Content area
Full Text
Graham Russell Gao Hodges, Anna May Wong: From Laundryman's Daughter to Hollywood Legend (New York: Palgrave Macmillan 2005)
AS A BIOGRAPHY, Graham Russell Gao Hodges's volume came at a most opportune moment - the eve of the centennial of Anna May Wong's birthday. Hodges's is not the only work that brings Wong back to the spotlight. Two. other important books published around this time are Anthony Chan's Perpetually Cool (Lanham, MD, 2003) and Philip Leibfried and Chei Mi Lane's Anna May Wong: A Complete Guide to Her Film, Stage, Radio, and Television Work (Jefferson, NC.2004).
What characterizes Hodges's biography is his use of substantial archival materials meticulously gleaned and compiled from a wide spectrum of sources such as fanzines, posters, newspapers, newsreels, film studio files, personal interviews, correspondences and memoirs, and government documents (including immigration forms, birth certificates, and death certificates). Furthermore, these sources originate from European, Asian, and Oceanic as well as North and South American countries. They combine to present a comprehensive picture of the production, exhibition, and reception of Wong's transnational work. The author also does the reader a great favour by carefully categorizing and documenting these sources in his selected bibliography.
Some of the most useful details that Hodges successfully tracks down regarding Wong's life and work include: Wong's earnings as an actress in comparison with those of her Caucasian Hollywood counterparts; reviews from Scandinavia, Cuba, Japan, and the Philippines, in addition to the more well-known Western European, North American, and Chinese commentaries; details of some of Wong's obscure films as well as radio shows and tv appearances; her elaborate costumes and body language; her hobbies and public activities as a transnational sophisticate, her personal correspondences (especially with Carl Van Vechten) and intricate interactions with a wide range of artists, writers, and politicians in Europe, America, and China; and finally, images of her palm print from Charlotte Woolf's palm-reading book and her immigration document (Form 430) from 1927.
All these bits and pieces that animate the entire book, often to the reader's delightful surprise, demonstrate the labourious research the...