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The Woman Warrior; A Brutal Examination of Self

“‘You must not tell anyone,’ my mother said, ‘what I am about to tell you,’” (Kingston

3). In the opening line of Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Woman Warrior; Memoirs of a

Girlhood Among Ghosts, the reader is immediately plunged into a realm of secrecy – one filled

with thoughts forbidden and feelings untold – a realm that holds true for the entire novel. In her

novel/autobiography, Kingston challenged conventional lines of fiction and nonfiction,

conventional lines where thoughts and feelings cannot be forbidden or untold, and asked her

readers to take her book as a product not of any specific state of mind or influence (China,

America, women, history), but a product of herself. True to life, her autobiography combines the

sphere of influences that make a human human, a single thing alone cannot define a person –

people are products of countless influences and experiences. In her novel, Maxine examines the

influences and experiences that have had the largest impacts on her life, and through this

discussion she reveals the major lessons she has learned in life. Looking at The Woman Warrior

through a formalist, feminist, and new historical lens provides unique messages. The formalist

lens will use the text alone – it will discuss the conflicts with in the novel and how these conflicts

prove the book’s message. The feminist lens will identify gender roles set for Maxine during

childhood that she ultimately breaks. And finally, the new historical lens will reveal the large

historical context the book is placed in, and the message about society that the context combined

with the book actually shows. Yet, while each message and each lens points out a different

aspect of the novel, all arguments still follows the main theme that people are a product of their

influences and only through evaluating these influences and taking action on their resolutions

can they find equilibrium and peace as human beings.



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“Chinese-Americans, when you try to understand what things in you are Chinese, how do

you separate what is peculiar to childhood, to poverty, insanities, one family, your mother who

marked your growing with stories, from what is Chinese? What is Chinese tradition and what is

the movies?” (Kingston 5-6) asks Maxine Hong Kingston in her novel/autobiography The

Woman Warrior . Maxine combines prose with history to make a startling novel of self-

discovery and definition. In the book, Kingston and her siblings are raised by their immigrant

parents – parents who still live in their Chinese village despite the American soil beneath their

house. The family still lives in China, both in that they live in a predominately Chinese

community, and in that they keep their Chinese customs despite living in America. Throughout

the work, Kingston chronicles how, “Those of us in the first American generations have had to

figure out how the invisible world the emigrants built around our childhood fits in solid

America,” (5). Maxine relays the incidents of her childhood; the things that have made her who

she is and the things that have made her define both of her identities – Chinese and American

alike. For Maxine cannot be American because in American eyes she is Chinese and yet, she

cannot be Chinese, because she was born in America. By examining Maxine’s childhood

through a formalist analysis – taking the text alone and identifying the conflicts within and how

these conflicts support the book’s message – we can see Maxine’s alienation in both an

American and a Chinese way of life, the conflict that arises out of them, and the way in which

Kingston comes to terms with this conflict. We can also see that in the end, Maxine does find a

resolution between her two influences of America and China. However, this is not a resolution

in the traditional sense, meaning a resolution where all conflict ends. Rather, Maxine chooses to

accept the conflict, and takes each day as it comes. Maxine’s resolution is to keep on defining

herself – each redefinition continually changes and never really ends. This decision (to keep



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redefining) makes sense because her book is a book about life, and in a madcap love of all the

intricacies and complexities of life; Maxine admits that she still has trouble with her own. If she

is in constant consideration – if she still has trouble, then she is constantly weighing both sides of

the situation – both the Chinese and the American identities – and both find a place in her every

day actions.

One of the main areas of conflict that Maxine struggles with, one that even all children

struggle with is being ashamed of her parents. But that stomach-sinking, let-me-die-now, please-

god-no feeling is exacerbated beyond the normal standard because of her immigrant parents who

refuse to accept American traditions and yet expect Americans to act on Chinese traditions.

Kingston’s mother is the main antagonist of such Chinese traditions in the novel – an ever-

present reminder of the Chinese traditions Maxine is expected to uphold, an ever-present dictator

and tormentor, while Maxine’s father is only a distant and disapproving figure. The

embarrassment that Kingston and her siblings face should not be taken lightly, because it is so

scarring. “In a sense, the human baby is not isolated but is part of a physiologically and

emotionally entwined dyad of infant and caregiver,” (Small) as a child, one is raised in

synchronization with his or her parents. When Maxine deals with embarrassment, she is forced

to choose between the principles she was raised on (China) and what she feels to be normal

(America). An example of the embarrassment Maxine faces is shown in the incident at the

pharmacy. Once, during her childhood, a delivery boy who worked at the pharmacy brought

medicine to the wrong house, to Maxine’s house. Maxine’s mother is enraged; “We’ve got to

avenge this wrong on our future, on our health, and on our lives. Nobody’s going to sicken my

children and get away with it,” (Kingston 169). In vengeance, she sends Maxine to the

pharmacy to make the druggists “stop the curse” (170), Maxine’s mother tells Kingston she must



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go to the pharmacist and get reparation candy (in China, pharmacists regularly give candy along

with medication), her mother tells her what to say to the pharmacist: “You have tainted my house

with sick medicine and must remove the curse with sweetness,” (170). Stomach sinking and

embarrassed already, Maxine goes to the pharmacist and asks for the candy. She gets the candy,

but in a way that is mocking and lacks respect.

They gave us Halloween candy in December, Christmas candy around

Valentine’s day, candy hearts at Easter, and Easter eggs at Halloween. “See?”

said our mother. “They understand. You kids just aren’t very brave.” But I knew

they did not understand. They thought we were beggars without a home who

lived in back of the laundry. They felt sorry for us (Kingston 171).

They begin to give the family old candy, and continued to every year. To Maxine as a child, this

entire situation exemplifies the way the Americans viewed her family as a joke, and how she was

forced to play into that joke because she could not deny her mother’s demands or her family’s

Chinese traditions. Her embarrassment is far deeper than most children’s, because in each

embarrassing incident, Maxine is shoved into the reality that she does not fit in anywhere –

neither with her family nor with America. When she first asks the pharmacist for the candy, and

he does not understand, Maxine is forced to reply, “That is the way the Chinese do it,” (171).

The pharmacist responds, “Do what?” (171) And helpless Maxine, only a child, answers, “Do

things,” (171). Maxine felt “the weight and immensity of things impossible to explain to the

druggist,” (171). To explain is to bridge a gap between cultures, and when Maxine could not

understand it herself, least of all as a child, how could she help a pharmacist understand?

While the issue of embarrassment establishes the conflict Maxine deals with, it is only

one kind of conflict. Embarrassment deals with the American world and it deals with Maxine on



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the outside. But internal conflict takes place as well – throughout her whole life, Maxine

struggles with talking out loud and making herself heard. “During the first silent year I spoke to

no one at school, did not ask before going to the lavatory, and flunked kindergarten,” (Kingston

165). Here as well, we see Maxine’s mother as an antagonist, one who tells Maxine that she cut

her tongue, “…my mother cut my tongue. She pushed my tongue up and sliced the frenum. Or

maybe she snipped it with a pair of nail scissors. I don’t remember her doing it, only her telling

me about it…” (Kingston 163-164). School is the hardest time for Maxine in terms of talking,

school is where the conflict of talking becomes pronounced and evident. Maxine goes to two

schools, American public, and Chinese school. In American school, she is silent and in Chinese

school, her voice is broken. And while most of the Chinese girls in American school are silent

(all suffering from alienation due to ethnicity), Maxine is one of the only Chinese girls who is

silent in Chinese school. This once again displays that Maxine can not fit in either place. In

American school, Kingston’s silence was,

…thickest—total—during the three years I covered my school paintings with

black paint. I painted layers of black over houses and flowers and suns, and when

I drew on the blackboard, I put a layer of chalk on top. I was making a stage

curtain, and it was the moment before the curtain parted or rose… My parents

took the pictures home. I spread them out (so black and full of possibilities) and

pretended the curtains were swinging open, flying up, one after another, sunlight

underneath, mighty operas (Kingston 165).

Unable to show her true self to the American world and hidden behind the Chinese opera curtain,

Maxine is trapped in limbo, always waiting for more, but never opening that curtain to receive it.

