Ngugi wa Thiong'o

The works of the Kenyan author Ngugi wa Thiong'o have intrigued me for a while because, for the past thirty-plus years, he has chosen to write them in Gikiyu, an African language, rather than in English.  Gikiyu being his first language, he believes that it is more appropriate for his writing and for African literature.  He views English as a colonizers' language that has been imposed on him.  (He and Chinua Achebe disagree on this.)  However, NwT is his own translator, which solves some of the problems of transmission.  (Note that Joseph Conrad, on the other hand, chose to write in English, rather than in Polish, and that he did not translate his own works into his first language.)

This article from the Global Literacy Project's web site discusses NwT's thoughts on the relationship between language and literature.

http://www.glpinc.org/Classroom%20Activities/Kenya%20Articles/Ngugi%20Wa%20Thiong%27o-On%20Language%20and%20Culture.htm

This article is more extensive and mentions his approach to each language:

http://www.nondomesticatedthinker.com/2010/04/dialogue-among-african-languages-by-ngugi-wa-thiong%E2%80%99o/

Here is a brief biography from 1996:

http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/Ngugi.html

This biography dates from 2001:
http://www.humanities.uci.edu/icwt/news/ngugi_bio.html

Since 2001, NwT has returned to Kenya where he and his wife suffered a vicious attack:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2006/jan/28/featuresreviews.guardianreview13

Below are some maps that will help you place Kenya.




Below is a picture of a woman picking tea in Limuru, NwT's hometown.  I was surprised to see that it was less than twenty miles from Nairobi, Kenya's capital. 

This summer I was able to read NwT's novel, Petals of Blood.  This book is the last one he composed in English.  It is set in Ilmorog, a fictional Kenyan village that becomes a boomtown over the course of the novel.  Events take place during the late 1960s and early 1970s, after Kenya becomes independent.  Ostensibly, the story is something of a murder mystery as at the beginning, three wealthy men have been killed in a fire.  However, NwT's narrative focuses more on the paths that four friends take over the course of a dozen years.  These friends are Munira, a teacher from a wealthy family; Wanja, a businesswoman who becomes the madam of a brothel; Abdulla, Wanja's former partner; and Karega, a union organizer whom she once loved.  Each man is a suspect in the deaths of the three wealthy men, and each of the wealthy men was involved with Wanja.  (The fire occurred at her mansion.)  Interestingly, NwT finished up this novel in 1977 at a Soviet writers' colony.  (The USSR hadn't yet fallen.)


NwT's next novel, Devil on the Cross, is also set in Ilmorog.  This novel, on the other hand, was written in a Kenyan prison and is the author's first novel in Gikiyu.


I am also reading NwT's recent memoir, Dreams in a Time of War, which was published this year (2010).  It's always interesting to learn more about an author's background since he or she often draws on it for his/her fiction.  Unsurprisingly, NwT grew up in a village, and members of his working-class family were involved in 20th c. struggles against the British.  (Kenya was a British colony until 1963.)  His older brother, Good Wallace, belonged to the Mau Maus, a group that actively fought the British.  Like one of the minor characters in Petals of Blood, he was betrayed, but the ending of his story appears to be happier.  Like Joseph, Abdulla's adopted son, NwT won a scholarship to an elite high school in Kenya.  The memoir ends with his arrival at this school after some surprising twists and turns.

Overview for Midterm

Above is a picture of Igbo elders in council.  Below is a quick overview of our material.

Genres:

novel -- a fictional prose narrative of at least 50,000 words, which emphasizes character over plot, focuses on a protagonist with whom we are supposed to sympathize, and has a realistic-seeming setting

life writing -- non-fictional writing about an individual's life.  Sub-genres are biographies, autobiographies, memoirs, letters, and journals or diaries.

autobiography -- covers the whole of the author's life

memoir -- covers part of the author's life

Works --

Apocalypse Now (1979) dir. by Francis Ford Coppola.  Set in Vietnam although it is an adaptation of Heart of Darkness.  Capt. Willard is the narrator.  He is sent on a mission to kill Col. Kurtz, a Green Beret who has gone rogue.  The men on the boat escorting Willard include Chef (remember the tiger scene) and Lance the surfer.  Along the way we meet Col. Kilgore (who wants to see Lance surf) and a photojournalist (played by Dennis Hopper) who is Coppola's version of Kurtz' Russian.

