two-year fellowship study in Japan, Yoshiko wrote
The Magic Listening Cap: More Folk Tales from
Japan, her second collection of Japanese folktales,
and wrote articles for Nippon Times in Tokyo. After
returning to the West Coast of the United States
in 1955, she wrote a column entitled “Letters from
San Francisco” for the magazine Craft Horizons
published in New York.
Over the course of her career, Yoshiko was hon-
ored with numerous awards for her portrayal of
her life as a Japanese American growing up in the
troubling times of World War II. Her book Journey
to Topaz (1971), based mainly on her experience
in the relocation camp in Topaz, was selected as
the American Library Association Notable Book in
- One of her most popular books, SAMURAI OF
GOLD HILL (1972), was given the Commonwealth
Club of California Medal for best juvenile book
written by a Californian author. The novel A JAR OF
DREAMS (1981) received another Commonwealth
Club of California Medal in 1982. In 1983 another
American Library Association Notable Book award
was given to her book The Best Bad Thing (1983),
the first sequel to A Jar of Dreams. In 1981 she re-
ceived the Distinguished Service Award, given by
the University of Oregon, for her dedication to
educate American people about Japanese-Ameri-
can culture and the hardships that Japanese Amer-
icans have endured over the decades. In 1985 she
received the Young Author’s Hall of Fame Award
from the San Mateo and San Francisco Reading
Associations for her collection of books that ben-
efit young readers.
Her collection of more than 30 books for young
readers includes The Promise Year (1959); The Sea
of Gold and Other Tales from Japan (1965); In-
Between Miya (1967); Journey Home (1978); and
PICTURE BRIDE (1988). Yoshiko’s novel Desert Exile
(1984) is for both young readers and adults. Her
last book, The Invisible Thread (1991), is an au-
tobiography written for young readers in which
Uchida depicts her life in the interment camps
and her years of devotion to educating the pub-
lic about Japanese Americans through her books,
articles, short stories, and poems. Throughout
her career, Yoshiko utilized her own hardships as
templates by which to mark her literary characters
who grow stronger through pain and distress. She
relates these aspects to the younger audience in
order to give them an insight into their country’s
history; in doing so, she uses fiction to make to
keep history alive and believable. Yoshiko Uchida
died in Berkeley, California, on June 21, 1992, at
the age of 71.Bibliography
Online Archive of California. “Uchida (Yoshiko)
Photograph Collection: Biography.” Available on-
line. URL: content.oac.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft6k
4007pc;jsessionic=DdmXhJ9SO_hBAQiK?&que
ry=icjoda%20photograph&brand=cac. Down-
loaded on October 19, 2006.
Zia, Helen and Susan B. Gall, eds. Notable Asian
Americans. New York: Gale Research, 1995.
Anne BahringerUmrigar, Thrity (1961– )
Thrity Umrigar was born in Bombay and received
her B.S. from Bombay University. After moving to
the United States for graduate school in 1981, she
received a Ph.D. from Kent State University. She
has published two novels, Bombay Time (2001)
and The Space between Us (2006), and a memoir,
First Darling of the Morning (2004). In addition,
she has published essays and journalistic pieces in
the Akron Beacon Journal, Washington Post, and
Boston Globe.
Umrigar’s debut novel, Bombay Time, has re-
ceived many laudatory reviews. Like BAPSI SID-
H WA and Rohinton Mistry, Umrigar writes of the
Parsi community, an ethnic minority in India that
practices Zoroastrianism and traces its origins to
Persia. The novel is set in a middle-class apart-
ment complex in contemporary Bombay, and
the residents of that building become the collec-
tive protagonist of the novel. The story centers on
the wedding of the son of Jimmy Kanga. As the
members of the community arrive at the wedding,
the author gives us carefully nuanced portraits of
the main characters: Kanga’s economic success298 Umrigar, Thrity