Summarised by Song - M Butterfly

In a new segment of this blog, I've decided to link texts you are reading to popular songs so their themes are, hopefully, easier to understand! So, pull up a chair and get ready for the emotional rollercoaster that is David Henry Hwang’s M Butterfly (1988). A wild *true* story of a man who falls in love with a woman. Who is actually a spy? And secretly relaying insider information to the Chinese Communist Party?? And a man!??

                                                        (my reactions when reading M Butterfly)

Blurred Lines - Robin Thicke

Robin Thicke passionately sings about ‘domesticating’ women in 'Blurred Lines', seemingly nonchalantly repeating the phrase ‘I know you want it’ with the hopes listeners would view it as ‘cool’. However, I would hope that we readers have more critical literacy than this, and can see the blatant gendered prejudice that is the lyrics underlying premise, much like the protagonist Gallimard’s views towards many of the women he interacts with (Song, Helga, Renee … all the other female characters). Song summarises (haha, you get what I did with the blog title?) this idea of misogynistic violence when she discusses how Western men view Eastern women with an 'internalised rape mentality', exclaiming how they justify acts of sexual violence by saying ‘her mouth says no but her eyes say yes’, here, Hwang perpetuates the systemic oppression of women through their non-consensual relationships with the male characters. The 'eyes' metaphor conveys how men's sexual fantasies of women aren't reciprocated. Pinkerton, a character derived from Puccini's opera Madame Butterfly, conforms to representing these discriminatory notions when he declares ‘it's true what they say about Oriental girls. They want to be treated bad!’. I know what most of you are probably thinking reading this ... "Wow! It sure would suck to be a woman during this time!" And you would be right! Hwang's use of collective plural pronouns groups Eastern women together and essentialises preconceived notions about the 'submissive oriental woman'. Hwang imposes these dominant stereotypes throughout the play to deconstruct them, unveiling the intersectional inequalities Eastern women face through the Western perspective and sparking a conversation regarding equality and the treatment of Eastern women in modern society, ‘Blurred Lines’ conveys that these ideas are anything but dated. 

China Girl - David Bowie

 

This tune may be a tad old for our younger readers, but it does wonders when reflecting on Hwang's representation of the Orient (East) and the Occident (West). Its paradoxical lyrics conform to stereotypes of race to, well, ‘fight racism with racism’. Bowie’s unnamed ‘China girl’ creates a sense of ambiguity and allows the predominately Western audience of the time (the 1980s) to generalise the oppression of Asian women to a larger population. Some could also argue that leaving her unnamed demeans her, Bowies’ singing about his ‘little China girl’ contributes to eliminating the contending stereotypes of the East and West by dissecting them. Song, the so-called antagonist in M Butterfly represents the East and is conveyed as ‘submissive’ and ‘modest’ while the West, (Gallimard), is 'masculine' and ‘cruel’. Listening to Bowie's 'China Girl' only proves to us readers that the stereotypes of hyper-sexualised Asian women are still prevalent, Hwang critiques these essentialist ideas commenting, through Song, on how the ‘West thinks of itself as masculine – big guns, big industry, big money – so the East is feminine- weak, delicate, poor’. He uses antithesis to compare feminine/masculine, weak/strong, poor/wealthy, creating a binary opposition of the East and West, he comments on how this damaging hegemony results in inequities that have negative ramifications on the East and serve to empower the West. The Occident’s tendency to exercise their coercive power is internalised in a lot of the male characters, when Gallimard remarks that ‘Orientals will always submit to a greater force’ he is reinforcing traditional Western stereotypes of the East, Hwang encourages us as the reader to reject these oppressive values. 

Wow, this is a lot to unpack! In an overly simplified explanation, Hwang demonstrates how essentially, racism is engrained in society by the West so they can remain relatively more powerful, listening to Bowie's China Girl aids in understanding how prevailing these notions are today.

Bad Blood - Taylor Swift

I’m sure all of you have been waiting for this, because, let’s be real, is a set list ever complete if a Taylor Swift song isn't in it? I hope you answered no...that was a rhetorical question! Much like Tay Tay’s sensationalised feuds with celebs such as Kanye, Gallimard also has some ‘bad blood’ with Song near the end of the play. Hwang writes what can only be described as one of the greatest betrayals of the 20th century, as Gallimard acknowledges that his beloved Butterfly is not a woman but a male spy. Gallimard can’t deal with the fact that his ‘Perfect Woman’ is anything but. Hwang stresses that Gallimard’s ‘Perfect Women’ never existed. The construct was created by male fantasies of the ‘ideal’ woman who was a ‘quiet’ and ‘serving’ object that existed purely for male pleasure. Hwang furthers this idea when Song says that ‘only a man knows how a woman is supposed to act’, creating a sense of tension through Hwang's use of dramatic irony, leaving the audience on the edge of their seat waiting for Gallimard to come to terms with his delusions and see Song for who he really is. Hwang expresses how, for Gallimard, ignorance really is bliss. He lived in a state of denial for most of the play, refusing to believe he was in love with a man. However, unlike Taylor’s zealous feelings of fury, Gallimard is left hollow and vulnerable. In a closing soliloquy, he connotes that he is unable to deal with the devastating knowledge that the ‘object of (his) love was nothing more, nothing less than… a man’, he then commits suicide dressed as Puccini’s character Butterfly in a traditional Japanese Seppuku position. His transformation from a Western man into an Eastern woman allows Hwang to comment on the alarming sentiment that once an individual loses coercive power over another, much like Gallimard was unable to control Song, they are forced to assume an oppressed position. His transformation into Butterfly and subsequent suicide is powerful in denoting the lurid effects repressing your ‘id’ (as Freudians would say) has on the regression of self-identity. He lives in a ‘fallacy of thought’ and refuses to accept his true sexuality, Hwang denotes the negative implications that concealing one's true identity has and how it has the tendency to create ‘bad blood’ between the parties involved.

If you have made it this far, a big thanks for reading! Much like Mariah Carey, I’m 100% ‘Obsessed’ with M Butterfly and hope that this song summary has you hooked too!

 

Until next time!

    Xx Your fave literature tutor