Heart of Darkness (serialized 1899, published as a book 1902) by Joseph Conrad for whom English was *not* his first language.  This novel is a frame narrative, beginning with an unnamed Englishman's narration and then moving to Marlow's narration.  Marlow is a merchant marine who goes to the Belgian Congo as an employee of the nefarious Company.  He is sent to captain a boat rescuing Kurtz, a star of the Company.  Along the way we meet the Accountant (who may remind you of Kilgore), many pilgrims, the Helmsman and the Fireman, the Russian, and Kurtz' Intended.  Is Marlow on the hero's journey as he moves from the center (London) to the margins (Congo, esp. Kurtz' trading post)?  Note that London has not always been the center.  It has been one of the dark places like the Congo.

"An Image of Africa" (1975) -- African novelist Chinua Achebe strongly criticizes Conrad's depiction of Africa and Africans.  He focuses on Conrad's description of the landscape and his refusal to let Africans speak for themselves.

Achebe on writing in English -- Achebe feels that he has been given the gift of English.  He argues for his choice to write in English.  (Ten or fifteen years later Kenyan Ngugi wa' Thiongo will argue for his choice to write in Gikiyu, his first language.)

Things Fall Apart (1958) -- This is not only Chinua Achebe's first novel but also one of the first works of modern African literature. Achebe wrote this novel shortly before Nigeria gained its independence from the UK.  Things Fall Apart is a third-person narrative set in the 1890s when missionaries were active in the British colony.  Its protagonist is Okonkwo, a forceful man whose downfall may be his pride, his anger, or his desire NOT to be like his father.  Is he a tragic hero?  Okonkwo has three wives and many children.  We focus on Nwoye, his son who repudiates his father to become a Christian, and Ezinma, his daughter whom Okonkwo wishes were his son.  She has "the right spirit."  We also meet Ikemefuna, Okonkwo's foster son whom O. kills.  Ikemefuna's death naturally alienates Nwoye.  Along the way, we learn much about Igbo culture (especially its reliance on oracles, proverbs, and a council of elders).  We also watched a TV miniseries of TFA that includes scenes NOT in the novel.

 
Turkish Embassy Letters (not published during the life of their author, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu).  Lady Mary wrote these letters while accompanying her husband, the ambassador to the Ottoman Empire from 1716 to 1718.  At this time, the British Empire was not yet dominant, and the Ottoman Empire was powerful and prosperous.  The letters we read included Lady Mary's letters to the poet Alexander Pope (she makes many literary and cultural references and even translates some Turkish poetry), her friend Susan Chiswell (about vaccination for smallpox), and her sister Lady Mar (about trips to the harems or homes of two Turkish women of high rank).  Does it make a difference that Lady Mary edited these letters?

The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano (1789) -- Afro-British businessman, anti-slavery activist, and former slave Olaudah Equiano writes his autobiography.  We discussed his depiction of being taken onboard the Europeans' slave ship (he was already a slave), of seeing snow for the first time, of being betrayed by his first English owner Captain Pascal, of witnessing the sexual harassment of female slaves, and of finally buying his freedom.  How does Equiano represent himself?  How does he address his audience?  Who is his audience?  Some scholars question whether Equiano was born in Africa, but most do not.  Equiano was also an Igbo, but he lived on the coast of what is now Nigeria.

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861) -- American social activist, educator, and former slave Harriet Jacobs writes her autobiography.  However, she calls herself Linda Brent in this work.  (At the time she wrote, slavery was still legal in the US, and the Fugitive Slave Act was in effect.)  Jacobs emphasizes what it was like for a child and then a young woman to be a slave.  We see that she grew up in a community of slaves who were thwarted in their efforts to be free.  As a young woman, she was menaced by her owner's father, Dr. Flint, a "hoary-headed miscreant, " yet she had an affair with a white neighbor.  From this affair, she bore two children.  She also distinguishes between womanly women (like her grandmother) and unwomanly women (like Dr. Flint's wife).  Jacobs eventually escaped from slavery, spending almost seven years in her grandmother's attic before finally traveling to the North.  There, as we learn, she was not free until (against her wishes) her employer bought her freedom from Dr. Flint's son-in-law.

We also watched scenes from TV versions of Dickens' David Copperfield (contrasting David's joy with his nurse Peggotty's family and his fear with his stepfather Mr. Murdstone) and Jane Eyre (focusing on her mistreatment by her aunt and cousins).  Below is an original illustration of David with his nurse's family.


