Courtney Dunn Mrs. Besnard World Literature 02 November 2015 Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress In 1971 the Chinese Cultural Revolution has begun to take off. In this story the protagonist, an unnamed a fine musician, and his storytelling best friend luo, are sent away from Chengdu to a secluded mountain village to be re-educated. After arriving to the "Phoenix of the Sky", the Headman of the village wants to burn the protagonist’s violin. Luckily, Luo saves the violin by encouraging the musician
Khalil Mack 16 July 2014 Summer Reading Assignment Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress Setting the Stage Genre: After reading the novel, I realized that the genres of the book are historical and it is an autobiography. Author: The author of the novel, Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress is Dai Sijie. Dai Sijie was born in Putian, China in 1954. He spent most of his childhood working in his father’s shop. At age 30, Dai received a scholarship to study Western art and cinema in France.
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress tells the story of two boys being re-educated during the Cultural Revolution in China. Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress is inspired by the author, Daj Sijie's experience with being sent to a re-education camp in Rural Sichuan from 1971 to 1974 due to him being born and raised into an educated family. The process and experience of China re-educating their citizens is called the Cultural Revolution. The Cultural Revolution lasted from 1966 to 1976. The
author of Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, recognizes the importance of foreshadowing and uses this technique in his novel. The color red is used to foreshadow through different motifs such as the “red beaked-raven,” (Sijie 135) wardrobe, and politics. Through the perspective of the book's narrator, whose name is not disclosed, the audience sees connections between red and approaching danger or troubles. The usage of the color red contributes to Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by foreshadowing
people the will and desire to live, and most of us cannot imagine a world or life without them. But what if these aspirations were taken away overnight? In Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, Dai Sijie (戴思杰) illustrates these turn of events with a significant focus on three characters: Luo, the narrator, and the Little Chinese Seamstress. The story takes place during the Cultural Revolution in Maoist China when young intellectuals from the city were forced to be re-educated in the peasant environments
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, by Die Sijie contains many prominent themes, such as the effect and influence of literature on the characters, friendship and loyalty, coming of age, and the power of knowledge. However, one significant, underlying theme appearing throughout the novel is feminism. Feminism is defined as the acnowledgement that women and men are equal socially as well as in intellegence, and that both deserve to have equal rights to freedom and be treated as such in society
The novel of Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress written by Dai Sijie is a story set during the historical period of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. During this time, the civilians are forced to endure the harsh conditions of reeducation. Dai includes very vivid details that exemplify how terrible the situation was for the characters and exemplify the severity of the tasks they had to complete such as carrying their waste up a mountain and working in dangerous coal mines. The narrator’s friend
novel you hardly recognize the main character who transformed so much from the starting character. In Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, Dai’s characters exhibit considerable character development due to the banned books they acquire. The author depicts his thoughts on the way books affect people's lives through the in depth perspective of the narrator, his best friend Luo, and the Little Chinese
Balzac and The Little Chinese Seamstress In the novel Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress written by Dai Sijie, the interaction between Luo, the Narrator, and the headman reveals the purpose of re-education and its cultural values that shaped Chinese culture and shows the impact that it left on characters such as Luo and The Narrator. Not only does the Chinese government encourage re-education, but through this, it discourages individuality and showing your intellectual abilities.
but too often, we tend to define each other by one specific quality. Dai Sijie’s 2001 publication Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress demonstrates this in the form of two young men and how they consider their female companion. The Narrator and his friend Luo are being reeducated in a village in Communist China. Along the way, they both become captivated by the tailor’s daughter, the Seamstress. However, they only see her for her physical beauty, and for her potential to become “civilized”. By