Even though Kingston is silent, she wishes that she wasn’t, and she wishes that the curtain and



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her silence could fly up and reveal the Chinese opera – a show of noise and volume and beauty

that is her true self – that lies underneath. But the curtains offered protection “so black and full

of possibility,” the curtains and Maxine herself remained full of possibility if they remained

closed. Whereas if she spoke, she would have to put herself above others and deal with the

social situations that would inevitably follow, so instead, Maxine settles for total silence and

blackened drawings. In Chinese school, Maxine did use her voice more, but only in groups.

“There we chanted together, voices rising and falling, loud and soft, some boys shouting,

everybody reading together and not alone with one voice,” (Kingston 167). At the same time

that the shelter of other voices provided a cushion for Maxine, it was also another kind of black

curtain that she could hide behind. The American school and the Chinese school displayed

Maxine’s conflict with talking, a conflict that was directly related to the Chinese beliefs that

Maxine was raised on.

I could not understand “I”. The Chinese “I” has seven strokes, intricacies. How

could the American “I,” assuredly wearing a hat like the Chinese, have only three

strokes, the middle so straight? Was it out of politeness that this writer left off

strokes the way a Chinese has to writer her own name small and crooked? No, it

was not politeness; “I” is a capital and “you” is lower-case (Kingston 166-167).

To the Chinese, unlike the Americans, the group or the family is more important than the

individual. Talking aloud is putting your own voice above others and making the “I” more

important than the “you”. Talking is a conflict between China and America, to speak aloud is to

conform to American identities and Maxine is unable to give outright submission to one identity

of self. So instead, Maxine either doesn’t speak at all (drawing black curtains or talking when

she alone cannot be heard) or struggles through each word she speaks, her voice sounding like,



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“a crippled animal running on broken legs. You could hear the splinters in my voice, bones

rubbing jagged against one another,” (Kingston 169). Maxine cannot trust her voice with either

the Chinese or the Americans, believing that both would condemn what she says, “Sometimes I

hated the ghosts [Americans] for not letting us talk; sometimes I hated the secrecy of the

Chinese,” (Kingston 183). How do you choose? When your very speech contradicts some belief

or value that your conscience or your society tells you that you must follow, how do you choose

between the desire for speech and the need for silence? Thus far, Maxine has been unable to

choose – unable to choose between speaking and not, unable to explain “things” to the

pharmacist – and instead, she is simply torn, ragged edges flapping in a desolate wind.

Obviously, Maxine’s childhood was full of turmoil, more so than any normal child would

have to deal with. And one cannot simply exist like this, always in frustration and confusion

without some sort of acceptance and coming to terms with the situation – some peace of mind. It

is evident after looking at her embarrassment and her fear of speech that Maxine is trying to

please both her Chinese parents and the American world, and the tugging is taking its toll on

Maxine. Only after a breakdown, and isolation does Maxine finally realize her salvation. Only

after those two stages does she realize that it is okay to have conflict, and that she does not have

to have a set identity or set quantities of Chinese and American within to be accepted. First the

confrontation: while in sixth grade, Maxine and her sister form a sort of friendship with another

pair of sisters. It is strange because while Maxine plays with them, she hates the younger one

because the younger one is so like herself but has no reason to be. Because while Maxine’s

mother does not protect her or her sister and shoves both into the American world, the other quiet

girl is sheltered, “…their parents kept the older girl back to protect the younger one….protected

both daughters. When it sprinkled, they kept them home from school. The girls did not work for



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a living the way we did,” (Kingston 171). Maxine sees her own faults expounded in someone

else, faults that are caused because of her sad and lonely life and she sees them in someone else –

someone whose parents care for them even though they are girls (Maxine’s family considers girls

worthless). The years of frustration and anger at her own incapability to find a place of

belongingness overwhelm her, and hatred builds towards this unassuming quiet girl. Why

should Maxine suffer through her own faults when there is a girl who has everything, a

supportive and loving family that is around the corner for her, how can this girl cop out and

choose to be quiet? Someone with normalcy waiting chooses awkwardness instead, and Maxine

snaps with the unfairness of it all.

One afternoon, the seething riot of anger inside Maxine – at her own situation and the

other girl’s, at both their failings – manifests and turns into physical action. The girls (both pairs

of sisters, Maxine included) stay after school and play. The shadows grow longer and longer,

and though it is long past the time when they should be home, they continue to play. Then, in a

quirk of fate, Maxine and the other, quiet girl are alone together in a bathroom. Maxine

advances. “I walked closer. She backed away, puzzlement, then alarm in her eyes. ‘You’re

going to talk,’ I said, my voice steady and normal, as it is when talking to the familiar, the weak,

and the small. ‘I am going to make you talk you sissy-girl.’ She stopped backing away and stood

fixed,” (Kingston 175). And Maxine does really try to make this girl talk. Maxine acts in an

insane desperation – to fix her own life by forcing someone else to act as she wished she could,

believing that if this other girl does it, then everything will be better – Maxine resorts to violence

and heckling.

Her neatness bothered me. I hated the way she folded the wax paper from her

lunch; she did not wad her brown paper bag and her school papers. I hated her



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clothes—the blue pastel cardigan, the white blouse with the collar that lay flat

over the cardigan, the homemade flat, cotton skirt she wore when everybody else

was wearing flared skirts. I hated pastels; I would wear black always. I squeezed

again, harder, even though her cheek had a weak rubbery feeling I did not like. I

squeezed one cheek, then the other, back and forth until the tears ran out of her

eyes as if I had pulled them out. “Stop crying,” I said…. “If you’re not stupid,” I

said to the quiet girl, “what’s your name?” She shook her head, and some hair

caught in the tears; wet black hair stuck to the side of the pink and white face. I

reached up (she was taller than I) and took a strand of hair. I pulled it. “Well,

then, let’s honk your hair, “ I said. “Honk. Honk.” Then I pulled the other side

—“ho-o-n-nk”—a long pull; “ho-o-n-n-nk”—a longer pull. I could see her little

white ears, like white cut worms curled underneath the hair. “Talk!” I yelled into

each cutworm (Kingston 176-177).

The madness that takes hold of Maxine is inevitable, the mere existence of someone like the

quiet girl – someone who is loved and sheltered, someone who does not have to constantly

struggle between two identities, and yet chooses, chooses, to make life difficult for herself – this

mere existence had pushed Maxine over the edge and into her own sorrow, frustration, and anger

at life.

Immediately following Maxine’s burst of anger, she is isolated. The next year and a half

is spent on a couch at home with a “mysterious illness” (Kingston 182) that has “no pain and no

symptoms” (Kingston 182). Instead of going on with school, Maxine tries to avoid reality and

avoid her anger at life by shutting it all out. She lives,



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…like the Victorian recluses I read about. I had a rented hospital bed in the living

room, where I watched soap operas on t.v., and my family cranked me up and

down. I saw no one but family, who took good care of me. I could have no

visitors, no other relatives, no villagers. My bed was against the west window,

and I watched the seasons change the peach tree. I had a bell to ring for help. I

used a bedpan. It was the best year and a half of my life. Nothing changed

(Kingston 182).

Maxine falls back into the pattern established during her struggles with embarrassment and

talking by avoiding it all. By painting curtains she avoided talking, and by not talking she

avoided embarrassment, and living in the Chinese village her parents constructed allowed her not

to confront her questions of self. She does not have to deal with the everyday questions of

loyalty, either an American existence or a Chinese one, because at home she can merely exist.

And at the same time that is all she can do. Watching the seasons change through a window, she

leaves the vitality of life for the false comfort of an unchallenging, packaged, hypoallergenic

existence. For someone like Maxine, who had enough fire to struggle this much for so long in

the first place, such an existence can only last so long. One day, her mother – her doctor, decides

that the illness is over and Maxine must go to school again. Stepping outside for the first time in

a year and a half, Maxine realizes what she was missing all that time, and why she cannot avoid

life all together. “The sky and the tress, the sun were immense—no longer framed by a window,

no longer grayed with a fly screen. I sat down on the sidewalk in amazement—the night, the

stars. But at school I had to figure out again how to talk,” (Kingston 182). And Maxine does

just this – she figures out how to talk, how to catalogue in her head what needs to be said and

why – and finally, she says it all.



