Teresa Wong

Teresa Wong is the author of the graphic memoirs All Our Ordinary Stories and Dear Scarlet, which was a finalist for The City of Calgary W.O. Mitchell Book Prize and longlisted for CBC Canada Reads. Her comics have appeared in The Believer, The New Yorker, McSweeney’s and The Walrus. A teacher of memoir and comics at Gotham Writers Workshop, Wong was the 2021–22 Canadian Writer-in-Residence at the University of Calgary. She lives in Calgary with her family.

All Our Ordinary Stories

Beginning with her mother’s stroke in 2014, Teresa Wong takes us on a moving journey through time and place to locate the beginnings of the disconnection she feels from her parents. Through a series of stories—some epic, like her mother and father’s daring escapes from communes during China’s Cultural Revolution, and some banal, like her quitting Chinese school to watch Saturday morning cartoons—Wong carefully examines the cultural, historical, language, and personality barriers to intimacy in her family, seeking answers to the questions “Where did I come from?” and “Where are we going?” At the same time, she discovers how storytelling can bridge distances and help make sense of a life.

A book for children of immigrants trying to honour their parents’ pasts while also making a different kind of future for themselves, All Our Ordinary Stories is poignant in its understated yet nuanced depictions of complicated family dynamics. Wong’s memoir is a heartfelt exploration of identity and inheritance, as well as a testament to the transformative power of stories both told and untold.

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Canada kept vast documents on the Chinese Exclusion Act. So why couldn’t I find my grandpa? –Teresa Wong, CBC First Person

Interview with Teresa Wong. –Autobiographix

Teresa Wong

FESTIVAL SHOWS

What a Trio!

All Our Ordinary Stories