The Story of the Stone (written during the 1740s & 1750s, published in 1791) by Cao Xueqin (vol. 1-3) and Gao E (4-5).  This very long novel (five volumes in its English translation) narrates a wealthy young boy (Bao-yu)'s growth from a spoiled child to a man.  He is also involved in an emotional triangle with his delicate, sensitive cousin Dai-yu and the more resilient and emotionally intelligent cousin Bao-chai whom he will marry.  This novel has a complicated and dense frame narrative!  Along the way, we meet Bao-yu's Grandmother Jia, his father Jia Zheng (the masculine ideal for his class), many girl-cousins, and Bao-yu's maid and later chamber wife Aroma.

We watched scenes from Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, and Spring Again (2000), a film by Korean filmmaker Kim Duk-ki.  This film is set in a secluded, rural monastery that was built in the middle of a small lake.  It follows the relationship between a monk and his adopted son, a passionate man who will eventually kill his wife.  We looked at scenes from Spring (the son's boyhood) and Fall (the son's young adulthood). 

Finally, we watched Raise the Red Lantern (1991), a film by Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou.  This film, adapted from a novella by Su Tong, follows a former university student, Songlian, as she becomes the fourth wife of a wealthy man from rural Northern China.  We do not see much nature except for human nature as the women of the compound compete with each other and the servants look on and comment.  Important characters are not only the Master whose face we rarely see but also the second wife Zhouyan (a scorpion with the Buddha's face), the third wife Meishan (a former opera singer), Songlian's disgruntled servant Yan'er, Meishan's lover Dr. Gao, and Feipu, the Master's older son.  Is Songlian a tragic heroine?


Presentations

Sean's presentation on the life of Black Nationalist, entrepreneur and Pan-Africanist Marcus Garvey (1887-1940)

Bryan's presentation on the history of Liberia

Concepts

mimesis -- art that imitates life...or elements of art that imitates life

orality -- characteristics that arise from or remain from a preliterate society (or a society without writing).  Some of these characteristics may include a reliance on proverbs, performance, and an audience.  In a preliterate society, memory is especially pragmatic and flexible...since there are no written records.  An oral performer also relies on set phrases to jog his or her memory.

imperialism -- refers to one country's political, economic, and sometimes cultural domination over another

colonialism -- refers to the practice of settling a country as the British settled in America (before we became independent), India, or their territories in Africa

post-colonialism -- refers to the aftermath of independence.  Post-colonialist writing is generally by individuals whose lands were occupied and depicts experiences from their perspectives.

center/margins

hero's journey -- Joseph Campbell's term.  Stages include birth, call to adventure, crossing the threshold, helpers/amulet, tests, climax/final battle, return, elixir, and return home.  Is Marlow a hero?  If so, what is his elixir?

hypermasculinity

misogyny -- hatred for and distrust of women or the feminine

tragic hero -- is often of noble stature but is not perfect, is capable of both good and evil, experiences a downfall because of his/her tragic fall, and does not deserve his/her punishment.  Yet his/her fall is not completely negative and depressing.  There is room for his/her awareness and our catharsis (or purging of emotion).

nature/human nature

film as literature

film's visual elements

film's aural elements

Gensomaden Saiyuki

Link

See the link above for other versions of Journey to the West, including an anime!

Monkey (Arthur Waley's translation of Journey to the West)

Link

The link above is to my review of Monkey, an English-language version/translation of Journey to the West, another of the Four Classic Chinese Novels.

Study Guide for Midterm (Summer 2009)

It seems like we've just begun,but I'd like to start posting our midterm guide as soon as possible.  The take home midterm is due July 27, but since it will cover what we've discussed in class, I want to make up this guide sooner rather than later.

We began our summer session by defining literature and watching some scenes from Francis Ford Coppola's film Apocalypse Now (1979).  Coppola's film reworks Heart of Darkness, resetting it during the Vietnam War.  For people in the late 1960s and 1970s, Vietnam was extremely controversial and, for some, disillusioning.  (BTW, in the interview we saw, Joseph Campbell alludes several times to Vietnam--even though the interview took place in the mid-1980s.)