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“Maybe because I was the one with the tongue cut loose, I had grown inside me a list of

over two hundred things that I had to tell my mother so that she would know the true things

about me and to stop the pain in my throat,” (Kingston 200). And so, slowly, one by one,

Maxine tells her mother the things that burn inside her. Silly things, like how the first thing she

can remember consciously killing was a spider, and how she had prayed to the Christian god for

a white horse – things of meaning to Maxine, but of irrelevance to her mother. But each telling,

each release, took away a little of Maxine’s pain. Until just after another release, Maxine’s

mother replies, “I can’t stand this whispering… Senseless gabbings every night. I wish you

would stop,” (Kingston 200). And although Maxine stops for the time being, she also says that

she “feels something alive tearing at my throat, bite by bite, from the inside,” (Kingston 200)

Maxine feels the truth, her voice, her need for peace tearing at her insides and longing to get out

– until it finally does.

One night when the laundry was so busy that the whole family was eating dinner

there, crowded around the little round table, my throat burst open. I looked

directly at my mother and screamed…. My telling was scrambled and out of

order. When I said them out loud I saw that some of the items were ten years old

already, and I had outgrown them. But they kept pouring out anyway in the voice

like the Chinese opera. I could hear the drums and the cymbals and the gongs and

brass horns (Kingston 201, 203).

And even though it was hard, the telling was beautiful at the same time. The sweet release of all

that has troubled her over the years, all that has ever constrained Maxine, it all gives her release

and sends her black curtains flying upwards to reveal the Chinese opera beneath. After this

outburst, Maxine leaves for college and follows an American way of life. Looking for logic and



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a clean, plasticized way of life, Maxine finds the same loss of vitality that came from a Chinese

life alone (when she was a “Victorian recluse”), “Now colors are gentler and fewer; smells are

antiseptic,” (Kingston 205). Maxine loses the sense of fantasy in life that makes it all

worthwhile, and so realizes that both the American and the Chinese in her are necessary. “I

continue to sort out what’s just my childhood, just my imagination, just my family, just the

village, just movies, just living,” (Kingston 205) but she finds that her difficulty with speech

remains – in a good way however. Whereas before, to avoid pain and confusion, Maxine would

stay quiet, now to get rid of pain, she has to speak her mind, “The throat pain always returns,

though, unless I tell what I really think, whether or not I lose my job, or spit out gaucheries all

over a party,” (Kingston 205).

In the end, Maxine comes to terms with her lot in life. Even if there are “gaucheries”

splattered all over a party, Maxine takes the good with the bad and evaluates every day with

consideration of both sides within herself – the Chinese and the American. She even tells her

mother that she too talk story’s (talk story being the method by which Maxine’s mother taught

her children, stories guided by necessity and harsh with the brutal reality of their homeland

China, and the expectations of family), “…I told her I also talk story…” (Kingston 206). In

response to this, her mother and her combine stories, combine past and present, combine Chinese

and America in “A Song for a Barbarian Reed Pipe”. A tale of a woman captured by the

barbarians of the north in China, who lived, fought, had children, and in the end even sang

among them. The barbarians were not Chinese and neither were her children, even she had lost

some parts of herself that were Chinese – but in the end, when she sang, all, even though it was

written in the barbarian lands and sung in Chinese, understood her song,



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Her words seemed to be Chinese, but the barbarians understood their sadness and

anger. Sometimes they thought they could catch barbarian phrases about forever

wandering. Her children did not laugh, but eventually sang along when she left

her tent to sit by the winter campfires, ringed by barbarians…. She brought her

songs back from the savage lands, and one of the three that has been passed down

to us is “Eighteen Stanzas for a Barbarian Reed Pipe,” a song that Chinese sing to

their own instruments. It translated well (Kingston 209).

Maxine, once wandering forever, sad and angry, was able to return from the barbarian lands to

China and can sing her barbarian song to a Chinese instrument. She is able to establish her

identities by constantly redefining them (evaluating her influences), acting upon this redefinition,

and is finally able to gain a sense of peace.

The formalist lens is especially useful is examining Maxine’s ultimate message in the

novel. The lens cuts through a lot of side layers by focusing in on the way Kingston (while

writing) uses conflict within herself, and how that conflict is resolved, to reveal an ultimate truth

in the novel. At the same time, this method of analysis can be detrimental to the end product –

the message discovered by the formalist approach can be too simple. There are many more

layers to Kingston’s novel than simply a girl discovering herself – she also displays struggles

with other children of ethnicity, has issues with her distant if not absent father, and rewrites the

story of Mulan on her own terms (the section in the novel labeled White Tigers, that will

unfortunately not be discussed in this paper as well as the other issues cited above). There is so

much more to the book than what the formalist critique reveals, in fact the formalist critique

glosses over much of the book. This weakness must be kept in mind when reading formalist

analyses, if it is not, the analyses given could be misinterpreted as the only message their



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respective books, which is anything but true. However, if this flaw in formalist critique is kept in

mind, the critique can be helpful is giving a basic line of understanding for any novel. One way

to correct the flaw of formalism is to use a specific lens, by narrowing the area and the issue that

one is analyzing, one can avoid glossing over parts of the novel or oversimplification. A specific

lens can be applied to The Woman Warrior is that of feminism. Feminist issues pervade much of

Maxine’s childhood, and a feminist critique will cover a large issue that is never addressed in the

formalist critique.

“Stop that crying!” my mother would yell. “I’m going to hit you if you don’t

stop. Bad girl! Stop!” I’m going to remember to never hit or to scold my

children for crying, I thought, because then they will only cry more.

“I’m not a bad girl,” I would scream. “I’m not a bad girl. I’m not a bad girl.” I

might as well have said, “I’m not a girl,” (Kingston 46).

For Maxine growing up, it was obvious that being a girl was not the ideal. In addition to her

issues with her identity; trying to understand which parts of her are Chinese and which parts are

American, she also has to identify who she is as a woman among the Chinese. In a

novel/autobiography where everyone but Maxine seems to identify women with slaves, where

being a girl means that you are bad and to be good is to be a boy, Maxine struggles with the idea

that she was bad before she ever did anything wrong. Her family follows the traditional

Confucian ideologies, where girls are groomed to be wives, and a wife, “…had no power over

her own life; her husband's decisions were her own. She was forced to be completely subservient

to her husband's family…” (Fulton). Maxine sees a future of, “…‘looking after a household,

cooking and sewing, flower arrangement, embroidery’ and, above all, to obey, without question

(qtd. Chang 70),” (Fulton). With this bleak future in mind, Maxine grapples with her own



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desires for freedom and the consequences of having this freedom. There are two of her mother’s

stories in Maxine’s childhood that aid this battle. One will be examined in detail: The No Name

Woman, and the other is examined in less detail, but still has a large impact on Maxine – the

story of Fa Mu Lan. Maxine’s mother, by telling her these stories and by acting like the woman

warrior Fa Mu Lan, provokes the conflict in Maxine. Maxine does not know if she should

follow her desire for freedom or to conform to the Chinese ideal of a woman – meek,

submissive, hardworking, and obedient. The No Name woman story tells Maxine to be the

submissive woman, or else terrible consequences will befall her. The second story of Fa Mu Lan

and Maxine’s mother’s actions tell Maxine to be someone who stands up for herself – a woman

warrior. By examining both these stories and their effects on Maxine, specifically the way she

treats the No Name Woman because of Fa Mu Lan and her mother’s actions, we see that even

though there could be dire consequences Maxine is able to rise against oppression and stand up

for herself, advocating the feminist message and yet, still keeping this message realistic for

women everywhere.

To understand the feminist message of The Woman Warrior , we must first identify the

oppression that Maxine must rise up against – we must identify the rules for women that exist in

Maxine’s family as told through Maxine’s mother’s tale of the No Name Woman. Maxine’s

mother tells her this story when she has her first menstruation. The story is about Maxine’s

father’s sister, a woman who had an illegitimate child before Maxine had been born and when

Maxine’s mother (and her aunt) still lived in China. The family’s Chinese village is going

through a period of famine, and because the No Name Aunt commits adultery (her husband is in

America working and sending money back to the family), she is in a way insulting the entire

village. “Adultery is extravagance. Could people who hatch their own chicks and eat the



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embryos and the heads for delicacies and boil the feet in vinegar for party food, leaving only the

gravel, eating even the gizzard lining—could such a people engender a prodigal aunt? To be a

woman, to have a daughter in starvation time was a waste enough,” (Kingston 6). Although it

may seem that this quote is addressing a practical matter in terms of food and the inability to feed

an extra child, it is actually slandering women. “To be a woman…was waste enough.” The fact

that the village discredits Maxine’s aunt automatically for simply being a woman and nothing

else blows away the idea that the village was considering the practicalities of the situation – the

hate for the woman and her illegitimate child was inherent, meaning the village hated her and her

child because she was a woman, and not because it was a time of famine and they could not feed

the child (the hate would have existed in a time of bounty as well). As well, even if the affair was

not her choice, it did not matter. She was the woman in the relationship, and so she was blamed.

