The Playwrights Database
LAWRENCE YEP (1948 - )
Nationality: Asian Americanemail: n/a Website: n/a
Literary Agent: n/a
Yep has won several awards for his novels for young adults. His books often deal with alienation, drawing on his own experiences as an outsider. Yep was born and raised in a black neighborhood and educated in San Francisco's Chinatown, although he didn't speak Chinese. He didn't truly experience American culture until high school. As a high school student Yep began writing science fiction. He published his first short story in a science fiction magazine at age 18, and his first novel, Sweetwater, at age 23. He is best known for Dragonwings, (1975) about a boy who leaves China to live with his father in San Francisco. The novel was selected as a 1976 Newbery Honor book and won the Boston Globe/Horn Book Award for Fiction. It remains one of the most acclaimed books in children's literature. His other works include Child of the Owl (1977), which also won the Boston Globe/Horn Book Award for Fiction, the fantasy tale The Imp That Ate My Homework (1998), and Dragon's Gate (1993), which was also named a Newbery Honor Book. Yep graduated from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1970 and earned his PhD in English from the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1975.
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below is a list of Lawrence Yep's plays - click on a Play Title for more information
Age of Wonders, The Dragonwings Fairy Bones Pay the ChinamanAge of Wonders, The
Synopsis:
A pair of one acts exploring the Chinese in 19th Century America. Pay the Chinaman takes the archetypical American figure of the roving swindler and reworks him as a wily symbol of immigrant Chinese survival. The play imagines a 19th Century encounter between two Chinese flim-flammers: an old-timer in California and a young recent arrival. FairyBones, captures another cross-generational contest rife with duplicity. This time the mutual conning is done by a manipulative old shaman-woman and her resentful daughter-in-law.
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Notes:
Full length play combining "Fairy Bones" And "Pay The Chinaman"
1st Produced:
- 1989
Organisations:
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1st Published:
- -
Music:
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To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
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Genre:
-
Parts:
Male: 2 Female: 2 Other: -
Further Reference:
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Top of PageDragonwings
Synopsis:
At the turn of the century, a young boy living in China with his mother, travels to San Francisco, California, "Land of the Golden Mountain," to be with his father, Windrider, a kite maker who immigrated there a few years earlier to take advantage of the West Coast's booming expansionism. Now a laundryman, Windrider hopes to save enough money to bring his entire family over to the United States, but as his son Moon Shadow discovers, Windrider's heart really lies in his dream of building a flying machine like that of the Wright brothers. Spurred on by the conviction that he was once a dragon in a former incarnation, Windrider tinkers in his makeshift workshop, building model after model of seemingly magical flying machines, much to the wonderment of Moon Shadow. Surviving in the western world, however, demands that more crucial lessons be learned. There are racists attacks by angry San Francisco natives who resent the ever increasing presence of the Chinese; there are tensions between Moon Shadow and the father he hardly knows; and eventually, father and son will face the devastation of the 1906 earthquake which destroys their home and forces even more grueling trials upon them. Through it all, and with the help of two Americans who believe in them, Windrider and Moon Shadow do build their flying machine and forge a deeper relationship. The results of their labor, though, will ultimately force Windrider to make a courageous decision about his and his family's future in the West.
Notes:
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1st Produced:
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Organisations:
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1st Published:
American Theatre Magazine, NY - September, 1992 -
Music:
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To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
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Genre:
Childrens Drama Youth Audience
Parts:
Male: 4 Female: 3 Other: -
Further Reference:
-
Top of PageFairy Bones
Synopsis:
A manipulative old shaman woman and her daughter-in-law in conflict.
Notes:
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1st Produced:
- -
Organisations:
Pan Asian Repertory Theatre
1st Published:
- -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
One act
Parts:
Male: - Female: - Other: -
Further Reference:
-
Top of PagePay the Chinaman
Synopsis:
-
Notes:
-
1st Produced:
- -
Organisations:
-
1st Published:
in "Between Worlds", Theatre Communications Group, New York, 1990 -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
One act
Parts:
Male: - Female: - Other: -
Further Reference:
-
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