On page 63 of M. Butterfly, Song asks Miss Chin, "Miss Chin? Why, in the Peking Opera, are women's roles played by men?" Song then goes on to answer her own question by saying, "No. Because only a man knows how a woman is supposed to act."
This immediately reminded me of Cloud 9 and the notion of the ideal woman being what only men want. Where does this leave women? What is the ideal woman for women (and I say that platonically)? It seems like according to this, women only have their ideas of the ideal woman because of what men have instilled in them throughout the years.
2 comments:
Patrick, this line stood out to me as well as well as its reference to "Cloud 9." I like that you ask "What is the ideal woman for women" because I think "Cloud 9" discusses this idea just as much as "M. Butterfly" does. In act two of "Cloud 9" we see the relationship between Cathy and Lin that studies this. But in "M. Butterfly" we get less of that, since there are so few female characters and Gallimard narrates from his perspective.
Exactly. The fact that idea of what women want in women is rarely shown in this play leaves me with this hovering curiosity.
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