The Buddha In The Attic Analysis

Women play a particularly unique role in the Asian literature we just read. How are their experiences different from the male characters' and how do they navigate their middle passages and adjust to the New World?

While looking at the passages of Asian literature, I noticed women had a more prominent role than the male characters. Each work began telling how a woman was on a boat traveling from an Asian country into America. “The Buddha in the Attic” by Julie Otsuka shows the prominent role of women in Asian literature.

The story begins in the chapter entitled, “Come, Japanese!” The author tells the reader about the young women on the boat saying, “On the boat, we were mostly virgins. We had long black hair and flat wide feet and we were not

In “Tears of Autumn” and “I Learned to Sew” women went to America to see the men they had been writing letters to for so long. And, just as the women in “The Buddha in the Attic”, these women were disappointed. Many of these men were not successful businessmen like they described themselves in the letters. The women had to work to make a living for themselves and support themselves because the men did not. This was strange to see considering the men in the earlier works would work to provide for themselves. In “Life as a Greenhorn”, the man got a job to support himself. In “Maus” Vladek went from job to job to provide for himself and Anja. This is where much of the culture comes into play. In America, it is typically believed the man will work, while the woman stays home with the children. The way the women were treated in this story was especially surprising considering these were American men. I believe they worked the women due to the fact they were not from America and knew very little English. By looking at what it was like for the women, it was easier to understand the hardships they had to go through. I believe if they would have taken the men’s point of view, the story would not have impacted the reader as