Hey! Time to meet another Angry Reader of the Week, spotlighting you, the very special readers of this website. Over the years, I've been able to connect with a lot of cool folks, and this is a way of showing some appreciation and attention to the people who help make this blog what it is. This week's Angry Reader is writer and self-described "East Coast Asian" Ed Lin...
Who are you?
I'm Ed Lin. I've been wearing glasses since I was eight. I tried contacts
for a while, but I found them annoying.
What are you?
I'm a writer. I've written the novels Waylaid and This Is a Bust. My third
book, Snakes Can't Run, will be published in April 2010. It's the sequel
to This Is a Bust. I have a massive music collection and I'm
transitioning from being a hardcore punk fan to jazz and progressive
metal. My favorite music this year has been Baroness, Kylesa, Pelican, Don
Pullen, Blue Mitchell, Buck Clayton and seeing the Mummies' reunion shows.
Where are you?
I'm a native of New York City. I live in Manhattan with my wife Cindy
Cheung, the actress. You know, us East Coast Asians are fewer in number
than out West but I like our situation better. We don't get comfortable
and there's always something irritating going on to keep us on our toes. I
once went out to visit a friend in L.A. and all we did was go to vapid
Asian clubs -- one time to see this fledging act perform in front of 30
people: The Black-Eyed Peas!
Where are you from?
I am of Taiwanese and Chinese descent. That's right. Taiwan is not China,
rah rah rah! I have Mongolian blood, too. That's where I get my height,
girth and affinity for colder weather from. Although I was born in New
York City, I grew up in New Jersey and finished high school in
Pennsylvania. I came back to New York to attend Columbia University and I
haven't left the city since.
What do you do?
I try to read people's minds and determine what they will do and what they
have done. I also collect ghost stories because I lived for a summer in
an old farm house that was haunted. Nothing too exciting about it; there
was a presence in one of the empty bedrooms that would snore at night. I
play videogames, as well. Infinite Undiscovery got terrible reviews, but I
actually like it!
What are you all about?
I'm all about trying to understand everything. I went to a writing
conference in Indianapolis via Amtrak and came back on a Greyhound (both
about 24-hour trips) because I wanted to see what the country looked like
out the window and also observe people as they got on and got off from
state-to-state. I'm glad I did it. Parts of West Virginia looked like
Edward Hopper paintings and I loved the quiet, plaintiveness of it.
What makes you angry?
I get mad when people don't listen. When you don't listen, your mind
isn't open to challenge your own thoughts. One of the most infuriating
episodes of my life was when I was taking a class on John Milton at
Barnard and the old white female professor called me into her office to
tell me that I had made mistakes in my paper "that a native English
speaker wouldn't have made." She asked where I was from and I said I was
born here. She quickly interjected, "Well, your parents weren't!" I
couldn't believe that I was sitting there talking with someone who,
despite our lengthy and rather pointed conversation, had merely made a
visual check and labeled me as an illiterate. Later on in the year she
complimented me on another paper I had written, but asked me, "Did you get
help on it?" I told Columbia students about this incident at a reading
last year, and all these students came up to me afterwards with similar
stories. I can't believe such idiocy is still going on!