Cycle of Oppression

Buffalo

“The buffalo was still alive.  I will never forget how affected I was by its long drawn-out, plaintive bellows”(93).

“On top of the neatly stacked books lay the buffalo tail: black, with a tufted end, and stained with dark blood.  It was exceptionally long, and no doubt once belonged to the unfortunate buffalo responsible for breaking Four-Eyes’s glasses”(105).

Banned Books

“‘So, are you weeping tears of joy?’ I said.

‘No. All I feel is loathing.’

‘Me too.  Loathing for everyone who kept these books from us’”(99).

“‘What happened to her books?’

‘They went up in smoke.  Confiscated by the Red Guards, who promptly burnt them in public, right in front of her apartment building’”(51).

 

Sijie adopts the symbols of the buffalo and the banned books to demonstrate people’s inclination to oppress the ones that defy their accepted ways, showing an overall cycle of repression. They are attempting to prove their dominance over the buffalo. Four-Eyes tries to prove his adulthood by showing how he can dominate over the buffalo and assert his power. Likewise, Luo and the narrator are trying to become adults and learn by accessing the books while the government is trying to repress them and keep them from becoming educated adults.

The Bloody Truth

“I noticed three blood spots in his left eye, one large and two small, all the same shade of bright red.”(3)

“Was it a ploy to get rid of the Red Guards, who were slipping out of his grasp? Or was it the fantasy of a great revolutionary dreamer, wishing to create a new generation?” (7)

Analysis: The three blood spots represent three stages of life; childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. Also, there are three main people, whether it is Luo, the Narrator, and the Seamstress, or Luo, the narrator, and Four-Eyes. The Red Guards consisted mainly of teenagers who banded together to support Mao, they left their childhood behind because it was of fashion then to forget about past civilization and embrace Mao’s new form of life.

Before:  “‘They’re waiting for the blood to congeal,’ he replied. “It’s a remedy against cowardice. To gain courage, you must swallow it when it’s still lukewarm and frothy.’ ... When he had finished he sucked his fingers one by one, to make sure not a drop was wasted.” (94)

After: “A few minutes later, while he was making a knot in the rope, I heard Four-Eyes exclaim: ‘Shit!’ ‘Mind your language now, my son.’ ‘I’ve got the runs,’ Four-Eyes wailed. ‘Use the bucket in the bedroom!’ To our immense relief we heard Four-Eyes running out of the house. ‘Where are you off to?’ the mother cried. ‘To the maize field.’ ‘Have you got some paper?’ ‘No,’ replied the son from afar. ‘I’ll get you some!’ the mother called.” (104)

Analysis: Four-eyes drank buffalo blood for a rite-of-passage kind of event. The blood was supposed to give him more courage and make him more manly. However, the graphic description of his “disposal” had an air of a little baby getting diarrhea- vulnerability. I think this speaks to the idea of the fact that trying to grow up too fast does not work, because, as this happened, it led to a gross situation. He was so excited to grow up and lose his old ways that he forgot that he needed to step back and let things happen. Also, his mother was a big shadow over him meaning that he just still needed to be in her nest. A lot of the coming-of age quotes speak to the role of family in growing up.

The color Red & Three Blood Spots in Headman’s eye and Drinking Buffalo Blood are symbols in Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress that emphasize the coming of age in the main characters of the novel through other themes throughout the plot. For the color red and blood spots, it shows how events mark life and that life has different components and different stages of life. For the blood-drinking, there was a negative consequence showing if you are too vulnerable you will not grow up and have courage. Together, they represent the negative parts of blood.

Red Eye

Shedding the Past

Thesis: Sijie uses the symbol of the narrator’s sheepskin coat to illustrate the connection the narrator feels to his former and life the significance of his friendship with Luo.

This connects to Coming of Age in that the narrator is coming to terms with Luo entering into a relationship and advancing past their friendship. He feels that he is losing his friend and his family, but is choosing to handle the change maturely.

Sheepskin Coat Represents:

• the boys’ friendship
• betrayal or hurt
• intellectual property being stolen?
• inner thoughts being used to benefit another?
• Luo’s disregard for the narrator’s possessions

• a connection to the narrator’s home
• making the mountain life his own journey
• staying connected to his past, or himself while on the mountain
• inspiration for what he wanted his life to be like again

• makes Little Seamstress feel more educated
• Luo’s struggle to civilize the Little Seamstress
• literature connected the Seamstress and Luo

1. “I copied out the chapter where Ursule somnambulates. I longed to be like her: to be able, while I lay asleep on my bed...I would visit, in my dreams, places I had never set eyes on before…”(58)

2. “He borrowed my sheepskin coat to wear when he went to meet the Little Seamstress at the foot of their gingko tree in the valley of love. After I had read the passage from Balzac to her word for word… she took your coat and reread the whole thing in silence… When she’d finished reading she sat there quite still, open-mouthed. This fellow Balzac is a wizard… He touched the head of this mountain girl with an invisible finger, and was transformed, carried away in a dream.”(62)

Thesis: Sijie uses the symbol of the buffalo to emphasize the significance of Four Eyes. Escaping from his re-education process, while giving up his morality in the process. This connects to Coming of Age in that Four Eyes has grown up from a boy into a man by really showing his literature skills.

