Louis H. Chu
Louis H. Chu, born Louis Hing Chu in Taishan, Guangdong, China, immigrated to Newark, New Jersey at the age of nine. He pursued higher education, earning a bachelor’s degree in English from Upsala College and a master’s degree in sociology from New York University, where he notably examined Chinese restaurants in New York City in his thesis. Serving in the U.S. Army during World War II, he returned to China to marry Kang Wong before establishing a life in New York City's Chinatown. Chu worked as a Chinese-language disc jockey and owned a record shop, immersing himself in the vibrant local community.
His literary contribution includes the 1961 novel "Eat a Bowl of Tea," recognized as the first Chinese American novel set in the United States. The novel explores the complexities faced by Chinese immigrants navigating traditional values and life in America. Although he did not publish further fiction, Chu dedicated his later years to community service, helping to establish significant social services organizations in Chinatown. His work and experiences provide valuable insights into the challenges and cultural dynamics of the Chinese American community.
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Subject Terms
Louis H. Chu
Chinese-born writer
- Born: October 1, 1915
- Birthplace: Taishan, Guangdong, China
- Died: February 27, 1970
- Place of death: New York, New York
Louis Chu was the major Chinese American contributor to the modern American novel. His novel Eat a Bowl of Tea was a vital link between the first stirrings of Asian American literature in the 1970s, when the category became firmly established.
Area of achievement: Literature, sociology
Early Life
Louis Hing Chu was born into a middle-class family in Taishan, a town in China’s Guangdong province. At the age of nine, Chu immigrated with his parents to Newark, New Jersey. In high school, Chu wrote poetry and was interested in the works of Shakespeare. In 1937, he received his bachelor of arts degree in English from the now-defunct Upsala College in East Orange, New Jersey. He went on to earn a master of arts degree in sociology at New York University in 1940. His graduate thesis, which focused on Chinese restaurants in New York City, was a notable work of autoethnography, or work about a certain cultural group written by a member of that group. It was also one of the first academic treatments of food as a cultural form. In the early 1950s, Chu did further graduate work at the New School for Social Research, although he did not pursue a degree program.
Chu served in the United States Army from 1943 to 1945. This was a time of high patriotism for Chinese Americans. Nationalist China was an ally of the United States in its struggle against the Japanese empire. Chu served in the China-Burma-India theater in the province of Kunming, to the south and west of his birthplace. The War Brides Act of 1945 lifted the US policy that had set a quota on the number of Chinese women who could immigrate into the United States. After these restrictions were eliminated, Chu returned to his home province, bringing back with him a wife, Kang Wong, whom he married in 1945.
After leaving the army, Chu settled into a productive life in New York City’s Chinatown, where he worked as a Chinese-language disc jockey for the WHOM-FM radio station, doing four ninety-minute shows a week. Chu also served as proprietor of the Acme Company record shop at 34 Bowery, located just north of Chinatown in Chatham Square.
Life’s Work
Chu’s novel Eat a Bowl of Tea was published in 1961, with the help of radio-show producer Lyle Stuart. The novel is steeped in Chu’s own experience as a bachelor in Chinatown before the passage of the War Brides Act. It is a sociological study examining the Chinese American community from both the inside and the outside, focusing on how immigrants face challenges negotiating traditional values and their new lives in the United States. Chu’s wide-ranging business and social network in Chinatown gave him access to a variety of personalities and situations that he made use of in creating his fiction.
Having served in the military and earned esteemed academic credentials, Chu was fully at home in the wider American world. However, he lived his life in Chinatown, among his fellow Chinese Americans. He was a talented writer in English, but his style did not hew to stereotypes of Chinese Americans. The themes were considered modern and controversial, particularly in the work of an immigrant writer.
Significance
Eat a Bowl of Tea was the first Chinese American novel to take place in the United States. Chu produced no further works of fiction in his lifetime. He spent the last ten years of his life working in support social services initiatives in Chinatown, where he helped construct the framework for major community institutions such as the Educational Alliance and Asian Americans for Equality.
Bibliography
Douglas, Christopher. A Genealogy of Literary Multiculturalism. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2009. Print. Discusses Chu’s sociological work as indicative of the link between sociology and the rise of multicultural literature.
Kain, Geoffrey. “Refracted Identity(ies) in Louis Chu’s Eat a Bowl of Tea: Insularity as Impotence.” MELUS 26.2 (2001): 187–98. Print. Explores the themes of sexual dysfunction and cultural isolation in Chu’s novel, Eat a Bowl of Tea.
Ling, Jinqi. Narrating Nationalisms: Ideology and Form in Asian American Literature. New York: Oxford UP, 1998. Print. Analyzes the works of authors Frank Chin, Louis Chu, Maxine Hong Kingston, and John Okada. Presents a detailed discussion of the sociological and cultural themes present in Chu’s work.