The Oriental Woman In Madama Butterfly
In the last chapter, both the Oriental man and woman, according to Edward Said, is represented by the Occident. The representation of the Oriental woman is frequently illustrated or named as the Oriental butterfly since Madama Butterfly, an iconic opera written by Giacomo Puccini. Grace Ji-Sun Kim in the Embracing the Other: The Transformative Spirit of Love stresses that Madame Butterfly “is viewed as the ideal ‘oriental woman.’ She is beautiful and subservient, small and fragile, like a butterfly” (64).
In the play Madama Butterfly, a delicate and deferential character Cio-Cio-San, named as Butterfly by her friends, falls in love with a worthless American sailor Pinkerton. Through the success of Madama Butterfly, the Occident constructs the image of the Oriental woman based on Cio-Cio-San and meanwhile, reckons that every Oriental woman has Cio-Cio-San’s characterises; namely feminine, submissive and self-devoting. In order to revise the image of the Oriental butterfly, David Henry Hwang adapts a true story, which is the relationship between the French embassy worker Bernard Boursicot and the Chinese opera singer Shi Pei Pu, for his opera M. Butterfly. Hwang’s play depicts how the French ambassador Rene Gallimard is attracted by the Chinese opera singer Song Liling. With examining the relation between Gallimard and Song, the representation of the Oriental butterfly can be seen. Nevertheless, Hwang has the blind spot on the sexual issue of Song Liling in his play and
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