Summary
Though the entire Kao family compound sleeps, the bondmaid Ming-feng stays awake to savor her few hours of freedom and ponder the nature of fate. Two other servants, Mama Huang and Sister Chang, sleep in the same room. Ming-feng, expecting to be married off soon, worries if she will end up like Hsi-erh, Madame Shen's maid. Hsi-erh is married to a brutal man and still works at the Gao household. As a married woman, Hsi-erh now endures even greater abuse.
Ming-feng recalls how, almost eight years ago, her father, mourning the death of his wife, sold Ming-feng to the Gao family as a bondmaid. Ming-feng uses her belief in fate as a source of comfort. She recalls the kindness that Eldest Young Miss, a deceased sister of Chueh-min and Chueh-hui, showed Ming-feng. Ming-feng laments that there is no one to help her now. She thinks of Chueh-hui and feels a glimmer of hope that he might save her from her wretched life but quickly dismisses that hope and falls asleep.
Sedan carriers, wearing straw sandals despite the snow, carry Chin and her mother, Mrs. Chang, from the Kao household to the Chang family compound. The sedan carriers are cold and tired, but they are used to terrible working conditions. The sedan carriers think about smoking at an opium den or gambling at a card table after transporting the mother and daughter.
Mrs. Chang and Chin arrive home and go to their room to change. Though Mrs. Chen has only just turned forty, she shows visible signs of age and is often fatigued and forgetful. Mrs. Chang is exhausted from playing twelve games of mahjong, but Chin is eager to discuss the prospect of attending the Foreign Languages school next autumn. Mrs. Chang changes into a fur-lined jacket and dismisses her maid, and appears to fall asleep before asking Chin to get her a cup of tea. After pouring her mother's tea, Chin raises her idea of taking the coeducational school's entrance exam. At first, Mrs. Chang is incredulous; co-education seems too foreign and improper. Mrs. Chang, a widow, raised Chin with progressive ideas. For example, Mrs. Chang did not bind Chin's feet and allowed Chin to attend school against the family's wishes.
Chin argues that every generation has new ideas, and times are changing. Chin also affirms that she is just as much a person as a man is. Mrs. Chang acquiesces, agreeing that Chin's education has been overall positive. Mrs. Chang humbly says that Chin could out-debate her mother using ideas from all the books she reads. Mrs. Chang is still concerned about what the family, particularly Chin's grandmother who lives in a nunnery, will say if Chin attends a coeducational school. Mrs. Chang desires peace in her final years and wishes Chin would not be so rebellious, though Mrs. Chang is still inclined to give Chin what she wants. Promising they will discuss the matter the next day, Mrs. Chang dismisses Chin.
Disappointed, Chin goes to her dreary room and sees a copy of New Youth magazine that contains a quotation from Ibsen's play A Doll's House. Chin reads:
"I believe before all else that I am a human being, just as much as you are—or at least I should try to become one…I cant be satisified with what most people say…I must think things out for myself, and try to get clear about them."
This passage inspires Chin to write a letter to her classmate Hsu Chien-ju and invite the girl to join Chin in applying to the coeducational school. In her letter, written in pai hua, Chin stresses her and Chien-ju's shared responsibility is to fight for their rights so that future girls can live in a just world. Chin ends the letter by inviting Chien-ju to visit soon.
Chueh-hsin is Chueh-min and Chueh-hui's older brother, and the eldest son of an eldest son. Thus, Chueh-hsin holds the family's highest role and has the most responsibility after the Venerable Master Kao. Externally, Chueh-hsin has an idyllic life. He is handsome, intelligent, and greatly loved by his entire family. In his fourth year of middle school, Chueh-hsin endured the loss of his mother.
Chueh-hsin's father takes a new, younger wife, Mrs. Chou. During this time, Chueh-hsin turns to his dreams for comfort; he hopes to go to Shanghai, Beijing, or abroad to study chemistry or physics. He is also in love with his cousin, Mei, a woman who comforts and understands Chueh-hsin. Since marriage between cousins is common in the Kao family, Chueh-hsin fully expects to take Mei as his bride.
However, the very day Chueh-hsin graduates from school, his father informs Chueh-hsin that he will marry a woman he has never met. Many men with unmarried daughters tried to match their daughters with Chueh-hsin, and Mei was not an option, as Mrs. Chou and Mei's mother had a falling-out. Chueh-hsin's father narrowed the potential brides down to two options and let fate decide, picking a name randomly.
Chueh-hsin's father believed he was graciously fulfilling his role as a father and Chueh-hsin would be happy about the marriage. Chueh-hsin is too shocked by the news to respond, and nods his agreement before running to his room to weep.
The engagement ends Chueh-hsin's dreams of marrying Mei and continuing his studies. Chueh-hsin does not fight against the decision, complain, or weep loudly enough for anyone to hear, and therefore the family assumes he is happy with the decision.
On the day of the engagement, Chueh-hsin feels like a puppet, pulled about and paraded for other people's entertainment. Chueh-hsin is too numb to do anything other than obey when asked to perform ceremonial tasks. In the time between the engagement and the wedding, Chueh-hsin keeps himself completely occupied with mahjong, operas, drinking, and preparing for the wedding, indifferent towards these activities. He puts away the books he had hoped to study and does not look at them again. Less than six months after the engagement, Chueh-hsin's bride, Li Jui-chueh, arrives. Chueh-hsin's father and grandfather set up a stage in the family compound as part of the wedding celebration. Chueh-hsin has to perform three days' worth of traditions before marrying his bride.
