese population in a broad sweep of time. His vignettes Vancouver articulated many different delineate the struggle between immi- positions about Chinese identity over grants and older immigrants as well time. Over thirty-five years, he argues as the Canadian-born in the 1950s, Book Reviews 143

Chinese involvement in the politics of his adoption, an event that leads him urban renewal in the 1960s, and to recall his childhood in Vancouver. Chinese engagement in the ethnic The majority of the book recounts his politics of Canadian multiculturalism life from his earliest memories to his in the 1970s. For each of these eras, he departure for at age eleven. has sketched a partial outline that will Later in life, he returns to his family help orient future research. members and friends to explore the The book's scope necessarily sacri- meaning of his childhood, researching fices depth. There is little coverage of its details and contexts with a more individual group members or leaders, mature understanding. His narration and no individual accounts of identity, moves seamlessly from the present to which makes for a rather impersonal his childhood view of past events and study. It seems difficult to completely to the personal mysteries that, decades assess the meaning of these groups later, still haunt him. without paying closer attention to Like his previous best-selling book, their membership. In addition, women The Jade Peony, Paper Shadows joins the and gender are curiously absent from specificities of Chinese historical ex- his discussion, despite women's visible perience in Vancouver with universal presence in community organizations childhood themes. In Paper Shadows, during this era. Further, the pivotal though, Choy constructs history, not pre-1945 backdrop to identity politics fiction, fusing fact and memory in for both older immigrants and the local- masterful prose. His use of detail and born could use further elaboration. acknowledgments testify to a meti- Finally, Ng's focus on Chinese organ- culously researched past through izations would be strengthened by a interviews and archival research. The more sustained analysis of how identity book ultimately integrates these per- was linked with political power. spectives in ways he could have never In contrast, Wayson Choy's Paper fully understood as a young boy, im- Shadows traces the question of Chinese mersing the reader in a finely crafted Canadian identity in the author's own portrait of his childhood world of family, life. Choy's deeply researched, poetic friends, and school. memoir of growing up in Vancouver The memoir serves as a rich educa- revisits his early childhood, richly tional resource, particularly as an analyzing the personal and collective account of a son of immigrants. Like contours of his life as a young boy in other youth of his era, Choy chose to the 1940s and 1950s. The result is an rebel against his parents' attempts to astonishing historical narrative of teach him the Chinese language and personal discovery. His poetic style declared his intention to be "Canadian." effortlessly weaves sophisticated con- Such matters of the heart, he soon textual analyses of the era into an discovered, are not so simple. China- engaging story. Though a memoir, it town, his family, his friends, and his makes an important contribution to language never truly left him, and so, Chinese Canadian history, and it in Paper Shadows, he returns. History deserves a wide audience, including too proves to have more mysteries than the general public, children, and does a novelist's fiction. In the end, his Canadian historians. quest to discover the meaning of his Paper Shadows opens with Choy's own life and his family's past leaves middle-aged discovery of the secret of much to the imagination. 144 BC STUDIES

Both Choy's Paper Shadows and imagined their identities while being Ng's The Chinese in Vancouver attest to engaged in many layers of community the increasing maturity of Chinese interaction. More books like these Canadian historical writing. They would continue to build the nascent analyze identity as complex - rooted field of Chinese Canadian history and in time, generation, locale, and inter- would also make important contri- action with other Chinese and European butions to Canadian immigration groups. To sum up, Chinese history.

Ships of Steely A British Columbia Shipbuilder's Story T. A . McLaren and Vickie Jensen Madeira Park, British Columbia: Harbour Publishing. 2000. 288 pp. Mus. $39.95 cloth.

ROBERT D. TURNER

Curator Emeritusy Royal British Columbia Museum

and

KENNETH MACKENZIE Canadian Nautical Research Society

HIPS OF STEEL tells the story of the famous "Park" vessels, were designed the careers of two men, William for mass production, and, although S Dick McLaren and his s o n their construction produced a surge in Thomas Arthur McLaren, and is set shipyard activity, it did not prepare the within the context of British Columbia's industry for the postwar period. "The steel shipbuilding industry, from the experience," notes Arthur McLaren, 1920s through the 1990s. The McLaren "was doing the same ship fifty-five story begins in Scotland with the ship- times, not building fifty-five different building endeavours of W . D . McLaren, ships" (69). The details of the wartime which included converting war surplus program are fascinating and well minesweepers into passenger vessels illustrated, but more credit should for the Union Steamship Company. I n have been given to the way that H.R. 1927 McLaren moved to Vancouver MacMillan and his West Coast cronies and worked as a consulting engineer. stole the march on eastern ship- The Second World War created an builders when establishing a Second urgent need for merchant ships, and World War shipbuilding program. W.D. McLaren served as manager of After the war Arthur McLaren the newly established West Coast decided, against sound advice, to Shipbuilders. His son Arthur, as a new establish his own shipyard. And, with graduate of UBC's engineering school, considerable perseverance and imagin- joined him. T h e wartime ships, including ation, he succeeded in making it a