The consequences that the angry villagers wreak are terrible, and they fall upon the No Name

Woman and her entire family.

The villagers broke in the front and the back doors at the same time, even though

we had not locked the doors against them. Their knives dripped with the blood of

our animals. They smeared blood on the doors and walls. One woman swung a

chicken, whose throat she had slit, splattering blood in red arcs about her. We

stood together in the middle of our house, in the family hall with the pictures and

tables of the ancestors around us, and looked straight ahead, (Kingston 4).

The village takes its vengeance because if the family thinks themselves so rich that they can be

wasteful enough to have a daughter who commits adultery – if that family thinks they can defy

the rules of society - then they do not deserve any food, any home, or any respect from their

ancestors. Maxine’s mother intentionally tells her this story when Maxine is first able to have



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children. Her mother tells her the terrible consequences that come from disobeying the female

expectations and customs, and by having an illegitimate child. The story is a warning to Maxine,

as if to say “one misstep and you will bring dishonor to the entire family.” Maxine’s mother

goes so far as to say, “Now that you have started to menstruate, what happened to her could

happen to you. Don’t humiliate us. …The villagers are watchful,” (Kingston 5). (After moving

to America, Maxine’s family moves to a place where everyone else from that same village in

China has moved, and so the villagers can still watch.) From the beginning of the story of the

No Name Woman, Maxine learns that freedom will cost you dearly.

One would think that the punishment of the No Name aunt would end there; but no, the

story continues. Quickly the family turns on the No Name Woman, and drives her away. In her

imaginings, Maxine sees the aunt running into the fields and laying there for hours during labor.

Then, the aunt is going to the pigsty and is giving birth there. Unexpectedly, the aunt finds that

she loves her child. But this love is no aid, to love the child makes their fate worse, makes it all

the more painful. “Toward morning she picked up the baby and walked to the well…. It was

probably a girl; there is some hope of forgiveness for boys.” (Kingston 15) “There is some hope

for boys,” Maxine says. Even though it was an illegitimately born child whose conception

caused such violence and destruction – if the baby had been a boy it would have “some hope of

forgiveness” and would have been raised. A boy had no end of faith and love, but the girl’s only

option was death, once again proving the poor treatment of women inherent to Maxine’s Chinese

village. But the aunt’s – the No Name Woman’s – punishment unfortunately does not end in

death. “The real punishment was…the family’s deliberately forgetting her. Her betrayal so

maddened them, they saw to it that she would suffer forever, even after death. Always hungry,

always needing, she would have to beg food from the other ghosts, snatch and steal it from those



18

whose living descendants five them gifts,” (Kingston 16). Not even finding relief in death, the

aunt lives on, tormented forever for a crime she probably did not even choose to commit.

However, scarier still than her aunt’s fate is that through all of this darker interpretation of the

story, Maxine relates herself to the aunt’s fate. “My aunt haunts me…I do not think she always

means me well. I am telling on her, and she was a spite suicide, drowning herself in the drinking

water. The Chinese are always very frightened of the drowned one, whose weeping ghost, wet

hair hanging and skin bloated, waits silently by the water to pull down a substitute. (Kingston 16)

Maxine believes and is ultimately haunted by the idea that she could become her aunt, that she

could be trapped forever in unhappiness and abandonment with one wrong move. Maxine is

horrified and afraid; and these are the feelings and the threats she must overcome if she wishes

for freedom – for a release. Another lesson from the No Name Woman – that if Maxine desires

individuality she has to give up her family and her history - a very heavy roadblock on the path

to freedom for such a young girl.

As well as the No Name Woman, Maxine’s mother tells her the story of Fa Mu Lan, and

acts as Fa Mu Lan does. Fa Mu Lan is the story better known to Americans as Mulan. It tells of

a Chinese swordswoman who poses as a man to serve in the Chinese army, who fights for herself

and her family and is independent, loud, and anything but obedient (at least Maxine’s version of

the tale is). Maxine’s mother told her that she would grow up to be a wife and slave, but at the

same time, “…she taught me the song of the warrior woman, Fa Mu Lan. I would have to grow

up to be a warrior woman,” (Kingston 20). As well, Maxine’s mother’s actions are akin to the

warrior woman Fa Mu Lan. When Maxine’s mother’s sister – Moon Orchid, they call her –

comes to America, Maxine’s mother forces Moon Orchid to confront her husband. Moon

Orchid’s husband lives in America and has married a new wife. He had been sending money



19

back to China for Moon Orchid but had not brought her to America. Maxine’s mother – called

Brave Orchid – yells for Moon Orchid to hunt down her husband.

You have to ask him why he didn’t come home. Why he turned into a barbarian.

Make him feel bad about leaving his mother and father. Scare him. Walk right

into his house with your suitcases and boxes. Move right into the bedroom.

Throw her [the second wife’s] stuff out of the drawers and put yours in. Say, “I

am the first wife, and she is our servant,” (Kingston 126).

These brazen urgings directly contradict with the meek expected character of the Chinese female

and the Chinese wife. Brave Orchid is urging Moon Orchid to stand up for herself and her rights

– women do not have rights according to the Confucian ideal. Brave Orchid acts in contradiction

to the No Name Woman story and the Confucian thoughts. Brave Orchid tells Maxine the No

Name story to scare her into submission, but acts in the fashion of a warrior woman and even

teaches Maxine the warrior woman’s song so that Maxine will never submit.

From the No Name story, we see the oppression that Maxine faces – being forgotton forever.

And fed that kind of sexist thinking – thinking that condemns a woman for having a child out of

wedlock, without even knowing if it is her fault (it could have been rape), but condemning

simply because that woman was a woman – fed that kind of thinking since birth, it is amazing

how much Maxine fights the idea of a submissive woman. In truth, she must fight because of the

Fa Mu Lan story and the example her mother sets. This fight within Maxine is at first only seen

in her thoughts. Through her thoughts, Maxine imagines the No Name aunts’s life before death

– Maxine imagines an aunt that lives out her own desires for freedom as best she can in such an

oppressive society – Maxine sees herself in the aunt. “Unless I see her life branching into mine,

she gives me no ancestral help,” (Kingston 8). Considering all possibilities of her No Name aunt



20

and her lover, Maxine wonders things like, “It could very well have been, however, that my aunt

did not take subtle enjoyment of her friend, but, a wild woman, kept rollicking company.

Imagining her free with sex doesn’t fit, though. I don’t know any women like that, or men

either,” (Kingston 8) and, “I hope that the man my aunt loved appreciated a smooth brow, that he

wasn’t just a tits-and-ass man,” (Kingston 9). These thoughts differ wildly from her mother’s

and the intended impact of the story. Instead of pondering on her own choices and thinking on

how to evade a man’s attentions out of wedlock, Kingston goes so far as to try and identify the

type of relationship the No Name aunt had with her illegitimate lover, defying the Confucian

ideal and dreaming of freedom. Kingston, in her imaginings, identifies herself with her aunt in

other ways as well. She thinks about her aunt’s pull over men, “Even as her hair lured her

imminent lover, many other men looked at her. Uncles, cousins, nephews, brothers would have

looked, too,” (Kingston 10), and her own pull over men, “I had no idea, though, how to make

attraction selective…” (Kingston 12). To Maxine’s mind she and the aunt are alike in their

confusion (on how to make attractiveness singular to one man). As well, Maxine believes the

two face the same constant oppression while trying to find tiny ways to elude it, and to be free.

