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The Cooked Seed: A Memoir, by Anchee Min
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In 1994, Anchee Min made her literary debut with a memoir of growing up in China during the violent trauma of the Cultural Revolution. Red Azalea became an international bestseller and propelled her career as a successful, critically acclaimed author. Twenty years later, Min returns to the story of her own life to give us the next chapter, an immigrant story that takes her from the shocking deprivations of her homeland to the sudden bounty of the promised land of America, without language, money, or a clear path.
It is a hard and lonely road. She teaches herself English by watching Sesame Street, keeps herself afloat working five jobs at once, lives in unheated rooms, suffers rape, collapses from exhaustion, marries poorly and divorces.But she also gives birth to her daughter, Lauryann, who will inspire her and finally root her in her new country. Min's eventual successes-her writing career, a daughter at Stanford, a second husband she loves-are remarkable, but it is her struggle throughout toward genuine selfhood that elevates this dramatic, classic immigrant story to something powerfully universal.
- Sales Rank: #127275 in eBooks
- Published on: 2013-05-07
- Released on: 2013-05-07
- Format: Kindle eBook
From Booklist
*Starred Review* Min’s first book, Red Azalea (1994), was an electrifying memoir. Six singular novels followed, including Becoming Madame Mao (2000) and Pearl of China (2010). Now Min returns to her own astonishing life story. She writes, as always, with singeing candor and devastating precision as she chronicles the severe poverty and brutality of her childhood in Shanghai, her grim years in a labor camp, and her friendship with the girl who became the actress Joan Chen and helped Min immigrate to the U.S. But Min’s ordeal was far from over when she arrived in Chicago to attend art school. With no English and no money, she lived in constant fear of deportation while contending with the shock of American racism, exploitative jobs, wretched living conditions, criminal scams, crushing loneliness, illness, even rape. Her brief marriage turned into a living hell when they naively purchase a dilapidated apartment building. But Min gave birth to her daughter and started writing in English, an extraordinary and resounding creative breakthrough that finally set her free. Min’s indomitable and magnificent memoir spans the full spectrum of the human experience, elucidates her noble mission as a writer, and portrays a woman of formidable strength and conviction. “I was broken yet standing determinedly erect. I could be crushed, but I would not be conquered.” --Donna Seaman
Review
A wild, passionate and fearless American writer New York Times A story of changing times as China moves through war and revolution ... a powerful paean to love and friendship Daily Mail on Pearl of China This is not just another book on the Cultural Revolution ... A riveting account told in language that is distinctly Min's yet accessible to any heart Amy Tan on Red Azalea A terrifying and moving account of growing up in China's Cultural Revolution ... a beautifully written account of a mass psychosis and a testament to the courage, powers of survival and ability to love in the face of appalling privations Shena Mackay
About the Author
Anchee Min was born in Shanghai in 1957. At seventeen she was sent to a labor collective, where a talent scout for Madame Mao's Shanghai Film Studio recruited her to work as a movie actress. She moved to the United States in 1984. Her first memoir, Red Azalea, was an international bestseller, published in twenty countries. She has since published six novels, most recently Pearl of China.
Most helpful customer reviews
21 of 21 people found the following review helpful.
Min's tenacity and triumphs are remarkable, and her story is worth telling
By Bookreporter
At first glance, Anchee Min's life looks like an American Dream story come true. As a young woman, she moves to the U.S. in hopes of achieving a better life. Once there, she succeeds in getting undergraduate and graduate degrees from the Art Institute of Chicago, builds a family, and becomes a bestselling author. But Min's story is not a simple path from point A to B. In fact, the route she takes to international fame is frequently traumatic, terrifying and devastating. It is a testament to Min's resilience and drive that her story becomes the one told in THE COOKED SEED.
Min grew up during the Cultural Revolution in China and spent her childhood dreaming of being able to fight American enemies in the name of Mao and Communism. But her understanding of the world shifts when she is sent to a collective labor camp at 17. "Discovered" by Madame Mao and chosen to star in propaganda films, she becomes convinced that the only way to avoid a wretched fate is to escape to the U.S. after Mao's death in 1976.
Luck and boldness allow Min to enter the States as a student, despite the fact that she speaks no English and has no one to help her once she arrives in Chicago. Through perseverance, she struggles through her classes, paying her way by working up to five jobs at a time. Her incredible poverty is capped by a number of horrific experiences in Chicago, including multiple robberies and rape. Marrying and divorcing in her mid-30s, she finds herself remaking her life once more, now accompanied by her daughter Lauryann.
Many of the incidents that Min relates casually are hard to believe. Experiencing even one of these terrifying events could be tragedy enough to derail a life. Yet she does not dwell on the miraculous nature of her survival; she simply continues living. Of course, this is her reality. While many would turn to family or friends, Min has no options. In her early years, fear dominates her experience: she can't return to China, even for a short time, for fear that she will be unable to leave; she can't stop going to classes for fear she will lose her visa; and she can't fight the people who take advantage of her because she fears government attention of any kind.