If you would like to rewatch some of the scenes that we saw, here are links to YouTube videos.  The first is the beginning when Willard (Coppola renamed Marlow) is in Saigon, waiting for his mission:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzM4D2_uOP0

Next Willard gets his mission:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iw1KobfPwk

Then he and his men meet Col. Kilgore. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TmrEo85vuEI

I am not able to find a video of the rest of this scene, but here is the scene where Lance surfs and Willard mutters "Charlie don't surf."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiRTONtkVb8

Finally, here is the scene where Willard & Chef encounter the tiger:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbFvAaO9j8M



Tuesday we discussed the first part of Heart of Darkness.  I gave a brief definition and history of the novel.  Here is a link to a more extended definition.

http://www.nvcc.edu/home/ataormina/novels/history/define.htm

Here are some outlines of the 18th, 19th, and 20th century novel.  Note that Conrad is not included in this history! 

http://www.nvcc.edu/home/ataormina/novels/history/origins.htm

http://www.nvcc.edu/home/ataormina/novels/history/19thcent.htm

http://www.nvcc.edu/home/ataormina/novels/history/20thcent.htm

For more information about Conrad's life, see this very full chronology:

http://conrad-centre.w.interia.pl/pages/chronology_en.html

This page has more detailed information about Conrad's most well-known novels:

http://www.mantex.co.uk/ou/a319/conrd-01.htm

Below is the album cover for the soundtrack of a 1960s movie based on Conrad's novel Lord Jim.  (Marlow also narrated this novel as well.  In this novel, he mentions that he likes to mentor young men.)


Among the topics we discussed Tuesday were the frame narrative (story within a story), the unnamed narrator & Marlow's depictions of London, Marlow's depiction of Brussels ("whited sepulcher"), his description of Africa (coast & the first station), his audience's perception of him, our perception of him, his relationships with women (specifically his aunt), his relationship with other Europeans, and his perception of the native workers.  Since we discussed Marlow's admiration for the accountant with his starched cuffs and collar, we watched a little more of Apocalypse Now's scenes featuring Col. Kilgore.


On Wednesday we moved on to part 2 of Heart of Darkness, focusing on its depiction of Africa and Africans as well as of Europeans.  Some key scenes were Marlow's depiction of his fireman, his reaction to the death of the helmsman, and his encounter with the young Russian.  A number of you mentioned Chinua Achebe's "An Image of Africa":

http://www.idst.vt.edu/modernworld/d/Achebe.html

We also took another perspective on Conrad's novel, examining the more recent history of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (aka DR Congo or Zaire).  For more specific information, see this link to my earlier Multiply entry:

http://worldlit2.multiply.com/journal/item/84/Reading_Heart_of_Darkness_Historical_Background>Reading Heart of Darkness (Historical Background)

Here you may rewatch the YouTube documentary on Patrice Lumumba that we saw in class:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrcX3XUm7eA

In addition, these are links that I sent you with the questions for Wednesday:

This is a link to an English-language trailer of the movie Lumumba :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLh4LGadxoU

Here are links to Al-Jazeera English's documentaries on the Congo:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_d4dFYiIzK8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpd3ykS4QOQ



Although we did not listen to the music of the Baka people until Thursday, I am linking it here since it fits in better with Wednesday's emphasis on African history and culture.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98Xj_oLkRT4


Thursday we moved on to part three of Heart of Darkness and another perspective: Joseph Campbell's outline of the hero's journey.  Do you think that Marlow follows the hero's path?  If so, where does he cross the threshold?  who are his helpers?  and what is the elixir that he brings back?  Was his elixir that compassion that he shows to Kurtz's fiancee? 

To review the outline, you may go to this link from UC Berkeley:

http://orias.berkeley.edu/hero/JourneyStages.pdf

To watch more of the video that we saw in class, go to this link:

http://www.mythsdreamssymbols.com/herojourney.html

We also discussed Marlow's expectations of Kurtz, his impressions of him, the reasons why Kurtz escaped into the woods & Marlow went after him, and his final interview with Kurtz's fiancee, his Intended, as well as the novel's last paragraph.

On to Things Fall Apart!!

The Story of the Stone (part five)

Apologies for not posting sooner, but here is the final installment of The Story of the Stone. 

At the beginning of the story, Bao-yu still has not recovered his jade, so he has relapsed into a stupor.  Baochai's brother is still in prison despite the family's best efforts to bribe the officials into releasing him.  Bao-yu's father Jia Zheng has been posted to a job in the provinces where his naivety and rigor will get him into trouble...ironically...for corruption.  (His servants are notoriously corrupt, and one man has even convinced his master that servants expect to be able to make money from corruption in their position.  He said that if they are unable to do so, the master will not be able to do his job.)  The narrator also implies that the Jia family is out of favor with the government.  In fact, later in this volume, the family compound will be raided, and two senior members will have to go into exile.  Ironically, by then, Bao-yu's father will be working in the capitol at a job more suited to his strengths.

It goes without saying that at this point the garden (called Prospect Garden) is haunted.  Some of the family then become possessed by the spirits in this garden after You-shi (one of Bao-yu's aunts) takes a short cut through it.


