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Chang-rae Lee

About Chang-rae Lee An Interview with Chang-rae Lee More About Chang-rae Lee

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One day my mother asked me if I was ready to choose a name.

I was five years old. Of course I already had a name, the one I have now, but even then I knew what she meant. In the coming fall I would enter the first grade of elementary school, the first year of my formal schooling, and my mother, heeding the suggestions of the kindergarten teacher and school counselor, was determined to give me every aid and advantage.

First, he must learn English, at all costs he must learn English, and with a good accent. So in my room I found piles of books, and I could watch as much television as I wished, and she and my father would speak to me only in Korean, to protect my impressionable ears.

Next, the boy would need an American name. This was more difficult for her, because all those funny-sounding names held no meaning for her, no nuance or significance. An old astrologer who consulted ancient charts and equations had chosen my Korean name, matching the exact time of my birth on this day, of this month, of that Year of the Snake, with certain characters, to arrive at the most auspicious of combinations.

But here in America she had to leave the crucial naming to me. So I looked to my books, to the newspapers, and then to the television, and for weeks I couldn't decide between Greg and Peter and Bobby. But Greg and Peter and Bobby really weren't like me, they lived in a giant house and with a maid, and thought they had troubles -- their's weren't anything like mine.

My friends in the apartment building were no more of a help. They gave me names that they considered neat or cool, names they wished one of their friends to have: Buzz, Rocky, Speed. One kid, not quite getting it, suggested the name Tom Seaver (the year was 1970).

My father had his own ideas. He didn't seem terribly concerned either way, but he thought that if it had to be, I should sport something respectable, intelligent, like William or Walter. But those names seemed too old. And his bookshelves of psychology-- Sigmund, Alfred, Erich, Rollo---led me nowhere.

Finally, I settled on solid middle ground, names I was sure were 100% American, unremarkable, easy to say, and most important, normal: Chris, David, Mike, James, Ray, and then the one I came closest to being, Chuck. Of all things -- Chuck. I would write Lee after all of them, scribe them out at the top of separate pages, to see how they looked, worked. I had my friends call me Ray for a week, Chuck for another, but they would always forget, and so would I; I'd acknowledge them when they called my Korean name. I'd forget the whole day the person I was trying to be.

I was trying so hard to make it easier for them, and for strangers, the idea being that if we make it simpler for them it would be simpler and easier for me. No more fumbling of my name on the first day of class, no more taunts of "chang-a chink-a" in the playground, no more questions of what I was, or where I came from, no more of that constant trouble and confusion.

But even the alias Chuck didn't help. Maybe the name made me a little bit more American in those others' eyes, but not enough to make a real difference. The project slowly faded. I went back to writing out my own name, practicing it, as if in reacquaintance. And somewhere inside, I was just beginning to understand that who I was couldn't change at all, ever, that I couldn't dress up in another boy's clothes. I wasn't being smart or proud. I would stare into the mirror and try my best. But simply nothing fit. And if Chuck or Ray couldn't run or play any easier in the world, then it would have to be just me, out there, old name and all.

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