“Fear at the enormities of the forbidden kept her desires delicate, wire and bone,” (Kingston 8)

Maxine’s aunt and Maxine herself feel the oppression and keep their desires small. To want too

much would border action, and to take action would be to fall into disgrace. “On a farm near the

sea, a woman who tended her appearance reaped a reputation for eccentricity,” (Kingston 9) hair

style - another extravagance and freedom that women were not allowed. But Maxine and the No

Name aunt found quiet ways to express oneself. “At the mirror my aunt combed individuality

into her bob. A bun could have been contrived to escape into black streamers blowing in the

wind or in quiet wisps about her face…” (Kingston 9). Maxine relates herself to the No Name



21

aunt, and in doing so shows her desire for freedom and expression of self. These mental

expressions, because of her mother’s warrior song, prove that the need to overcome oppression

exists within her.

Though the above shows the expression of Maxine’s mother’s words in a feminist way,

Maxine is also influenced by the flip side – the oppression imbued in the No Name Woman story

– and because of this other influence we see a conflict within Maxine. Because of her mother’s

tales and actions, Maxine is willful enough to desire a life of freedom, but again because of her

mother’s tales, she comprehends the magnitude of the consequences for leading such a life, and

is genuinely afraid of them. The effects of these two conflicting lessons are again seen in

Maxine’s thoughts. “As if it came from an atavism deeper than fear, I used to add “brother”

silently to boys’ names. It hexed the boys, who would or would not ask me to dance, and made

them less scary and as familiar and deserving of benevolence as girls,” (Kingston 12). Afraid of

what might happen, Maxine disables all boys and makes them brothers. When they are brothers,

she cannot endanger her family or herself because they cannot be thought of as possible dates,

but rather, as siblings. Maxine, upon meeting a boy, automatically falls in line with Chinese

feminine expectations and does not even consider a relationship. At the same time, her need for

freedom because of the Fa Mu Lan story hexes her view of marriage (although marriage is bleak

to begin with, Maxine’s desires make it more so). To be married is to give up freedom, freedom

to express oneself, freedom to be independent, and freedom to simply be one’s own self. From

childhood onward the descriptions of marriage that she is given are less than satisfactory. “…at

their weddings they displayed themselves in their long hair for the last time. ‘It brushed the

backs of my knees,’ my mother tells me. ‘It was braided, and even so, it brushed the backs of

my knees,” (Kingston 9). Maxine’s mother tells Maxine of the last time she had freedom, after



22

marriage the hair is cut and worn in no nonsense styles that stripped women of their

individuality. No longer long and free, it is worn in practical buns and short bobs – their hair is

controlled, just as their husbands control the married women. Women besides Maxine’s mother

also tell of the folly of marriage,

Walking home the noisy women shook their old heads and sang a folk song that

made them laugh uproariously:

Marry a rooster, follow a rooster.

Marry a dog, follow a dog.

Married to a cudgel, married to a pestle,

Be faithful to it. Follow it, (Kingston 193).

For Maxine, marriage is the equivalent of becoming a slave. In marriage she would be forced to

follow her husband’s will, and give up her own individuality. And so Maxine finds herself at

odds; to risk damnation by her family or to submit her spirit and freedom.

This battle between oppression and freedom, the two conflicting tales from her mother,

plays out much later in Maxine’s life – during her senior year of high school her parents begin

bringing suitors to the laundry. “Suddenly a series of new workers showed up at the laundry;

they each worked for a week before they disappeared. They ate with us. They talked Chinese

with my parents. They did not talk to us. We were to call them “Elder Brother,” although they

were not related to us,” (Kingston 193). To Maxine this must seem a sort of death sentence – a

killing of all the things that make Maxine and a creating of all the things she dreads - marriage.

The presence of these male suitors is the final test. Their presence forces Maxine to choose

between her desire for freedom and her feminism, and her family’s acceptance.



23

My mother took one home from the laundry, and I saw him looking over

our photographs. “This one,” he said, picking up my sister’s picture.

“No. No,” said my mother. “This one,” my picture. “The oldest first,”

she said. Good. I would protect my sister and myself at the same time. As my

parents and the FOB sat talking at the kitchen table, I dropped two dishes. I found

my walking stick and limped across the floor. I twisted my mouth and caught my

hand in the knots of my hair. I spilled soup on the FOB when I handed him his

bowl. “She can sew, though,” I heard my mother say, “and sweep.” I raised dust

swirls sweeping around and under the FOB’s chair—very bad luck because spirits

live inside the broom. I put on my shoes with the open flaps and flapped about

like a Wino ghost. From then on, I wore these shoes to parties, whenever the

mothers gathered to talk about marriages. (Kingston 194)

And in the end, feminism wins out. All the conflict before the FOB (fresh off the boat – a slang

term for foreigners new to America) arrives, where Maxine contemplates the fate of her No

Name aunt and adds “brother” silently to the end of every boy’s name, all this takes place only in

Maxine’s mind. The small but significant actions of dropping dishes, limping, spilling soup,

sweeping oddly, and “flapping about like a Wino ghost” prove that Maxine could stand up for

her feminist beliefs. And the fact that Maxine was able to rise above the threatened

consequences that befell the No Name woman and evade marriage – to deliberately take action

against it, and not only think thoughts proves The Woman Warrior ’s feminist message. Yes,

Maxine’s actions are not exactly in direct defiance of the suitors or of the oppression, but the fact

alone that she was able to take physical action – against such terrible consequences, being

forgotten forever – and not just ponder as she did with the No Name aunt story, the boys in her



24

class, and marriage – shows that Maxine was able to overcome her fear in favor of individual

freedom. Because Maxine is able to take physical action, the book in essence urges all women to

take action. A woman cannot submit to the oppression that others would have her fall under, she

must stand up for herself.

At this point, the book seems to be advocating that women should overcome all

oppression everywhere and without doubt or hesitation. This is true, but the book also proves

that this message is only an ideal. In real life women falter, and cannot always live by their

ideals.

No husband of mine will say, “I could have been a drummer, but I hat to think

about the wife and kids. You know how it is.” Nobody supports me at the

expense of his own adventure. Then I get bitter: no one supports me; I am not

loved enough to be supported. That I am not a burden has to compensate fro the

sad envy when I look at women loved enough to be supported. Even now China

wraps double binds around my feet. (Kingston 48)

At first Maxine stands by her convictions, but then grows doubtful. Even though Maxine was

able to stand up for herself that one time, she still has trouble (Johnson 81). Self-doubt and

longing for love and a family tempt Maxine to stray away from her feminist ideals, but through

taking things a day at a time, she remains herself and does not submit to the easy way out. For

Maxine could never be happy with a relationship where she did not support herself, otherwise

she would’ve married one of the “Elder Brothers”. Still, Maxine has to reaffirm her beliefs in

feminism everyday – just as she must redefine her Chinese and American selves day by day.

Above lies the feminist message of the novel as it applies to Maxine alone, but I would

like to examine the overall Chinese treatment of women and how this novel’s feminist message



25

applies to that as well. Yes, Maxine is Chinese and so the expectations she are presented with in

the novel are logically also Chinese, but at the same time, Maxine’s experiences are unique to

her life and taking the book alone does not prove the novel’s feminist message to be a universal

one. Ya-Jie Zhang, a visiting professor from the People’s Republic of China published an article

on The Woman Warrior in 1986 (Wong 5). Through her article we do see that The Woman

Warrior ’s feminist message is a universal one. Zhang states, “I am ashamed to admit that

negative feelings for women have not been completely wiped out from Chinese minds…”

(Zhang 19). She goes on to say that although times have changed since the stereotype of the No

Name woman, these times are still hard on women.

Nowadays, thanks to the “open door policy,” I can see a great many young men

and women holding hands, embracing, or even kissing each other on the streets or

on a bus. Such public displays were impossible ten years ago and even criminal

in olden times. I happen to think it delightful that our young people can feel free

to show their affection openly. Yet, how many people are throwing a

disapproving glance at them, thinking in their small minds “what a cheap girl.”

Some even voice such thought in an undertone. However, never does one say,

“What a cheap boy,” (Zhang 19).