Buffalo Represents:

• Four-Eyes’ re-education
• his struggle
• his revenge for the buffalo for breaking his glasses, like the re-education threatening his job?
• Cultural Revolution taking away his opportunities
• job blinded him to the value of the literature, like buffalo blinded him by breaking his glasses

1. “They’re waiting for the blood to congeal, … It’s a remedy against cowardice. To gain courage, you must swallow it when it’s still lukewarm and frothy… He (the headman) caressed the edge with the tips of his fingers and then sliced the pudding of thick blood in two: half for Four-Eyes, half for himself.” (94)

2. “For all his efforts to dodge the relentless lashes, one split second of inattention was enough for Four-Eyes to receive a blow to the face from the buffalo’s tail, which spent his spectacles hurtling through the air...He bent over and plunged his arms into the water, groping around in the mud. The blank expression in his bulging eyes was disconcerting.”(49)

Disconnect and Intellect

Disconnection due to the Cultural Revolution

Four Eyes’ glasses

• Four Eyes’ glasses portray the idea that he doesn’t fit in. He can’t re-educate as well as others, because without his fragile glasses he can’t see, and is set apart by his intelligence. His glasses are a symbol of comfort and courage as well, and shape how he sees the world. When he loses them, he has lost his ability to see and feels like he has lost his way of looking at the world. They also give him a feeling of superiority towards the villagers. Without his glasses, he’s no better than the rest of them; they symbolize his education and wealth. They set him apart from everyone else. Symbolizing that he is smart and from the city, they re-education started to break Four Eyes, just as the buffalo broke his glasses.

Quotes

• “That’s where my son is being reeducated. You may have met him. It seems he’s the only one up there who wears glasses” (84).
• “Without his spectacles his goggle eyes reminded me of the dull, dazed look of a Pekinese dog. He seemed quite lost and stricken, even before he had hoisted the hod of rice onto his back”(53).
• “He kept his bulging eye fixed on the ground before him but couldn’t see the raised stoned on which he might have put his feet. He advanced blindly, tottering and lurching like a drunkard . . . and he fell to his knees” (54).
• “He bent over and plunged his arms into the water, groping around in the mud. The blank expression in his bulging eyes was disconcerting”(47).
• “. . . Which sent his spectacles hurtling through the air . . . Clapping his hands over his eyes, he let out a stream of abuse, as if he had been blinded” (47).

Thesis

• Four Eyes’ glasses give him comfort and courage that depict his difference from the rest of the village, and his dependence on them shows his struggle to cling to the world outside of the mountain.

Books

Books let the narrator achieve things and give him courage to talk to Seamstress.

They allow him to realize that his ability to go and learn has been taken away from him by Mao and the Red Guards and makes him understand just how repressed his society is by the Cultural Revolution. Now that they books have shown him another way to live, he resents the people who keep him from doing so by banning literature.The books are helping him cling to the outside world and are one of the only things that reminds him of his life before it was destroyed by Mao. Literature is a large part of intellectual growth, and because the boys were not exposed to it, they feel like there was a gaping hole in their education. When introduced to books, they visibly grow as characters.

Quotes

• “‘This fellow Balzac is a wizard,’ he went on. ‘He touched the head of this mountain girl with an invisible finger, and she was transformed, carried away in a dream… She said having Balzac’s words next to her skin made her feel good, and also more intelligent.’” (62)
• “I took the novels out of the suitcase one by one, opened them, studied the portraits of the authors, and passed them on to Luo. Brushing them with the tips of my fingers made me feel as if my pale hands were in touch with human lives...‘So, are you weeping tears of joy?’ I said. ‘No. All I feel is loathing.’ ‘Me too. Loathing for everyone who kept these books from us.’

Thesis

• When the author Dai Sijie weaves the symbolism of books into the narrator’s journey, he portrays Balzac and the other forbidden forms literature to be life changing as they open a new opportunity for him to grow in an intellectual sense, that had been previously oppressed from the lack of opportunity.

Unlocking the Deep Layers of Symbolism

Unlocking the Deep Layers of Symbolism

Suitcase symbolism:

Quotes:

“‘But I want to read all of them,’ Luo said resolutely. He shut the suitcase again and, resting one hand on the lid like a Christian taking a solemn oath, he declared: ‘With these books I shall transform the Little Seamstress. She’ll never be a simple mountain girl again.’” (100).

“‘It reminds me of a scene in a film,’ sand Luo. ‘You know, when a stolen suitcase turns out to be stuffed with money...’ ‘So, are you weeping tears of joy?’ I said. ‘No. All I feel is loathing.’ ‘Me too. Loathing for everyone who kept these books from us’”(99).