By this time, hardly anyone is living there or even goes there.  Even the older women who were tending fruit and vegetable gardens there have left.

A number of characters also die in this volume.  The first is Xia Jing-Gui, Xue Pan's wife.  She appears to commit suicide, yet as it turns out, she was tricked into drinking the poisoned soup that she was about to give to Caltrop.  All this is revealed in an inquest.  The next is Ying-chun whose husband had been abusing her.  Grandmother Jia dies a while after the government raids the family's compound.  Ironically, she becomes ill at Baochai's birthday party.  Her protege Xi-feng is responsible for Grandmother's funeral, yet the family's finances, the politics within the family, and her own frailty make it impossible to carry out her duty.  She collapses during the funeral and dies but not before asking Grannie Liu, a poor woman from the country, to watch out for her daughter, Qiao-je.  This will be very important as after Xi-feng's death relatives will attempt to sell Qiao-je as a concubine to a Mongol prince.  Grannie Liu will then rescue the girl, hiding her at her own home in the country. 


Robbers also attack the Jia family compound in this volume, carrying off all the treasure that the late Grandmother Jia hid from the government.  Seeing Adamantina, a beautiful nun whose convent is within the compound, one robber kidnaps, rapes, and (probably) murders her. 

The tide begins to turn for the family towards the end of the book.  A mysterious monk returns Bao-yu's jade.  (As Adamantina predicted, the stone went into hiding at Greensickness Mountain for a time.)  Jia Zheng as head of the family continues to flourish in the capitol.  After all of her tribulations, Caltrop becomes Xue Pan's wife, not merely a "chamber wife."  Xi-feng's husband similarly "promotes" Patience after his wife's death.  Bao-yu and his precocious nephew Jia Lan take the civil service exam, enabling them to carry their weight in the family.  However, shortly after excelling on this exam, Bao-yu disappears.  As it turns out, he has become a monk, having completed what he was destined to do.

The Story of the Stone (part four)

Cultural China's picture of Baoyu, Baochai, and (I think) Dai-yu will be a good lead for this entry on the fourth volume of the Story of the Stone.  Here the cousins are older.  Bao-yu has begun to take his studies much more seriously, in part to please his father and the rest of his family but also because he is no longer able to spend time with his female cousins.  Some have returned home; some are married.  In fact, his family is making arrangements for his marriage to Baochai (the young lady on the right) as well.  Bao-yu, on the other hand, loves Dai-yu even though she is pushing him away.  (She continues to be ill in this book and at one point even tries to will her death.)  Yet Dai-yu hopes that she will marry Bao-yu.  Finally, despite what this picture implies, Baochai is pushing herself away from Bao-yu as well.  She has moved back in with her mother and taken on more responsibilities as her family situation has become worse and worse, even with the marriage of her brother Xue Pan, who seems to have reformed. 

However, Xue Pan has also married Xia Jin-gui, a spoiled yet wealthy young lady who is constantly trying to assert herself and cause trouble in her husband's family.  She is jealous of her husband's "chamber wife," Caltrop (whom she arbitrarily renames); her own maid; and, of course, Baochai.  Then, after her husband is sent to prison for killing a waiter, Xia Jin-gui attempts to seduce her husband's cousin, a clean-cut young man.

In this volume, even more so than in Volume 3, we see the rivalries within the family and among their servants.  I have already mentioned Xue Pan's wife.  In addition, as Wang Xi-feng becomes weaker and the family less rich, she becomes vulnerable to attacks from others.  At one point when her daughter is very ill, Jia Huan, the son of a jealous concubine, knocks over the medicine that Wang Xi-feng has gone to great lengths to make for her daughter.  Then the convent located in the family compound is the site of a lurid scandal.  The family member responsible for maintaining this convent is caught partying with the young novices.  The family then disbands the convent, returning the novices to their families. 



Amidst all of this turmoil Bao-yu and Dai-yu find time to discuss their mutual love of music.  Not only is Dai-yu a brilliant poet but she is also proficient on the qin, a seven-string instrument that is now called the guqin.  (It is pictured above.)  For more information about this instrument, see this link:  http://www.chineseculture.net/guqin/qinjieshao.html 
To listen to what the guqin sounds like, see these videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKNeParT2eQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRFFpxkrfGw&feature=related

At the climax of this volume, right before he is about to go to a viewing party for out-of-season crab flowers, Bao-yu loses his jade.  He attempts to cover it up at first, but he is not successful as he quickly becomes very ill.  Despite everyone's best efforts, including a visit to a psychic, the jade does not turn up.  Bao-yu continues to be quite ill, and in order to cure him, Grandmother Jia and the rest of his family decide to bring about the union of jade and gold...that is...marry him off to Baochai.  Since he is still very much in love with Dai-yu, the family tricks him into believing that he will marry her...hence this scene below.

