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Angelica Fuentes

Professor Batty

Emglish 102

18 October 2017

Broken Butterfly

In David Henry Hwangs M. Butterfly, Rene Gallimard a French male diplomat and

the main character who engaged an romance affair with Song Liling, a male Chinese spy who

play the role of a women, throughout the play shows positions male against female, and East

against West. Hwang uses the affair, along with its power dynamics, to challenge traditional

notions of gender. The judgemental of sociality showing how people judge each other as either

male or female but not both, however Song and Gallimards characters suggest that gender

doesnt show how gender really presents itself. By illusions about sexuality and cultural

differences, Hwang creates an ironic play that addresses social myths of gender and national

identity. According to Hwang, he suggests that gender identity is an significant of a greater

power struggle that is set as our sense of place and self, and not as male or female category.

Throughout the play, Song shown multiples of series of gender transformations, until she

or he truly reveals itself. The title of the play M. Butterfly is referred to Songs gender, the title

of the opera played Madame Butterfly and based on. While the affair lasted, Gallimard's was

aware of certain masculine tendencies of Songs but never really question them. Gallimard saw

Song as bold, smart, but outspoken with a sweet, afraid, and shy heart. As the play goes along, he

ignores Song qualities because those qualities are what attracts him to her and never bothers to

question Song identify. Song seems to know what exactly to say to Gallimard to appeal to his

desire to dominate as an feminine partner. For example, when Song said, Please ... it all
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frightens me. I'm a modest Chinese girl(40) shows that Song know the Gallimard perfect

definition of the perfect woman he desires so Song follow. Song makes Gallimard crave for an

innocent dominant women meanwhile he's already committed with someone else showing how

insecure Gallimard really is. Song becomes the passive woman that Gallimard always wanted

and he buys into it.

When gender are greatly influenced in society, they can become so judgmental to society.

For example, Song said, Okay, Rule One is: Men always believe what they want to hear. So a

girl can tell the most obnoxious lies and the guys will believe them every time.. you really think

about it, is not possible in a single lifetime shows society can be very abuse to one. Song was

very aware of what society does to one another but yet shatter Gallimard.

Songs appearance of femininity and personality led Gallimard to deeply fall into love

him but dramatic tragedy occurred. Throughout play you can tell that Song s real masculinity

is broken by her feminine affect. Hwang shows how both masculine and feminine qualities dont

matter when someone desire someone for who they are. Rather than being something that is

prescribed at birth, gender is portrayed as a spectral characteristic. Gillimard asked Song, Are

you butterfly, the symbolism of an butterfly in any cultures is viewed as an resurrection, hope,

chance, and life. This is because in reality Song and Gallimard created a huge affection that lead

to great fantasy leading to a tragedy.

Gallimard through the play, he carries his insecurities because only Song made him feel

like men. Since the fantasy of Song and Gallimard grant his desire, he valued Song represent so

much that he wanted to protected her. The relationship between Song and Gallimard seem to that

they're both using each other for personal supposes. It seem that Song was using Gallimard for
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military and governmental information and Gallimard is using Song primarily to establish his

masculine identity.

When someone is attached and sprung on a human being, they become blinded with the

truth and only want to protect that person, just as Gallimard feel for Song. Theres relationship

based on the myths of gender identity of woman and man that desire their fantasy. The ideal

traditional of a man always being a dominant partner and the women being weak. Gallimard says

that he was afraid to find out Song's sexual identity because it would mean that he isnt a "real"

man. This is because he believes that real men don't love other men but rather. In this

heterosexist matrix because it's all in his head. But in reality anyone is allowed to love anyone

and who they desire. As Gallimard spoked to Song, Its one of your favorite fantasies, isnt it?

the submissive Oriental woman and the cruel white man an Oriental who kills herself for a

Westerner ah! you find it beautiful. shows the concept that appeal of Asian women for

Western men lies in their fantasy and has an impact on their traditional beliefs. They believe that

it's a huge threatened to their culture, because asian women come from a history where they

serve men and western men value more independence and power. That's where both Asian and

Western both get influence and create their fantasy of some sort of relationship where they can

create an dominance and power relationship.

However, when Gillimard introduce himself in the prison cell, he introduced himself as

an celebrate and as Madame Butterfly, meaning he doesnt see himself as a men but as

women. He become damaged and accepts his sexuality for what he really is. He view this affair

with Song as an imagination but the need of trying to maintaining his fantasy of Song alive.

Gillimard see no ideal reason between himself and the real world seeing the betrayal of Song at

court. When Song referred Gallimard as white men instead his lover at court, that's when he
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reveal his true feeling toward Song for what she real she a man that he was truly in love with.

However. that's when Song lost every toward Gallimard and become more power.

Western always has been powerful and dominance than Eastern culture so it created a

huge conflict for Gillimard, because that means that he isn't a real men in his terms. Due to this

conflict, Gillimard end up in prison cell and carrying around his sin but admitting what he felt for

Song and believing he can be a man for loving another man so took his life away. My mistakes

were simple and absolute the man I loved was a cad, a bounder until I could look into the

mirror and see nothing but a woman., showing that Gillimard admitted to his audience his

true feeling but not proud. But as a result of his flashbacks, they were haunting him destroying

so he committed suicide.

Having power is great and everyone at some point enjoy it. But when power and gender

identity come in between race and culture, there's chaos. The power of gender of Western and

Eastern cultures are similar to Whites and Negroes with an dominant history of who's more

powerful. Song know the truth tragedy and of West and East who accept it but Gallimard didnt

want to admit at first Song said,West thinks of itself as masculine big guns, big industry, big

money -- so the East is feminine weak, delicate, poorbut good at art, and full of inscrutable

Wisdom The feminine mystique., she saw the tragedy before it was costed.

As the play ended, Gillimard believed that Song were a dishonor and he lost himself and

believes there's no value in life. Meaning the genders had switch and Song transferred into the

masculine and Gillimard become the feminine, the broken butterfly of his story. As a result

society and gender identity become an issue with traditional culture. As eastern culture becoming

more powerful than Western culture.

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Citations

1. Balaev, Michelle. "Performing gender and fictions of the nation in David Hwang's M.

Butterfly." Forum for World Literature Studies, vol. 6, no. 4, 2014, p. 608+. Academic

OneFile,
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library.lavc.edu:2077/ps/i.do?p=AONE&sw=w&u=lavc_main&v=2.1&it=r&id=GALE%

7CA398253065&sid=ebsco&asid=5ad802fe5b9463acaa15c64c2c291fa2. Accessed 16

Oct. 2017.

2. Shimakawa, Karen. "'Who's to Say?' Or, Making Space for Gender and Ethnicity in 'M.

Butterfly.'." Theatre Journal, no. 3, 1993, p. 349. EBSCOhost,

library.lavc.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edsglr

&AN=edsgcl.14617715&site=eds-live.

3. Fung, Eileen Chia Ching (2010) "Deconstructing the Butterfly : Teaching David

Henry Hwang s M. Butterfly in Cultural and Socio-political contexts," Asian American

Literature: Discourses & Pedagogies: Vol. 1 , Article 4.

4. Hwang, David H, and Giacomo Puccini. M. Butterfly. New York, N.Y: New American

Library, 1989. Print.