Just as Maxine’s village dealt with the No Name Aunt, some people in China automatically

assume the worst about the “cheap girl”. Still today, some Chinese people condemn women

without even thinking about it. To a lesser extent, yes, but they do still condemn. Zhang goes on

to praise Maxine for telling the story of the No Name aunt, and questions how many other No

Name aunts are there whose stories remain untold. The Woman Warrior ’s feminist message is

universal – it is necessary for Chinese women to rise up against oppression and tell their stories



26

so they do not become the No Name aunts. They do not have to be the ideal, but can try and do

as Maxine does – to try each day to accomplish their goal. Once again, we must identify our

influences (in Maxine’s case the No Name Woman, Fa Mu Lan, and her mother), define them

(Maxine decides for feminism), and act upon them (Maxine stands up to the FOB). And in this

case, it is not a sense of peace that will be achieved, rather a sense of freedom – freedom that is

every woman’s right to have, and within every woman’s ability if she just follows Maxine’s

example.

The feminist lens is able to identify specifically that – the feminist issues in The Woman

Warrior . This approach provides a blatant feminist message that is well supported by the novel

and the author’s experiences. But just as the formalist lens bore the flaw of being too

general/simplistic, the feminist lens bears the flaw of being too specific. In an interview, Maxine

stated, “I was very concerned when The Woman Warrior came out right at the height of the

feminist movement, and everyone saw my work as being the epitome of a feminist book. I felt

really mad about that because that’s not all it is,” (Kingston 34). The novel is not only a feminist

book, and looking at it only from a feminist perspective cuts out much of the novel – rather than

glossing over as the formalist did, feminist simply does not deal with much of the book. And as

stated before, The Woman Warrior is like a person – with many influences and issues present.

To exclude one issue or many issues is to exclude part or parts of a person – part or parts of

Maxine. Therefore, the feminist is in no way complete in analyzing the book. Although the

feminist critique does present a valid argument, it must be understood that it is only a piece of

the whole. As Formalist was the trunk of the tree, the feminist is merely a branch – both have

meaning, function, and value on their own, but are not as valuable as the entire tree. To give

more context to the book, a new historical lens can also be applied. A person’s influences



27

include their history, and Maxine was definitely influenced by history – her ancestors and her

parent’s experiences with the national level changes in both California and China. Thus, a new

historical lens may prove insightful. The following new historical critique seeks to answer two

questions in the novel; what historical and social issues are reflected in the novel, and what does

the book say about these issues?

Conflict and culture shock, guilt and desire, freedom and obligation, hatred and bigotry,

these are things that Maxine Hong Kingston was forced to deal with while growing up in

Stockton, California: San Francisco’s Chinatown. And while The Woman Warrior portrays her

unique experience, in many ways, the book also chronicles a chapter in Chinese-American

history. Homesick and longing for the familiar, Chinese immigrants, from the first Chinese man

to immigrate to the ones that immigrated during Maxine’s childhood, created a shell around

themselves in Chinatown. To the Chinese, Chinatown became a place where one could feel as if

he or she were still living in China despite the American prejudices against them and the

inhumane working conditions.

Chinatown ran along three major streets, Stockton, Dupont and Kearney, and was

about six blocks long. Although they were newcomers to a foreign land, the

Chinese continued to maintain traditional values and ways as they gradually

established their own ethnic ghetto of Chinatown… Although there was a Chinese

hospital, the distrust of western things ran so deep that most Chinese only went to

the hospital when death was unavoidable (San Francisco’s Chinatown).

This shell was feared (for we fear what we do not know) and impenetrable. Kingston, by writing

The Woman Warrior reveals the effects of immigration laws targeting Chinese, of Communist

China and the Red Scare, and of a distrustful America on a Chinese family in Chinatown, breaks



28

this shell. Taking a new historical approach and by first delving into the history and social issues

surrounding The Woman Warrior and the circumstances of Maxine’s childhood, we can see how

this history and these issues manifested themselves and how they left a scar on the Chinese-

American community.

Today, Chinatown is a tourist location. A must see on any vacation to San Francisco.

Buses stop, the eager tourists leave their air-conditioned, cushioned, comfortable seats for a few

hours to take snapshots and eat at a restaurant. But this phenomenon of tourism is merely a

shadow of the historical Chinatown - a Chinatown that dealt with the real issues of everyday life.

“Soon however, the Chinese found themselves trapped in segregation because they had become

the targets of a ‘tidal wave’ of racism. The San Francisco Chronicle described Chinatown as a

‘filthy nest of iniquity and rottenness in our midst.’ Hoodlums enforced this segregation, beating

up Chinese they found outside of Chinatown and taking their queues, or braids, as trophies,”

(The Clash of Two Worlds). Anything but a tourist location, Chinatown was at the center of

hatred. This hatred, although for the most part is dead now, actually began over a century ago.

After the invention of railroads came a pressing need for the first transcontinental railroad.

Throughout 1869, with the Union Pacific Railroad company building from the east, the Central

Pacific began building from the West (Conigliaro), the companies competed to get to the middle

of the nation, a race that caught the whole nation’s attention. To beat the eastern Union Pacific,

the Central Pacific began employing Chinese men. These men worked extremely fast at very

low wages, thereby taking jobs that would have otherwise gone to Americans. This combined

with the Gold Rush – the Chinese that were supposedly “sending too much gold back to China –

they [Americans] believed that wealth should remain within the United States” (The Chinese

Exclusion Act: A Black Legacy)– created a very anti-Chinese feeling among Americans.



29

Finally, in 1882 these sentiments gained enough support to be made into national legislation.

The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 was a “climax of more than thirty years of progressive

racism” (The Chinese Exclusion Act: A Black Legacy). The only legislation to ever be directed

at a specific ethnicity, it was initially a ten-year policy, made permanent in 1902.

However, immigration continued. The exclusion laws were frequently evaded and illegal

immigrants thrived. An earthquake and its resulting fires in 1906 destroyed all files containing

information about Chinese immigrants. After this, any Chinese person living in San Francisco

could claim citizenship, thus enabling Chinese to adopt false identities and immigrate to their

“American relatives”. With so many Chinese sneaking past the immigration laws, the city of

San Francisco finally created a detainment center on Angel Island in 1910. Much more like a

prison, immigrants were subjected to grueling questions about their heritage and their

immigration papers, stuck on the island for weeks and sometimes months or even years. Those

that finally did immigrate were treated inhumanely, “Many of their customs and traditions were

violated, they were insulted, they were imprisoned, beat, and in some cases killed,” (The Chinese

Exclusion Act: A Black Legacy). Even though immigration was so difficult, and the anti-

Chinese feelings were very strong, Chinese continued to immigrate to America because the fact

remained that the opportunities in America were better. In 1924, the Exclusion Act was

enlarged, “The year 1924 was when the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act was expanded to exclude

all Asians from entry as immigrants, even Chinese alien wives of U.S. citizens,” (Li 199). Now,

Asians were completely cut off from entry. Finally in 1943, the Act was repealed. However, the

Act was not repealed because feelings against Chinese lessened; it was repealed because China

became an ally of America’s during World War Two. In the fight against Japan, America



30

needed the cooperation of China and its aid, in an effort to keep the ties between governments

friendly, America repealed the Chinese Exclusion Act.

The legal and societal discrimination against Chinese did not end with the Exclusion Act.

From the 1950s until the early 1970s and the dismantling of the House Un-American Activities

Committee, Chinese in America were persecuted for their homeland’s political affiliation. In

1949, China was declared a People’s Republic, and entered the Korean War indirectly against

America in 1950. While all this happened on a national scale, in Chinatown of San Francisco,

the Red Scare also had a huge impact.

For Chinese Americans, the Red Scare meant they couldn’t send money to

relatives in China, speak positively of their homeland or reaffirm their ethnic

identity. Families were divided, jobs were lost and people were jailed. And

perhaps more significantly, and entire community withdrew from society in hopes

that anonymity and submission might assuage government suspicion (Kim).

The Chinese people in America were once again subjugated to fear and suspicion, and once

again they retreated into their stronghold of Chinatown. Felicia Lowe, producer and director of a

critically acclaimed documentary featured in a series ( Neighborhoods: the Hidden Cities of San

Francisco) called Chinatown talks about Chinatown, “Historically, everything about being

Chinese in America had boundaries around it, a kind of fence that you couldn’t go beyond. So

Chinatown became the fortress, its own world – the people re-created their own America within

those crowded blocks where there was no choice but to survive on your own,” (Lowe). And

while this of the outside American world fear may seem out of proportion, all words and no

action, this is not true. Action did take place, “laundry workers also arrested and eventually

convicted for sending money home to their families in China” (Kim). Constantly afraid of



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deportation, jail, and racism, the Chinese in America faced a desperate situation that was only

tolerated because the situation in China was much worse. At least if you were in America, you

could send money to your family – even if you risked deportation or jail, that money sent home

was worth it. Finally in 1972, President Richard Nixon visited China and “paved the way for

open relations between the two countries” (Kim). The fear in Chinatown subsided, but the

feeling of racism and communism inspired anger lingered. Hatred so ingrained for such a long

time could not be wiped away with one visit. “To this day, people are still very afraid…It’s not

like anything can happen to them but there is the fear of the unknown. Once you’ve been

targeted, you’re always very suspicious,” (Kim).