Then, as Bao-yu and Baochai marry, Dai-yu dies alone, with only her maid Nightingale to keep her company.  (The family has neglected her in this last illness.)  Bao-yu relapses but does not learn about his beloved's death until Baochai informs him.  In the short run, he appears to handle the news well, but in the next volume, we will see about the long run!

I'll close this section with an image from a Shanghai ballet based on The Story of the Stone.  Of course, here, Bao-yu is with Dai-yu.


The fourth volume of The Story of the Stone is also a good point to talk about the novel's authorship.  In the version of the novel that I've read, the first three volumes are exclusively the work of Cao Xueqin (@ 1715 - 1763 or 1764), a descendant of a once-flourishing family that fell into disgrace in the 1720s.  The last two volumes were edited and even reconstructed by Gao E (1785 - 1838) as some chapters were missing and there were different versions of others.  Translator David Hawkes has speculated that the missing chapters had been supressed.  Interestingly, the fourth and fifth volumes contain many references to the Emperor's benevolence.

I'll end this entry with an image of Cao Xueqin's statue in Beijing and one of the Cao Xueqin Memorial Hall in a suburb of that city. The author, however, was not from the capital.  He was born in Nanjing and did not move to Beijing until after his family's disgrace.  However, his novel is set in Beijing.

 

The Story of the Stone (part three)

Since I'm not able to find a large enough picture of the cover to Volume 3, I will post this picture of a couple in the Grand View Garden from www.beijingguide2008.com.  It looks like this couple may be actors dressed as Bai-yu and Lin-yu. 

However, this picture is idyllic and belies the overall tone of this volume, "The Warning Voice."  At the end of the volume, Bai-yu is still living in the garden with *most* of the young people who were there at the beginning, and he and his father have begun to be reconciled to each other, but it is clear that things have begun to fall apart for the family.  Throughout the end of Vol. 2 and the whole of Vol. 3, the adult women (especially Wang Xifeng and Lady Wang but also Bao-chai) are concerned about its financial situation.  Xifeng herself is bedridden at the beginning of the volume after giving birth to a stillborn son.  Bai-yu's half-sister Tan-chun and his sister-in-law Li Wan have taken on Xifeng's duties, and they are constantly struggling to manage the family complex and its servants.  Much of the volume is taken up with the servants' jostling for power, prestige, and stolen goods as well as the family's efforts to discipline them for their thefts, gambling, and drunkenness. Moreover, the family is in mourning for Sir Jia Jing, its nominal head, and the Dowager Consort of the late Emperor.  She is not related to the family, but their social position requires that they enter mourning for her.

Below are 19th century painter Xu Baozhuan's depictions of two of Bai-yu's senior maids.  The first is Skybright, a skilled seamstress with a sharp tongue.  She will be one of the servants fired by Lady Wang, and she will die shortly after she is sent to live with her cousin and his vicious wife.  The second is Aroma, Bao-yu's chief maid and "chamber wife."





In addition, soon after her stillbirth, Wang Xifeng's husband Jia Lian marries another woman secretly and sets up a household with her outside the family's compound.  (As you may know from Raise the Red Lantern, men were permitted to have multiple wives.  However, Jia Lian is afraid how his wife and family will respond to his taking a second wife, and, as I have mentioned above, the family is in mourning.)  Once Xifeng finds out about her husband's secret marriage to You Er-jie, she brings her back to the family compound only to make her life miserable.  Er-jie, by the way, commits suicide after this mistreatment that includes the miscarriage of a son.  This miscarriage was induced by the incompetent doctor whom Xifeng hires for her. 

Jia Zheng's return to the family comes as a relief to them and even the reader.  (Remember that he nearly killed Bao-yu in Volume 2.)  Before his father's return, Bao-yu scurries around to complete all the tasks that his father has set him.  In fact, he has to ask his female cousins to help him compile enough calligraphy.  Nevertheless, father and son reconcile.  Jia Zheng even commissions his son to write a poem on a historical figure, the Winsome Colonel, a woman who goes to war to avenge the death of Prince Heng. 

Below is a picture of Mu Guiyung, another of China's woman warriors.


