The Woman Warrior – Maxine Hong Kingston

After reading this past section of The Woman Warrior I am now even more enthralled by the many intricacies of Chinese culture that Maxine Hong Kingston represents in her novel, particularly the practice of polygamy and the role of the wife as an enforcer of shame for her husband.  With the introduction of Brave Orchid’s sister into the narrative, the complications of having a husband move to the United States and leaving his wife back in China become all the more imperative.  Moon Orchid’s story is a tragic one.  Brave Orchid convinces her sister to confront her husband and his new wife in America, which only breaks her spirit and causes her descent into madness.  I believe that Kingston includes the tale of Moon Orchid in her novel to further complicate the gender roles which arise in Chinese culture and are then challenged when transplanted in the States; she represents polygamy as a form of misogyny, but the trope of the nagging and controlling wife demonstrates that the gender hierarchy is not as clearly defined as an outsider looking in would consider it to be upon first glance.

            One of the most interesting aspects of the chapter “At the Western Palace” is the ideal that Brave Orchid represents a form of femininity which is subversive to the male power structure.  She uses the allegory of the emperor and his four wives to demonstrate how polygamy is often more about one wife asserting dominance over another rather than the husband over his wives.  Of course the eastern wife is meant to depict the first wife (Chinese) and the western wife represents the second wife (American).  This portrayal of the second wife as an intruder is an example of the nature of competition within Chinese femininity that Kingston creates; Brave Orchid tells Moon Orchid that it is her right to usurp and humiliate her husband’s second wife, who has no knowledge of her husband’s first wife and therefore cannot really be held accountable for occupying Moon Orchid’s rightful place.

But the truly compelling aspect of this new Chinese femininity is Kingston’s depiction of the first wife as an enforcer of shame for her husband.  Brave Orchid explains, “You must make it plain to your husband right at the start what you expect of him.  That is what a wife is for – to scold her husband into becoming a good man” (130).  This view of marriage complicates the version of subservient femininity Kingston represents earlier in the novel.  Her beginning chapters represent the female (and the wife) as a slave to their male counterpart, but Brave Orchid asserts her agency over her husband and expects her sister to do the same.  Thus, Brave Orchid becomes a heroine for the women in her family.  The narrator details, “Brave Orchid’s daughters decided fiercely that they would never let men be unfaithful to them” (160).  Kingston chronicles the emergence of a new version of Chinese/American femininity to show that the stereotypical docile Chinese woman is not a true representation.  It is unclear whether it is this new American setting or simply Brave Orchid’s staunch opposition which spurs this development, but either way, the assertion of feminine authority rings true.