In The No Name Woman,
Maxine Hong Kingston illustrates her Chinese heritage through a story
regarding her aunt’s banishment from the family. The story is told
through two different points of view, beginning with the cautionary
version of the narrator’s mother. The narrator then imagines her aunt’s
ordeal, including taking orders from a rapist and primping in order to
lure in her man. However, Kingston’s best and most vivid fantasy is that
of her aunt deciding to take her and her child’s life in order to spare
them both a life without purpose.
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| The No Name Woman |
Kingston depicts the No Name Woman wandering to a pigsty and giving
birth to the child there; a symbol of her complete and utter banishment
from her family and former life. After a brutal birth, the woman vows to
“protect this child as she had protected its father” (Kingston 15). The
logical conclusion of this vow is that she will take care of the child
and raise it even without a family. However, in a strange twist of
events “she picked up the baby and walked to the well” (Kingston 15). By
taking her newborn daughter with her to the plunging depths of the
well, the No Name Woman believed that she showed the utmost care as a
mother. “Carrying the baby to the well was loving. Otherwise abandon it.
Turn its face into the mud. Mothers who love their children take them
along.” (Kingston 15) Kingston’s aunt truly believed that she was taking
care of her daughter, so that she would not be forced to live a life
without family and full of disgrace.
I thought the similarity between loving mothers taking their children along- the aunt jumping into the well with her newborn-and Kingstons relationship with her mother was very interesting. It makes sense that her mother wants her to assimilate and not be like her aunt and betray the family, the mother wants Kingston to come along with her, not be left behind. However, your logical interpretation of Kingston “protecting the child as she had protected its father”, I disagree with. I do not agree that this would mean the aunt would raise the child without a family. The supposed man that “raped” her was never given a name or an identity and the aunt would do the same for her child and that is why she took her child to death with her, I think.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, I think that you just need to keep in mind that the scenarios that are played out for Kingston’s aunt are simply conjectures as to what possibly could have happened, not what actually happened as you seem to have been insinuating. They are only interpretations most likely based on what Kingston is reflecting in her own life. I think that you are completely correct in your interpretation that this is a mirror for the double culture that Kingston struggles with. However, I disagree about what you say about the double culture issue that Kingston’s aunt was going through in the final interpretation. You say that she has two worlds, “tradition” and “lust.” I don’t believe that to be correct. I think that she is struggling more with, not tradition, but the value that the community places on tradition and with her unwillingness to allow that community imposed value to stand in the way of what she wanted.
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