At the end of the third volume, Bao-yu's companions are beginning to move out of the garden.  Bao-chai chooses to move back in with her mother.  The maid Caltrop must move back in with her master Xue Pan once he returns from a long journey.  He soon marries a cruel and capricious woman who torments Caltrop.  Another companion, Ying-chun, marries, and others will soon follow.

I'll finish with a more desolate picture from the Grand View Garden in Beijing.

Story of the Stone (part two)

In this volume of The Story of the Stone, the cousins are a little more grown up (14 or 15), and they are mad for poetry.  The Crab Flower Club is the name of their club, and many of "their" poems are included in this volume.  Our anthology includes only a few scenes from this section of The Story of the Stone, but I think that it is still well worth reading not only to see what happens to Bao-yu and his family but also to understand a little more about Chinese literature and literary studies as well as their attitudes towards gender.

The picture below is China-Guide's illustration of Dai-yu composing one of her poems.



However, this volume is not as wonky as it seems.    In fact, here, the clouds begin to gather over Bao-yu and his family.  Early on, Jia Zheng, Bao-yu's father, attacks his son, giving him an extremely severe beating because of what he perceives as his dissoluteness.  Keep in mind that Bao-yu hates to study and that he shows especially contempt for what is considered masculine knowledge.  His father, on the other hand, is a Confucian scholar and civil servant.  Almost at the beginning of the book, Golden, a servant to Bao-yu's mother, is dismissed for flirting with the young man.  Later she kills herself.  When Jia Zheng inquires into this young woman's suicide, Jia Huan (his other son by a concubine) informs him that Golden killed herself after Bao-yu had raped her.  (Right now I'm reading Vol. 3, and this lie has not yet been exposed although it is clear to the family that Jia Huan and his mother are troublemakers.)  Jia Zheng leaves the family compound shortly thereafter when the Emperor promotes him to high office.  However, Bao-yu's days in the garden may be limited.  His maid and now "chamber wife," Aroma, advises Bao-yu's mother to be stricter with him, move him into lodgings outside of the garden, and encourage him to be more like his father.  In other words, it is time for Bao-yu to learn to be a man.  (Below is a picture of Confucian scholars from www.cultural-china.com.) 



Dai-yu, Bao-yu's beloved cousin, also faces certain gender strictures.  At one of the meetings of the Crab Flower Club, she quotes lines from Dream of the Western Chamber, a risque novel that Bao-yu has encouraged her to read.  How explicit it is you may see here:
http://press.princeton.edu/chapters/s7134.html
Afterwards, Bao-chai takes her aside to warn her about her reading and even her absorption in literature.  She reminds her that for both girls and boys literature is just a pastime. 

Unfortunately, I can't find a picture of Baochai at work, so here is An Ho's portrait of Wang Xifeng, the relative who runs the household...or shall I say family complex.  Wang Xifeng is perhaps Dai-yu's polar opposite.  She is energetic, practical, manipulative, and illiterate.  She puts a great deal of energy into humoring Grandmother Jia and managing the servants as well as making money for herself.  Let's imagine that Wang Xifeng is sitting listening to reports from the various servants.



However, all is not well for Wang Xifeng either.  Her husband Jia Lian is a philanderer, and in the Crab Flower Club, we will see her attack him and her servant Patience after she overhears his complaining about her to a mistress.

As you might imagine, at this point, the poetry club, though, is a useful diversion, uniting the younger members of the family, a group that becomes even more numerous near the end of this volume.  Even Wang Xifeng is involved as the enforcer of penalties.


Perhaps I will end this entry with another picture of the Grandview Garden in Beijing:

The Story of the Stone (part one)

In EN 202, we've read a few scenes from The Story of the Stone, a classic Chinese novel from the 1700s, but I would like to give you a fuller picture of this novel.  After all, the English translation is in five volumes, and the Longman Anthology's excerpts are mainly from the first and the second volumes.

The Story of the Stone follows Bao-yu, a wealthy, spoiled, but idealized young man from before his birth (there is a frame story) through his childhood and adolescence to his decision to become a Daoist monk.  In his early years, his family flourishes, and admittedly, it is easy to lose track of the members of his extended family and their servants who people the novel.  However, Bao-yu will fall on hard times as we will see in the later volumes.  Translator David Hawkes mentions that Bao-yu's story may be a fictionalized version of his author, Cao Xuequin,'s life.  Like Bao-yu, Cao Xuequin came from a wealthy family that lost favor with the Emperor.

That was the short version of The Story of the Stone.   The pictures and text make up the long version of my summary of Volume 1.

