I was interested by the first story, “No Name Woman,” because of the way that the narrator imagined the type of person that her aunt was in her attempts to understand the past. I though that this introduced the reader to the type of stories and self-exploration that would follow in the novel.
Firstly, I thought that it was ironic that in trying to understand the truth of what really happened, the narrator speculates about the type of person her aunt was and fills in the details with her own imaginings. I think that this was an integral story for the narrator, however, because it shows how important it was for her to name the unnamed and to sort through the silence within her family.
The opening paragraph of the chapter emphasizes the silence that we have discussed many times in class. As the speaker noted, “No one said anything. [They] did not discuss it” (Kingston, 3). The family acted as if the aunt never existed in order to protect themselves from the shame—shame of a child born of wedlock, shame of a wife’s infidelity to her husband, and shame of a woman who committed suicide.
It was also interesting that while the mother used stories like this to scare her children into silence and to keep them from humiliating the family, the narrator took the skeleton of the story and started to flesh it out with a strong, individualistic woman. The narrator imagined her aunt in many different capacities—someone who wanted to travel west, someone who dreamed about a different life, or even someone who was “a wild woman” who took care with her appearance to attract the attentions of a man. She also imagined her aunt as a woman who accepted her responsibility as a mother: “[s]he may have gone to the pigsty as a last act of responsibility: she would protect her child as she had protected its father” (Kingston, 15). Even though she knew that her aunt killed herself and her baby, the narrator sees the suicide as an act of loving because the aunt did not abandon her child.
I felt that the narrator envisioned her aunt as a strong and individualistic woman because she felt a tie to her ancestor. Perhaps this connection arose because the narrator felt distanced from her family in China—the same family that distanced themselves from her aunt. Or maybe these sentiments arise because the narrator is in the process of negotiating her role in Chinese society, in Chinese American society, and in American society. The connection that the narrator had with the aunt made me think about the mother in All I Asking For Is My Body. In this novel, the mother thought that she was a substitute for someone else in the family and accepted the punishment until she could find someone else to shoulder the burden. In a similar manner, it seems as if the narrator sees her aunt as her own substitute. The aunt accepts the punishment of the family, a punishment that has been perpetuated for fifty years.
With the telling of her aunt’s story, it is as if the narrator is now lifting the punishment off of her aunt. The narrator becomes the substitute that her aunt, “whose weeping ghost, wet hair hanging and skin bloated, waits silently by the water to pull down” (Kingston, 16).
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I think this motif of punishment and substitutes in Woman Warrior is a really interesting one to take a closer look at. As Kim has pointed out, part of Maxine’s journey to find voice involves unearthing these secret stories of shame and punishment. In the process, she absorbs some of the shame herself by breaking social codes and challenging generations of silence. As I was trying to think of something to write, I found that I kept coming back to the repeated mentions of “crazy ladies” in these memoirs—what is the significance of their stories? I think that the retelling of these accounts is, like the revelation of the secret aunt, another form of “vengeance” and “breaking the silence,” as we have discussed. At the same time,
Maxine ends the account of her mother as a doctor with the stoning of the “village crazy lady” when they suspect she is a spy, sending signals to the Japanese enemy through the reflections from her headdress (110). Like Maxine’s aunt, this woman is feared because she poses a threat of bringing harm to the community through her words and actions. As with the aunt, she is ultimately killed for her defiance.
I also found it interesting that both Brave Orchid and Maxine give their definitions of insanity in terms of speaking. According to Brave Orchid, “sane people have variety when they talk-story. Mad people have only one story they talk over and over,” (184). Similarly, Maxine believes that “talking and not talking between sanity and insanity. Insane people were the ones who couldn’t explain themselves,” (216). Thus, Maxine hints that the neighbor woman, who was purchased in China to be a wife, and Crazy Mary, left in China and not reunited with her parents in America until “almost twenty and crazy” (217) are alike in their inability to speak. Moreover, Moon Orchid is left in mental disarray after her failed confrontation with her husband, in which she fails to speak up for herself, only able to cower in shame (178). However, at the end of this chapter, Moon Orchid relates that she is able to find a common language among her peers at the asylum who “speak the same language, the very same” (185). I’m confused at the significance of this—Maxine even admits, “she had a new story, and yet she slipped entirely away” (186).
Finally, Maxine admits to her own fear of becoming the “crazy one” (221)—unmarriageable, or even worse, paired with a mentally retarded boy (226). Once again, the issue of silencing arises; Maxine figures she best “keep quiet” (228) about her predictions rather than take the risk of cursing herself. In the end, as in the beginning, Maxine betrays this oath to silence. She ends up venting all her frustrations and strange notions to her mother, who rejects her stories and tries to maintain the silence—“I don’t feel like hearing your craziness,” she says. But Maxine persists, airing out all her grievances. In the end, the speaking was both a revenge and cure; she finds that she must tell what she thinks in all situations, no matter the consequence (239).
I also think that Kingston’s metaphor of sickness can be interpreted in terms of conflicting cultures, values, identities, etc. as it was used in No-no Boy.
Like others, I’m confused about the ending of Warrior Woman… Maxine seems to reach some sort of resolution in terms of her identity, but it sounds to me like a cop-out, something like “I just don’t think/care about it that much anymore.” It sounds like her passion is lost when she describes how her senses are now more dulled. Anyone have any thoughts?
- Grace
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