[5] In 1921, he fled Korea because of his participation in the Korean independence movement; he went first to Canada (where he briefly studied at Dalhousie University), then to the United States.

[5] He worked as an editor for the Encyclopædia Britannica and taught at New York University, where his colleague Thomas Wolfe read the opening chapters of his novel The Grass Roof and recommended it to Scribners publishing house.

In addition to The Grass Roof and East Goes West, Kang translated Korean literature into English and reviewed books for The New York Times.

East Goes West continues the story of Han (standing in for Kang) and his life in the United States, where he notices how involved his fellow immigrants are in Korean independence and how much they hope to return to their native land.

His distance from his fellow immigrants increases his sense of loneliness in his new country; Moreover, his hopes for a new life in the West are never realized, as his dreams exceed the reality of American opportunity at that time.