Dai Sijie uses the symbol of the suitcase to illustrate the oppression of the communists in China. They are a symbol of everything that has been censored from Luo and the narrator. The suitcase also represents change and hope in their lives. Once they know of it, they realize what joy and opportunity the suitcase can actually bring them. Their eyes have been opened to the Western world, and they start to mature.

Wyolin:

“He was inspecting my violin. Among the possessions brought to this mountain village by the two ‘city youths’ - which is how they saw Luo and me - it was the sole item that exuded an air of foreignness, of civilization, and therefore aroused suspicion” (3).

“A stupid toy”, a woman commented hoarsely.” “The village headman corrected her, “a bourgeois toy.” “I felt chilled to the 

bone despite the fire blazing in the center of the room.”(4)

The narrator views the violin as an important object that helps ground him to his normal life in the city. However the headsman only see the violin as a symbol of bourgeois oppression on the proletariat masses. Only until Luo comments on how it can be used to represent the revolution does the headman see that it is not just an oppressive toy.  

Open Your Mind, Close Your Mouth.

Open your mind. Close your mouth.

Old Storyteller’s Stomach

Thesis statement: Sijie uses the symbol of the old storyteller’s stomach to convey the vulnerability and openness of the storyteller. He only sang for Luo and the narrator because they showed him that they were open-minded.

Quotes

• “Our attention was immediately drawn to the contortions of his stomach, the sight of which was so extraordinary as to obliterate his voice, the tune and everything else from our consciousness. Being so thin, he didn’t actually have a stomach at all, just wrinkled skin forming innumerable tiny folds on his abdomen. When he began to sing the wrinkles billowed out, forming little waves that rippled across his tanned and gleaming body.” (p. 73)

• “We held our sides laughing. We tried to control ourselves, of course, but the giggles inside us mounted and mounted until we exploded. The old miller smiled, too, and went on signing while the skin eddied across his stomach. Luo and I rolled over the ground in a paroxysm of hilarity.”(74)

Lice

Quotes

• “Methodically he stripped off his shirt, vest, trousers and socks, and plunged them in the boiling water. His thin bony body was dotted all over with angry red bumps, and the skin was broken and bleeding and covered in scratch marks” (63).

• “”D’you know what he takes with his liquor? Pebbles! I swear it’s true… He dips them in salty water, puts them in his mouth.. and spits them out… He offered some to me, but I declined. I didn’t realise I’d be hurting his feelings…. he clammed up completely… and I spent the night in his bed”... It was not hard to imagine… the bug infested bed upon which Four Eyes lay, fighting to stay awake in case the old man happened to sing.” (p. 64-65)

Thesis statement: Sijie uses the symbol of lice to express the punishment inflicted upon Four Eyes for being close-minded and rude. When Four Eyes refused the “jade dumplings”, the storyteller deemed him as unworthy of hearing the song. If Four Eyes had not been so close-minded, he would not have needed to stay at the storyteller’s home and be subject to the merciless lice.

Civilization and the Westernized World

Symbol One: Movies

Sijie uses the symbol of movies in this book to represent and symbolize love, wonder, and civilization. First, the movies represent civilization in the deserted and unsophisticated world Luo and the narrator are stuck in. The movies are something viewed by people in the cities and the mountain villages; they are a connector between rural and urban. In this way, they symbolize civilization. The second combination of related concepts they represent are love and wonder. The love and maturity of the people in the movies is reflected in the Little Seamstress, Luo, and the narrator, helping them to come of age. The movies help them grow up by showing them idealized adults.

‘“As for us, we were content to watch her lovely face bathed in the luminous colours bouncing off the screen. Now and then everything would go dark and her eyes would shine like spots of phosphorus in the gloom. Then suddenly, when the scene changed, her face would light up, flush with colour, and blossom in wonder.” (81-82)

‘Her words pierced my heart. “It’s so much better when it’s you telling the story.”’ (82)

Sijie uses the symbol of the suitcase to represent mystery and the knowledge of the books. The mystery in the books helps them accept that there are some things they may never understand. Additionally, it represents the Westernized world that they so miss. When one starts growing up, they start to experience different things in their life. We see mysterious things that change our point of view in the world. For some people they see positive changes and others see things as negative. We start to see beyond one person and the little things that make them special to us. As we grow up we can discover ourselves and start learning what is important to us.

“Four-Eyes had a secret suitcase, which he kept carefully hidden.” (45).

“The heightened vigilance, and distrust shown by Four-Eyes, in spite of the friendship between us, seemed to substantiate Luo’s theory, and we grew convinced that the suitcase was indeed filled with banned books.”(50).

‘Luo broke silence the silence.“I expect they’re books,” he said. “The way you keep your suitcase locked up and hidden away is enough to betray your secret: you’ve got a stash of forbidden books”’ (49).

Physical Representations: