Mirror, Self, and Vision: Childhood Autobiographies of Yan Phou Lee and Ilhan New

This study compares two early childhood autobiographies in Asian American literature: Yan Phou Lee’s When I Was a Boy in China (1887) and Ilhan New’s When I Was a Boy in Korea (1928). It examines how both authors frame childhood through cultural translation and identity politics, countering Western notions of ‘otherness’. Written in distinct historical moments—Lee as a Chinese Educational Mission student in the late Qing era after the Chinese Exclusion Act, and New as a Korean expatriate under Japanese colonial rule—both texts employ English to seek social legitimacy in the United States. Their narratives merge personal memory with national tradition during times of modernization, negotiating the complexities of minority self-definition. Lee uses humor and vivid anecdotes to challenge prejudice and highlight shared human values, while New adopts an ethnographic tone to present a ‘collective childhood’ rooted in Korean culture and universal experience. Together, these works establish an early foundation for Asian American autobiography and reveal how cultural narration became a means of resisting colonial discourse and fostering cross-cultural dialogue.