Min's final portrait is rife with human contradiction, which creates the impression that you could know someone like her (although you may know no one who comes close to having experienced anything remotely similar). She is admirable, but most admirably, she is also aware of her own flaws. Implacable when confident, she doesn't gloss over times when she has behaved badly or been at the mercy of others. She rules over Lauryann with an iron fist, demanding high grades and forcing her seven-year-old to assist her with heavy work on apartment restoration.
Min clearly has a strong desire to justify this harshness. While she marries again to a man who has a similar child-rearing philosophy, she spends much of the latter part of the book illustrating that her demands ultimately served Lauryann well, and that Lauryann has come to appreciate her mother's nature. Even were this untrue, it would not alter the story significantly. It is nicer to think that Lauryann ultimately understands Min's demands, but Min has just led the reader through the events that formed her identity and made her see the world the way she does. Knowing this, we understand why she treats her daughter as she does, whether we think it is overly harsh or not.
Lauryann's suggestion that Min write a memoir seems a clear indicator of what the reader has learned over the course of the book: no matter her shortcomings, Min's tenacity and triumphs are remarkable, and her story is worth telling.
Reviewed by Rebecca Kilberg
30 of 33 people found the following review helpful.
"No Chance to Sprout"
By Fairbanks Reader - Bonnie Brody
As Anchee Min's newest book, The Cooked Seed, opens, she is about to land in Chicago. She has no money except a borrowed $500, does not speak English, and is terrified. She is 27 years old "and life had ended for me in China. I was Madame Mao's trash, which meant that I wasn't worth spit. I was considered a `cooked seed' - no chance to sprout."
By some miracle she has maintained a Visa and is accepted into the Chicago Art Institute. It appears that she has studied very little, if any, art but she attends classes and works several jobs at the same time. She frequently describes herself as crushed, defeated and fearful. Her goal is to get a green card and she has no idea how she can attain one.
Ms. Min was very ill in China and her health is fragile in the United States. She passes out many times and deals with coughing up blood, stomach problems, and other health issues. She has horrible memories of her time in Mao's labor camps and is referred to a psychiatrist but she is unable to open up about her feelings.
She meets a man with whom she lives for six years. However, the relationship is not a good one. He sees himself as a sage and Ms. Min is practical. She works hard and he prefers to sleep or give out words of wisdom. She does have a child with him and Lauryann becomes the love of her life. It is interesting to me how much Ms. Min wanted a boy instead of a girl. This is a very cultural wish.
Reading about the way she raises Lauryann reminded me of the book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. Lauryann is raised very strictly and in the Chinese way. She helps her mother with duties like plumbing, electric work, painting, and construction. She has little time for play and is taught that she must work to attain goals from an early age. It obviously paid off academically because Lauryann gets into Stanford University.
Ms. Min builds up the courage to leave her partner and moves to California where she meets the man of her dreams. It takes a while but it happens through a dating service. Meanwhile, she has written several memoirs and novels and has become a very successful author.
I enjoyed the book but a lot of it was repetitive from Red Azalea which I read and loved. Ms. Min spends a lot of time on some of the same things that were covered in that book and which I feel could have been better edited. These are small criticisms as overall, the book is quite heartrending and educational. To see how Ms. Min triumphs over all her problems and obstacles is a miracle.
18 of 20 people found the following review helpful.
Great narrative, but some of it hard to believe
By silhouette_of_enchantment
Anchee Min has a beautiful writing style, and a compelling story about her immigration (which was more like an escape from the camps) from China to the United States as an art student. She's also a good friend of Josie Chen (of Twin Peaks fame). Min survived poverty, a devastating rape, sweat shops, and other calamities. She also worked hard, lived through a really bad marriage and divorce, found love again, and raised her daughter.
Although I enjoyed reading her book, I began to question whether or not Min was completely honest. Beautiful, persuasive prose does not mean its factual. She recounted -- at length -- conversations she had (in English) with a college roommate and other friends. At this time, remember, Min immigrated to the country (as a student)only knowing a few words of English. How would she have conversations on race, slavery, President Reagan, friendship, etc; when she first arrived in the country, if she couldn't read or speak English fluently? She was nearly deported when she first touched American shores, because she didn't understand English.
Min even admitted (months after the above conversations took place) that she nearly failed an art course, because she didn't understand English, well, and it took her watching episodes of Sesame Street and other shows to learn the language. So, I found her conversations (when she first immigrated) extremely hard to believe, and made me question other facts she presented in her book.
I wanted to believe Min was being an honest narrator, but by the end, I just started to question her veracity.
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