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Angel Heredia

Professor Batty

English 102

16 October 2017

Questionable Power: An Analysis of M. Butterfly

In the drama M. Butterfly, there is a constant internal battle between two eastern and

western individuals. The character Rene Gallimard who is a french native meets and falls in love

with a Chinese woman from Beijing named Song Liling. Rene considers himself superior to

Song because of where he was born and raised. The effects of the Post colonization in this drama

are complicated because Gallimard, the dominant French diplomat views Song as a lesser

individual who must be submissive in order to satisfy Gallimard. This is a perfect example of

postcolonial criticism because as an outsider, it can be analyzed and proven to be so. Here in this

story we have the woman be part of a minority and the man who believes that because the

woman is a minority she must obey as he says and please him in every way possible. Song plays

two roles in this drama, the submissive helpless woman and the Chinese spy who takes

advantage of Gallimard. Many critics could argue that Gallimard is the male and has always

been the dominant one in his relationship but i believe that this drama switches up the power and

makes one realize that stereotypes are not always true. M. Butterfly is a drama that calls

traditional power dynamics into question because though Gallimard, the French Diplomat, felt

that he was the one who was superior, Song was actually the one who was pulling the strings

towards the end leaving the readers to question whether Song truly had the power all along.
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Song expects to disillusion Gallimard by proving that he is a man (saying, "Look at me,

you fool" [Hwang 2866]), but Song learns that it is impossible to destroy the image Gallimard

has constructed as the ultimate truth.(Hoffman 98) Based on an article written by Hope

Hoffman, this part of the drama epitomizes the concept of the power dynamic as Gallimard

seems to live by, by refusing to acknowledge that his significant other Song has a penis. In his

heart and mind, Song is still his butterfly. This demonstrates that the author is questioning a

controversial dynamic where the man who is supposed to be dominant, chooses to blind himself

that in reality, the person he has fallen in love with is a man. The author of the drama brings this

into questioning because it surely causes us to lift a brow, by questioning why did Gallimard

choose to ignore the fact that Song was indeed the dominant one and he chose to blind himself,

because the man only sees what he chooses to see.

The power of Songs subversion is her/his ability to manipulate and exploit the ideology

that governs the West in their relationships with the East.(Fung 21) This article written by,

Eileen Chia-Ching Fung exemplifies how Song, overthrows the stereotype that women are

suppose to be weak and submissive in a relationship, taking her own gender into her hands and

encouraging her self power, by overlooking her given name Madame Butterfly, which is taught

of weak, or soft. When you think of Song one may think of a soft, endearing performer, but Song

appears to be much more than that, by taking on her/his hands that she has the power to

manipulate others, by making them vulnerable and by having the power to imitate someone she

is not. This also overthrows the concept that the women of the west were often thought of as

weak, because in the end the, weak one was the Gallimard the French diplomat who ended up

getting lost in what was real and what was not.

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Gallimard: But . . . that fascination is imperialist, or so you tell me. Song: Do you

believe everything I tell you? Yes. It is always imperialist. But sometimes . . ., it is also mutual.

(Hwang 22) This quote explains the irony in Songs word, she agrees that the eastern side of

Gallimard is imperialist and imperious, but the irony behind it is that she understands because

she is a man herself, and although she might seem weak and fragile, she is much more stronger

and smarter than the diplomat himself. If the Eastern people are known to control and dominate

others, than Song can do it as well, that is why she agrees in a certain level of mutualism

between her and Gallimard, because she is also controlling him and dominating him, leaving the

readers to question the traditional dynamics of power between man and woman and the East and

the West.

Gallimard: Over the next five weeks, I worked like a dynamo. I stopped going to the

opera, I didnt phone or write her. I knew this little flower was waiting for me to call and as I

wickedly refused to do so, I felt for the first time that rush of power the absolute power of a

man.(Hwang 32) This part of the drama exemplifies the weak minded person Gallimard was,

waiting for Song to miss him, but little did he know that, that was part of her plan all along. Song

proclaims, only a man knows how a woman is supposed to act (Hwang 63) and we can clearly

see she is very successful at this, she creates a fantasy that she is able to manipulate and become

the dominant one.

In an article written by, Emily Poworoznek, she states, In order for Song to successfully

trick Gallimard into believing he is a woman, Song must imitate what society has dictated. He

must become the soft, fragile, elegant, nave, Oriental woman.(Poworoznek 6) Song: Okay,

Rule One is: Men always believe what they want to hear. So a girl can tell the most obnoxious
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lies and the guys will believe them every time- This is my first time-Thats the biggest Ive

ever seen or both, which, if you really think about it, is not possible in a single lifetime.(Hwang

82) This part of the article states how much work and persistency Song had to put in order to

gain what she wanted all along. The power dynamics are not so much to be questioned here, but

are meant to be put on display. Demonstrating that in fact Song was the dominant all along, and

her of a western woman are just as good as her eastern ones.

Post-colonial criticism is simply but a state of mind and the drama M. Butterfly displays

that western minds can be deceived and be seen as lesser by anyone the same way as anyone

else. Gallimard underestimated the love he had for the image of his butterfly. He believed he

was so much more powerful than she was until he realized that he was the one who had gotten

played. Gallimard, the man who wished to dominate a weak asian woman becomes weak and

figuratively, a woman himself. This drama ends ironically as Gallimard became the fantasy

woman he wished he could have had. Gallimard chose the weakest option and chose to commit

suicide by the japanese method of honor suicide. He felt that he no longer had a reason to live for

the only fantasy that brought him happiness was now exposed to be nothing more than a 20 year

long lie. No matter where anyone is brought up, whether it is in an Eastern continent or a

Western continent, one is not greater than the other and both are just as vulnerable to any

external threats that are faced. Looks are often deceiving. Gallimard and Song display this

clearly, for the weak asian woman is the one who truly dominated the all powerful Western man

in the end.

Works Cited
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Hwang, David Henry. M. Butterfly: With an Afterword by the Playwright. New York: Plume,

2006. Print.

Emily Poworoznek. The Cycle of the Butterfly: The Gender Condition within David Henry

Hwangs M. Butterfly, 2014/15 Issue.

<https://praxis.journals.villanova.edu/article/download/1810/1764>

Eileen Chia-Ching Fung. Deconstructing the Butterfly: Teaching David Henry Hwangs M.

Butterfly in Cultural and Socio-political Contexts. Asian American Literature: Discourses and

Pedagogies 1 (2010) 16-26.

<http://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1003&context=aaldp>

Hope Hoffman. Stereotypes as Reinforced Structure in M. Butterfly. 1998. Volume 10 | Issue 1

<http://digitalcommons.iwu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1092&context=rev>