Coral Wu
My name is Coral. I am from Taiwan. My Chinese name is Cheng-Yi Wu--a name which I don't think is charming in Chinese and which has no meaning in English. So, please call me Coral. I've called myself Coral sicne I was a sophomore at college. I made the name up because I liked its pronunciation.
I received my B.A. degree in Foreign Languages and Literature at National Sun Yat-sen University in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. I continued to pursue my M.A. degree in Foreign Languages and Literature at National Cheng-Kung University in Tainan. Though I studied in two departments of foreign languages and literature, my main interest was in English and American literature. My M.A. thesis is about nature in John Fowles's The French Lieutenant's Woman. In my thesis, I explore Fowles's unique attitude toward nature, using this perspective to re-examine the postmodernist criticism of his novel. It was in explaining Fowles's attitude toward nature that I began to be enthusiastic about the relationship between literature and the environment. In addition to ecocriticism, I am also interested in postcolonialism, D.H. Lawrence, 18th-century British Gothic fiction, and American Southern Gothic.
I like traveling to mountains and visiting old buildings and temples, though I am not religious. When I was a college student in Taiwan, I traveled around the country by scooter and hike in several beautiful mountainous regions. After my adventurous college life, I began to backpack in Southeast Asian countries such as Cambodia and Myanmar, where I visited temples with more than 500 years of history. During my trip to Cambodia, I visited Angkor Wat and several other old temples abandoned in the tropical jungle. It was really amazing to see how the great human constructions were totally occupied by gigantic tropical trees. This sublime spectacle really inspired me to think about the relationship between the natural world and human civilization. As for my trip to Myanmar, I visited Yangon, Mandalay, Bagan, and Inle Lake. On my way to Mandalay, I thought of Kipling's poem, imagining how this British writer cultivated his literary aesthetics through his colonial imagination. In Bagan, I was astonished by the oldness of the temples. Though not abandoned in the jungle but dotted over the Bagan Plain, their number was so great that I felt I was entering a space blessed with a sort of mysterious holiness. (But I was not converted!) My travel experiences in Cambodia and Myanmar were really great. If I were not a student of literature, I would be happy to be an archeologist burying myself in the ruins of temples.
When I put aside my studies and outdoor life, I am interested in cosmetics and anything related to "girls' stuff." If I were not going to get my PhD at UNR, I would become a beauty consultant who teaches women how to remain young, charming, and adventurous!
For more information, contact Coral at scarletcoral.at.yahoo.com.tw