My Lifelong Challenge is also the story of Mr Lee's own personal struggle to learn the Chinese language, which began when he was six years old and his Hakka maternal grandmother enrolled him in a Chinese class with fishermen's children. In evocative detail, the man born to English-speaking parents recounts his own feelings of rebellion and humiliation at different points in his life, when faced with the Chinese language and his own inadequacy in it.

This book describes in matter-of-fact yet vivid fashion his steely determination to improve his Chinese and reclaim his Chinese heritage, right up to the present when he is well into his eighties. In this book, we learn of Mr Lee's belief in a fundamental difference between the Chinese-educated and the English-educated and how it came about. He describes a scene of English-speaking students at the University of Singapore hostel revelling in party games even as Chinese-speaking students in the Chinese High School nearby were locked in a deadly face-off with the police in 1956, and gives the dire warning that "if Singapore students all turned out like those in the university hostel, Singapore would fail." Finally, Mr Lee distils his experiences of 50 years into eight precepts which he spells out at the end of his narrative.

The second half of this book is a compilation of essays by 22 Singaporeans. They include Mr Lee Hsien Loong, the current prime minister and son of Mr Lee Kuan Yew, and Ms Stephanie Sun, the well-known pop star. In these essays, the 22 recount their own language journeys, imbuing flesh and blood meaning to cold policy measures wrought over more than four decades.

This book is essential reading for anyone wanting to find more about Singapore's bilingualism policy and its chief architect. It breaks new ground by putting into the public domain information about education matters that has never been publicised. It is also an invaluable resource for all who are interested in the primeval interplay between language and politics.

李光耀，生於1923年9月16日，新加坡華人，祖籍廣東省梅州市大埔縣。為新加坡前任總理，曾任國務資政以及內閣資政。為新加坡的獨立及崛起做齣卓越貢獻，被譽為“新加坡國父”。 2011年5月14日，他宣布退齣新加坡內閣。李光耀不僅是新加坡的開國元老之一，也是現今新加坡政壇極具影響力的人物之一。

十二歲（1935年）時考入當地頂尖的萊佛士書院，後榮獲大英帝國女王奬學金赴英國留學。1949年畢業，獲得“雙重第一榮譽學位”。1950年在倫敦獲得執業律師資格。1950年迴到新加坡，開始從事律師工作。1954年，李光耀率領同道成立人民行動黨，參加次年舉行的首屆選舉。1959年6月3日，新加坡自治邦成立，由李光耀齣任自治邦政府總理。

新加坡獨立後，李光耀積極推動經濟改革與發展，在其任內推動瞭開發裕廊工業園區、創立公積金製度、成立廉政公署、進行教育改革等多項政策，成功使新加坡在三十年內發展成為亞洲最富裕繁榮的國傢之一。今天的新加坡政府以高效率、廉潔而聞名，人民生活水平較其他亞洲國傢高齣許多。