Throughout the Gold Rush, the railroad race, the earthquakes and fires, World War II, the

Korean War, and the Red Scare, Chinatown remained a stronghold of Chinese tradition and a

home base for Chinese immigrants. As Felicia Lowe says, “San Francisco’s Chinatown was the

first foothold of Chinese in the United States and is still a cultural touchstone,” (Lowe). As well,

throughout this turmoil, Maxine’s family lived in Chinatown. Her father immigrated right before

the expansion of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1924, and her mother could not immigrate until its

repeal in 1943. Maxine was born soon after their reunion, and lived through both the

immigration scares imprinted in Chinese-American minds because of the Exclusion Act and the

fear of Communism during the fifties and sixties. By looking at Maxine’s specific experiences

with both these social issues – by taking a new historical stance – we can see that the racist

actions of America left a scar on the Chinese people – causing a boundary between the races that

was still strong during the seventies and eighties.



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Although the Chinese Exclusion Act was repealed in 1943, illegal immigrants and fear of

deportation still ruled over Chinese thought. Maxine discusses this fear as it affected her family

and her community.

Occasionally a rumor went around that the United States immigration authorities

had set up headquarters in the San Francisco or Sacramento Chinatown to urge

wetbacks and stowaways, anybody here on fake papers, to come to the city and

get their files straightened out. The immigrants discussed not whether or not to

turn themselves in. “We might as well,” somebody would say. “Then we’d have

our citizenship for real.”

“Don’t be a fool,” somebody else would say. “It’s a trap. You go in there

saying you want to straighten out your papers, they’ll deport you.”

“No they won’t. They’re promising that nobody is going to jail or get

deported. They’ll give you citizenship as a reward for turning yourself in, for

your honesty.”

“Don’t you believe it. So-and-so trusted them, and he was deported. They

deported his children too,” (Kingston 184).

“So-and-so trusted them.” The use of “so-and-so” suggests that this is a common incident – that

the fear of Americans was common. With rumors circulating through Chinatown – fear as well,

the immigrants discussed whether or not they should turn themselves in. Ultimately deciding not

to because their mistrust and fear of the Westerners runs so deep. Maxine’s parents especially

support this division between the Americans and Chinatown, “‘Don’t tell,’ advised my parents.

‘Don’t go to San Francisco until they leave,’” (Kingston 184). This belief, that Americans were

out to get you and would deport you in a second must have been fed to Chinese children all over



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Chinatown, and probably all over America as well. And that fear, it did not stop at simply being

fear, it was also an action: the fear caused the Chinese-Americans to shut down around

Americans, “As a culture, we were taught to have a low profile, to become invisible. Something

was lost to us because of that. But it's the kind of thing you learn when you are subjected to the

kind of racial attacks we were,” said Felicia Lowe.

Maxine as well learned not to trust the Americans; she learned how to hide the truth even

when she did not want to. “…when I saw Father’s occupations I exclaimed, ‘Hey, he wasn’t a

farmer, he was a…’ He had been a gambler. My throat cut off the word—silence in front of the

most understanding teacher. Three were secrets never to be said in front of ghosts, immigration

secrets whose telling could get us sent back to China,” (Kingston 183). Whether or not being a

gambler could actually get her family deported is irrelevant, the point is that they believed it

could. This belief that you had to always be on your guard, and always defending yourself was

large enough that Maxine could not tell “the most understanding teacher” the truth – years of fear

and racism could not be overcome. Her parents told her again and again,

Lie to the Americans. Tell them you were born during the San Francisco

earthquake. Tell them your birth certificate and your parents were burned up in

the fire. Don’t report crimes; tell them we have no crimes and no poverty. Give a

new name every time you get arrested; the ghosts won’t recognize you. Pay the

new immigrants twenty-five cents an hour and say we have no unemployment.

And, of course, tell them we’re against Communism (Kingston 184).

The fear runs so deep that everything becomes a lie, everything becomes what the Americans

want to hear. “And of course, tell them we’re against Communism,” (184) added as an



34

afterthought, implies just how obvious this last command is, how intrinsic. For as much as fear

of deportation runs rampant, fear of Communist inspired anger must be worse.

Not only were the Chinese-Americans persecuted during the Red Scare for China’s

political affiliations, but Chinese-American people were also persecuted for sending money back

to their relatives in China. The purpose of most Chinese in America was to do just that, send

money home. But with the Red Scare and the House Un-American Activities Committee

looming overhead, they legally could not act on their purpose – they could be sent to jail for

sending money home. But at the same time, they couldn’t not send money home; to do so would

be to deny their upbringing. In Chinese culture, ruled by Confucian ideals, ancestors and elders

must be respected and taken care of, and to not send money would be in direct defiance of these

values and Chinese heritage. Expounding the need for money was the Communist rule of China,

families would get letters from their relatives, in which the relatives would describe their horrible

circumstances under communist rule, and beg for money. So the Chinese immigrants did what

they could, they lived in fear of jail and sent the money anyway. Maxine’s family dealt with

these issues just as every other Chinese family must have.

I was nine years old when the letter made my parents, who are rocks, cry. My

father screamed in his sleep. My mother wept and crumpled up the letters….

letters said that my uncles were made to kneel on broken glass during their trials

and had confessed to being landowners. They were all executed, and the aunt

whose thumbs were twisted off drowned herself. Other aunts, mothers-in-law,

and cousins disappeared; some suddenly began writing to us again from

communes or from Hong Kong. They kept asking for money, (Kingston 50).



35

The peasant class of China rose up against anything that even seemed to represent a landowner –

the class that had suppressed them for years. Maxine’s family is labeled as such and is executed

in cruel ways. This devastates her parents, and they do the best they can. But as Maxine’s

mother states, “They don’t understand that we have ourselves to feed too,” (Kingston 206).

Maxine’s family does the best they can, they work like dogs in their laundry business and send as

much money as they can back to China. Even after Maxine grows up and moves away, even

after the need for Maxine’s mother to work subsides, Maxine’s mother continues to work and

sends everything she earns back to China. “My mother sends money she earns working in

tomato fields to Hong Kong.” (Kingston 205). America forced its Chinese immigrants to choose

between loyalty to America (obeying the law) and loyalty to their Chinese relatives. The

Chinese-Americans obviously chose their relatives, causing a divide between Chinese and

America that ran deep and long – they never should have been required to make that decision in

the first place.

This is the America that Chinese immigrants had to deal with – one where they lived in

constant fear, where they could receive terrible letters from relatives begging for money, but

could not legally respond as they desired. This America, “It forced Chinese not to take a stand

on anything… It forced them to be silent and unwilling to speak out,” (Kim). In other words, it

created a shell around Chinatown – a shell that could not be broken because of years of hatred,

racism, and fear. This shell existed for a long time, but through the efforts of Maxine Hong

Kingston and the history behind her, a crack was made, and it began to break. By telling the

story of her life – the life of a Chinese-American, Maxine bridged the silence between American

and Chinese. She chooses not one culture, but both, and in embracing both, forces the reader to

embrace both. Felicia Lowe, in her documentary Chinatown was also able to crack this shell,



36

and she tells us what kind of story the Chinatown story is, what kind of story she looked for in

her documentary, and what kind of story Maxine’s was, “I began asking people to tell their

stories. All the time I had this profound sense of having to tell the stories to a world that never

heard them before. It boggles my mind to think that these people lived an American life in an

America that basically said ‘we don't want you,’” (Lowe). She goes on to say how hard it is to

get this story, “Young Chinese Americans hardly have an idea of what it means for an older

resident of Chinatown to be asked to speak publicly about life there - it's ingrained that you don't

go beyond the boundaries,” (Lowe). Maxine Hong Kingston was able to go beyond these

boundaries, she was able to identify who she was as both an American and a Chinese and who

she was as a woman. Maxine Hong Kingston took a history of racism and bigotry and created a

breathtaking novel of self-discovery. The novel, by identifying the gaps between Americans and

Chinese-Americans asks us, the readers, to bridge those gaps in hopes of a better future for

Chinese-American relations. Just as Maxine was forced to identify herself in context with

American and China, and was forced to rise up against oppression and define herself as a

woman, by writing her book and cracking the shell, Kingston is forcing the reader to deal with

the oppression of America and to redefine who he or she may be as an American or as an

immigrant. We must tell the stories of our lives, we must effect change, and we cannot abandon

our true selves and drift. Who we are in terms of culture and ethnicity, gender, and even as

either the bigot or the stereotype of that bigotry – Maxine Hong Kingston, in The Woman

Warrior declares that we must deal with these issues –evaluate our influences – and define

ourselves and ultimately act upon them with conviction.

