Minfong ho biography of abraham lincoln

Gallo, Candlewick Cambridge, MA , Characteristically focusing on strong female protagonists who interact with their families and friends against the backdrop of real events, she is often recognized for the sensitivity and understanding with which she treats the feelings of her characters, as well as for her depiction of Asian life and locale.

Her books include stories for young adult readers and middle graders as well as picture books for younger children. In all of these works, Ho does not back off from harsher elements such as poverty and violent death, but she also weaves the theme of the stabilizing influence of family throughout her work. Ho was born in Burma, grew up in both Singapore and Thailand and did most of her studying in English.

She, therefore, is fluent in three languages: Chinese, Thai, and English. The resulting fragmentation, or "linguistic schizophrenia" as she terms it, has never been resolved for Ho. Though she writes in English, she feels that she has never been able to bridge the languages of her life. At Cornell University, she began a short story that later became her first novel, Sing to the Dawn.

The original story describes how Dawan, a schoolgirl from a rural Thai village, encounters resistance from her father and brother when she wins a scholarship to the city high school. Ho submitted the work for the Council for Interracial Books for Children's annual short story contest and won the award for the Asian American Division of unpublished Third World Authors; she was then encouraged to enlarge the story into a novel.

I had always written, but now I would have readers! In writing Sing to the Dawn , Ho also saw the writing process as one that was inherently "a political expression," as she once wrote in Interracial Books for Children Bulletin. The few about village life portrayed it as idyllic and easy-going, full of kites and candles and festivals at the temples.

This was not the Asia I knew, and I had resented the writers—usually white—who out of condescension and ignorance misrepresented these countries. With Sing to the Dawn , Ho attempted to avoid these pitfalls and created a realistic story of Dawan, a Thai girl struggling to get an education. Seybolt in a School Library Journal review of the book.

Seybolt also noted that Dawan's story "provides a perspective on women's liberation far removed and much more important than breaking into the local Little League. In , after starting a family, Ho returned to writing fiction, publishing Rice without Rain , a book that retells the experiences of another village girl in Thailand. Jinda is seventeen the summer when young intellectuals arrive in her remote village from Bangkok and encourage the men to form a rent resistance movement.

Slowly the villagers, including Jinda's father, the headman, take up the rallying cry, and slowly too does Jinda fall in love with Ned, the leader of the student radicals. And finally, a decade after returning from Thailand, she began writing fiction again. The result was Rice without Rain , a story centering on Jinda, a seventeen-year-old girl from the fictitious Maekung Village which was caught up in the political winds sweeping across the country when a group of university students from Bangkok arrived to encourage the landless farmers to take up a rent resistance movement.

Minfong ho biography of abraham lincoln

Set against the very same historical background as Ho had experienced herself, Jinda's realization that the peasant class was but pawns in the ongoing political tug-of-war and her journey to find her own path in life told the untold stories during those years of turmoil that shrouded Thailand. Five years later Ho published her third book, The Clay Marble.

This time she drew her inspiration from the interaction with Cambodian refugees during her relief work on the Thai-Cambodian border. Once again, she presented a strong female protagonist, a twelve-year-old girl named Dara who was one of the thousands of refugees escaping to the border at the end of the Khmer Rouge regime when Vietnam invaded the country.

She also employed the theme of family unity in the face of adversity, as Dara persuaded her elder brother not to join the army but to return with family, sans their father, to restart life back at home. In , Ho returned to Singapore, where she worked as the writer-in-residence at the National University of Singapore for the next seven years.

As a result, she is widely referred to there as a "local writer". Her works have been selected as teaching material for English literature in lower secondary schools. Since , Ho has been living with her family in Ithaca, New York. She has also traveled and made presentations at various writing workshops in middle schools and high schools in the United States and international schools in Switzerland , Indonesia , Thailand, Poland , and Malaysia.

After the birth of her third and last child Ho shifted her focus to writing books for children. In the meantime, she even translated sixteen Tang poems into English and compiled them into a picture book titled Maples in the Mist: Children's Poems from the Tang Dynasty. In , she returned to writing for more mature readers with Gathering the Dew , a story of how a young Cambodian girl who lost her sister during the Khmer Rouge regime learnt to reconcile with life's harsh realities and live on.

Minfong Ho, in her four novels, presented to her readers realistic depictions of her native Southeast Asia. Despite being fictions, her stories were all set against the backdrop of real historical events that she herself had experienced or at least observed firsthand. Her optimistic central theme remains similar throughout all four books. As the Old One is caught placing the video camera back, Ah Liong is only focused on bringing the culprit to justice and satisfying his wife despite having argued with her countless times before.

This action is what the Old One takes as a sign of final maturity — after 30 years, her son has finally grown into a compassionate and caring man. Through the use of a setting designed to appeal to Asian families, Minfong Ho has instilled the values of humanity through these instances in the short story. The compassionate actions of Rosa, the Old One and Ah Liong are an example to others to be compassionate and humane when treating others.

Similarly, Beverly is an example of an inhumane person, perhaps sharing character traits with certain Disney villains. This serves as a reminder to society to embrace compassionate ideals in their daily interactions: people should care and love others just as they love their own children instead of embracing a cold stance towards others unfamiliar to yourself.

This can improve how people treat each other and contribute to the foundation of a loving, harmonious society, where people are treated equally and their hardships are tended to. This is clearly shown in the interactions between Ah Liong and the Old One. Among these interactions include:. As a whole, this reminds the readers about their own families in their individualistic ways, emphasising the need for them to understand their sacrifices and cherish them, especially as a grown adult with the financial means to support them.

Billy is the connection between the three women. Quot ations. This is one of the six short stories that is provided through the short stories anthology for English Literature KSSM. Theme A. Humanity This theme revolves around the actions of three characters, namely Rosa, Beverly and the Old One. Among these interactions include: Ah Liong bringing the Old One along to his graduation ceremony where he received his diploma.

Ah Liong still practices the simple gesture of helping the Old One to food before taking any himself. This is a simple sign of respect in Chinese households. Jade bracelets are a common accessory among Chinese women and, expensive as they are, they are ultimately very prized possessions. The Old One felt honoured by this show of respect. Ah Liong finally understood what the Old One had meant and decided to have compassion, just as he was taught to.

Characters Ah Liong Has filial piety. Not hasty when making decisions. About this article Ho, Minfong Updated About encyclopedia. Ho Xuan Huong. Ho shang. Ho Hsien-ku. HNI Corporation. HMV Group plc. Ho, Xuan Huong.