Trying to Find Chinatown: Selected Plays by David Henry Hwang

Trying to Find Chinatown: Selected Plays by David Henry Hwang

A collection of work by the pre-eminent Asian-American author.

David Henry Hwang is known for exploring the complex relationships which bridge Eastern and Western culture in modern America. It is a subject that has long haunted American drama: how, in a land of immigrants, does one deal with one's heritage and construct a sense of identity.

Included in this volume are:

Bondage, a one-act study of racial stereotypes and sexual myths set in an S & M parlour

The Dance and the Railroad, a haunting play about the inhuman conditions of the railroad workers in the 1860s American West

Family Devotions, a biting work which probes the religious conflicts in a modern Chinese-American family

F.O.B, meaning Fresh off Boat, explores the conflicts between the old and new worlds

The House of the Sleeping Beauties, based on a novella by a famed Japanese author, Yasunari Kawabata

The Sound of a Voice, another reworking of a Kawabata story set in feudal Japan

Trying to Find Chinatown, concerns two men in New York, one trying to investigate his Asian-American heritage, the other trying to shake free

The Voyage, the libretto for the Philip Glass opera, which re-examines American history.

M. David Henry Hwang is the Tony Award-winning author of M. David Henry Hwang's M. David Henry Hwang's M. David Henry Hwang' Butterfly, Yellow Face (OBIE Award, 2008 Pulitzer Prize finalist), Golden Child (1997 OBIE Award), FOB (1981 OBIE Award), Family Devotions (Drama Desk nomination), and the musical books Aida (co-author), Flower Drum Song (2002 Broadway revival), and Tarzan, among others. David Henry Hwang holds honorary degrees from Columbia College in Chicago and The American Conservatory Theatre. He graduated from Stanford University and attended the Yale School of Drama. He and his wife, actress Kathryn Layng, and their children, Noah David and Eva Veanne, live in New York City.