The New Historical approach to The Woman Warrior , does answer the questions it sets

out to. The historical issue reflected in the book is ultimately the racist treatment of Chinese, and



37

the book ultimately defines this treatment as bad. So in the respect that it answers basic new

historical questions, yes the critique is sound. But, while the critique does explain the feelings of

mistrust generated by Maxine’s parents towards Westerners, it also cuts out much of the

mysticism of the novel. Some might argue that this is a good thing – that losing the ethereal

qualities of the novel allows for better understanding, however this is not so. A cut and dry

version of The Woman Warrior as offered by the new historical lens cannot show the beauty and

poetry of Kingston’s writing. In the formalist and feminist critiques, even after the lens was

applied, one was able to retain a sense of the intricacy and fancy in the book, whereas the new

historical cuts all that out. And while the “intricacy and fancy” may seem useless, it actually

serves a purpose. It identifies the quality in which Maxine grew up – it adds a dimension to the

book. The mere style of writing in prose even though the book is technically an autobiography is

fundamental to the novel. This method shows that history and therefore this book are in a way, a

product of our imagination. Memory only goes so far as your ability to recall and imagine that

moment within your mind goes. Kingston, by writing non-fiction in a fiction format addresses

this issue. But the new historical approach treats the novel as only history, and treating the book

as history alone leaves out much of Kingston’s intentions. As I stated in the opening, things

“forbidden and untold” – things exciting and interesting – cannot be told as effectively or with as

much meaning when they are told within the strict definitions of fiction and non-fiction.

Ultimately, it is obvious that Kingston’s autobiography cannot be dealt with any one

critical lens. Each lens leaves something to be had, just as a person cannot be defined by only

one influence or idea, Maxine’s autobiography cannot be defined by only one critical lens. Only

after examining the novel under all three critical lenses – formalist, feminist, and new historical –

are we able to gain a sense of the complete novel (although this is still not total, there are still



38

many issues which these three approaches do not identify and examine). Just as a person can

only be understood completely by understanding all parts of them – their values, their beliefs,

and their history – The Woman Warrior can only be understood after examining it in all lights.

At the same time, however, we must examine whether or not this lack is a bad thing; the point of

a critical lens is to simplify the book and shed light on it for a specific matter. The flaw that

holds true for the critical lenses applied to The Woman Warrior must hold true for all critical

lenses – none are able to give a complete evaluation of the book. But this is not the point of a

critical lens, each lens is meant to highlight specific issues. So, in the end, the critical lenses

applied in this discussion of The Woman Warrior can be useful or not, it depends on the

individual’s need. If one is looking for an in-depth analysis of the entire book, then the lenses

are only partially useful, but if one is looking in depth analysis of specific issues, then yes the

lenses are very useful (the lenses being accurate in both cases). However, in any frame of mind

or need, at the end of all analysis, we do find a beautifully constructed book in The Woman

Warrior . A seemingly simple, yet raw, tale of a Chinese-American’s childhood, under closer

observation we see that Maxine writes in deep undercurrents of conflict, issues of identity,

gender pressures, and societal mistakes. Kingston pushes the reader into a world of talk-story,

where the reader must decide for him or herself what the truth is. At the end of the book, the

reader is left with the sense that Maxine knows what her truth is, but it is up to each and every

one of us to define the truth for ourselves. Who a person is – his or her experiences, his or her

culture, and his or her convictions – all is swirled into one mass of blood, muscle, and gray

matter. And Maxine, by writing this book, defines her mass of blood, muscle, and gray matter

and gives it meaning, gives it a soul. By doing this, she challenges us to do the same, who are

we? Who am I? In comparison to the brutal self-examination and conflict within Maxine, I am



39

still only blood, muscle, and gray matter. Hopefully, by evaluating my own influences, defining

them, and finally acting upon them, I too can have a soul. I hope that my soul will be even close

to the beauty of Maxine’s soul as revealed in The Woman Warrior .



40

Works Cited

Brownmiller, Susan. “Susan Browmiller Talks with Maxine Hong Kingston, Author of TheWoman Warrior ” Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Woman Warrior ; A Casebook . Ed. Sau-ling

Cynthia Wong. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, Inc., 1999. 173-179

Chang, Jung. Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China. NewYork: Bantam Doubleday, 1991

Fulton, Jessica. “Holding up Half the Heavens: The Effect of Communist Rule on China’sWomen.” Undergraduate Research Journal; Vol. III. 2000. Indiana University South Bend. 5

Jun. 2005. < http://www.iusb.edu/~journal/2000/fulton.html>

Johnson, Diane. “Ghosts.” Critical Essays on Maxine Hong Kingston. Ed. Laura E. Skandera-Trombeley. New York, NY: G. K. Hall & Co., 1998. 81

Kim, Ryan. “Keeping Tabs On Chinatown; Premiering documentary shows how Red Scare cast

pall of suspicion on an entire community.” SFGate.com. 10 Mar. 2001. San FranciscoChronicle. 5 Jun. 2005. <http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?

file=/chronicle/archive/2001/03/10/MN116573.DTL>

Kingston, Maxine Hong. “A Conversation with Maxine Hong Kingston.” Critical Essays on

Maxine Hong Kingston. Ed. Laura E. Skandera-Trombeley. New York, NY: G. K. Hall & Co.,1998. 34

Kingston, Maxine Hong. The Woman Warrior. New York: Random House, Inc., 1976.

Li, Davied Leiwei. “Re-presenting The Woman Warrior : As Essay of Interpretive History.”

Critical Essays on Maxine Hong Kingston. Ed. Laura E. Skandera-Trombeley. New York, NY:

G. K. Hall & Co., 1998. 182-203

Lowe, Felicia. Chinatown; Interview with Producer/Director Felicia Lowe. 5 Jun. 2005.

<http://www.kqed.org/w/hood/chinatown/ctinterview.html>

San Francisco’s Chinatown. Menlo School, Atherton, CA. 5 Jun. 2005.

<http://sun.menloschool.org/~mbrody/ushistory/angel/mixing/map.html>

Small, Meredith F. “Our Babies, Ourselves.” Find Articles. 2005. Natural History. 29 May

2005 <http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1134/is_n9_v106/ai_20135599#continue>

Shu, Yuan. “Cultural politics and Chinese-American female subjectivity: rethinking Kingston's

Woman Warrior - Critical Essay.” Find Aritcles. 2005. MELUS. 5 Jun. 2005.

<http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2278/is_2_26/ai_80852625#continue>

The Chinese Exclusion Act: A Black Legacy. Menlo School, Atherton, CA. 5 Jun. 2005. <

http://sun.menloschool.org/~mbrody/ushistory/angel/exclusion_act/>



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The Clash of Two Worlds. Menlo School, Atherton, CA. 5 Jun. 2005.

<http://sun.menloschool.org/~mbrody/ushistory/angel/mixing/>

Zhang, Ya-Jie. “A Chinese Women’s Response to Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Woman

Warrior .” Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Woman Warrior ; A Casebook . Ed. Sau-ling Cynthia

Wong. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, Inc., 1999. 19-21

(Source: Joanne S. Frye, "The Woman Warrior: Claiming Narrative Power, Recreating Female

Selfhood," in Faith of a (Woman) Writer, edited by Alice Kessler-Harris and William McBrien,

Greenwood Press, 1988.)

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