Below is a picture of a jade pendant to evoke the pendant that Bao-yu wore around his neck.  (As we learn in the frame story, he had been a jade cornerstone in a previous life.  Curiously, he was the stone that a goddess rejected and a Daoist monk rescued.)


Rescued by the monk, the future Bao-yu meets a flower that will become Dai-yu, his childhood companion and first love.  Below is a picture of the couple.  This appears to be a scene from the end of Volume 1 or perhaps Volume 2.



In 1987, CCTV, China's major television network, broadcast a miniseries version of The Story of the Stone.  (The miniseries, though, is titled The Dream of the Red Chamber, an alternate title for the novel.)  Here is a scene from that series.  In this version, Bao-yu is played by a man, but this role has been performed by a woman in the Shaw Brothers' version  from 1977.
(The Shaw Brothers were based in Hong Kong, which was a British colony and *not* part of China in those days.)

For a little more information, here is a link to a page on the TV series:

http://www.china-guide.com/entertainment/dream.html

I will also post a link to the trailer of the recent TV series:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHUGdUH-3fI



Or you may prefer Bukit Panjang Hokkien Konguay Opera Troupe's rendition of this scene:


If you would like to hear what an operatic version is like, see this video of Dai-yu burying the flowers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwBGFUiK0Bo


I also want to include some pictures that show you how opulent Bao-yu's lifestyle was as well as how beautiful his family's gardens were.  Below is a scene from the recent remake of The Story of the Stone!  In the first volume, Bao-yu's grandmother (Grandmother Jia) is often depicted holding court over her family's meals, so I imagine that this scene might be one of those occasions.


Bao-yu's life, though, is not all pleasure even though he is his grandmother's favorite.  His father, on the other hand, feels contempt for him because he prefers the company of women and dislikes studying.  (Jia Zheng, the father, is a Confucian scholar and civil servant, so he represents a more conventional adult masculinity.)  In one of the scenes that we may read for EN 202, Jia Zheng forces Bao-yu to come up with names and brief poems for the various highlights of the garden he has built for his daughter's visit.  The father appears to despise his son's contributions, but in the end he accepts them.  In another scene that we will not read, Baochai's brother Xue Pan tricks Bao-yu by claiming that his father is looking for him.  Bao-yu's fear of his father is that well-known. 


Below is another scene from this recent remake.  This depicts Dai-yu as a young girl who has just come to live with her relatives (Bao-yu's extended family).  We see Dai-yu's precociousness and pensiveness in this picture.  (She studies in secret and is an accomplished poet as well as a skilled needleworker who destroys her work out of spite.)  However, we do not see her prickliness, but this, too, is a strong element in her character.  As an adolescent, she is constantly bickering and battling with Bao-yu.  She is also jealous of Bao-chai, a more conventional young lady who has also come to live with the family and will marry Bao-yu. 



Here is a picture of Baochai from that same miniseries.  However, this picture depicts her as a teenager.  While Dai-yu is always bickering or brooding, Baochai has a much calmer, friendlier demeanor, and she is particularly noted for her kindness to servants.  As a poet and needleworker, she is talented but not as talented as Dai-yu is.   According to David Hawkes, Baochai and Dai-yu are two variants on the ideal woman. 



The picture below depicts Bao-yu and Dai-yu together in the garden near their houses.  (Yes, as adolescents, each of the young people in the family had his or her own house in the garden.  Previously they had lived with Grandmother Jia.)  This picture is quite fantastic, but it gives you an idea of how stunning the garden is.  (It was built as a venue for a one-day visit by Bao-yu's older sister, one of the Emperor's concubines.)


Here is a more realistic picture of what the garden may have looked like.  In fact, after the filming of the 1987 miniseries, the Chinese government recreated the novel's Grand View Garden.


For more information about this site, see the links below:

http://english.sina.com/p/2008/0806/176446.html

http://www.beijingguide2008.com/grand_view_garden_beijing/grand_view_garden_beijing.html

Finally, the picture below from www.culturalchina.com shows just how crowded with family members and servants The Story of the Stone is!  For example, when Jia Zheng quizzes his son in the new garden, a number of male family members and other "literary gentlemen" accompany them.  Moreover, quite a bit of the latter part of Volume 1 is devoted to the rivalries between the family's servants as well as those between members of the family.  At one point a concubine has a spell cast on both Bao-yu and Wang Xi-Feng because she feels that the family bullies her son.  Bao-yu is the first wife's son, but the bustling Wang Xi-Feng happens to be the young family member who manages the household.  Bao-yu's jade, by the way, breaks the spell once a Daoist monk repurifies the stone.