For a month, Chueh-hsin enjoys being married. His wife, though not Mei, is kind, equally beautiful to Mei, and understanding. He is briefly happy, forgetting the dreams he once had and embracing new ones. But Chueh-hsin's dreams are again shattered when his father announces that Chueh-hsin will be starting a job the next day, because if Chueh-hsin does not start earning his own money, people will talk. Chueh-hsin's father secured a position with the Sichuan Mercantile Corporation using a connection. Though the family has enough money to send Chueh-hsin to a university, his father believes this inappropriate since Chueh-hsin is married. Chueh-hsin thinks to himself, "everything is finished."
Chueh-hsin's father instructs him how to behave out in the world. Chueh-hsin goes to work and meets his coworkers before being dismissed after only two hours because there was nothing for him to do. Chueh-hsin earns a meager salary of 24 yuan. Chueh-hsin forgets his dreams, education, and Mei, and becomes adept in business.
Chueh-hsin lives indifferently for six months until his father dies during an epidemic, leaving Chueh-hsin to care for his wife, stepmother, and four siblings, though Chueh-hsin is only twenty. When Chueh-hsin's sister Elder sister dies of tuberculosis, Chueh-hsin "felt somewhat eased, since her death lightened his burden considerably."
When Chueh-hsin's first son, Hai-chen, is born, Chueh-hsin feels a renewed sense of purpose. Chueh-hsin promises that his son will not have to make the sacrifices in his career that Chueh-hsin did.
The May 4th movement begins in 1919, two years after Hai-chen's birth. The May 4th movement rekindles Chueh-hsin's idealism, and he begins to read revolutionary publications like his brothers. These publications include New Youth, New Tide, Weekly Critic, and Weekly Review magazines. Chueh-hui and Chueh-min are more radical than Chueh-hsin, who adopts a "compliant bow" philosophy in life and politics, trying to appease everyone and maintain the status quo at all costs. Chueh-hsin quickly realizes that the different Kao households, headed by his uncles, are a complicated web of alliances and enemies. The compliant bow philosophy is useful for Chueh-hsin in navigating these relationships, but detrimental to Chueh-hsin's personal happiness.
Analysis
Electric lights are symbolic throughout the narrative. Electric lights, a modern invention at the time of Family, symbolize how New Culture ideas reveal the flaws in the Confucian structure. After the lights go out, the residents of the Kao family compound take off the "masks" they had worn all day. These "masks" are the disingenuous behaviors that the people on the compound employ to conform to expectations. Performance is a motif used throughout the story. In Peking opera, masks are an essential and distinctive aspect of performance. Thus, using "masks" as a symbol is culturally significant. Every aspect of the gentry's lives is performative, and by extension, the servants have to perform as well.
Ming-feng reflects on how arbitrarily fate assigns people different roles. Her life could have been entirely different, even pleasant, if even one aspect of her identity was different. Though fate is what doomed Ming-feng to a life of abuse and unhappiness, she ironically finds comfort in believing that her fate is predetermined. Ming-feng's love for Chueh-hui is aspirational in multiple respects. First, Chueh-hui represents a life Ming-Feng wishes she had for herself. Secondly, Chueh-hui is an aspirational person who hopes to change the world for the better.
By transitioning from Ming-feng's story to Chin's, the narrative compares the two young women. In many respects, Ming-Feng and Chin are similar. Around the same age, they are both girls educated beyond their station who lost their fathers, grew up with the Kao children, and are under the authority of the Venerable Master Kao. However, because of their respective social classes, Ming-feng and Chin are destined for very different life outcomes. Additionally, how the two women process their respective fates is markedly different. Ming-feng accepts her lot in life mostly without complaint, and only bemoans her station in the privacy of night. Chin, on the other hand, takes an active role in determining her destiny. She argues with her mother for more privileges, and takes action when her wants are denied.
Similarly, the narrative contrasts Mrs. Chang with the sedan carriers to illustrate how people of different classes interact with the patriarchal system. Mrs. Chang is exhausted from playing mahjong, and the sedan carriers carry her home. The workers daydream about playing games to unwind after work. Mrs. Chang's work is the sedan carriers' entertainment. This contrast is reinforced when Mrs. Chang puts on a fur robe to go to bed in her heated home while the sedan carriers wear straw sandals in the snow.
Mrs. Chang has an unusual relationship with her own authority. A widow tasked with raising Chin on her own, Mrs. Chang does what she thinks is right by Chin regardless of the social consequences. For example, Mrs. Chang refuses to bind Chin's feet and allows Chin to go to school outside the home. These choices anger the Venerable Master Kao. Mrs. Chang, though she is the primary decision maker for Chin, also acknowledges that Chin can "out-talk" her using the ideas in the books Chin reads. Mrs. Chang, unlike most of the Kao family, is aware of her own ignorance. Mrs. Chang is Chin's ally, not her enemy. Still, Chin feels oppressed by her mother to some extent when Mrs. Chang expresses initial shock at Chin's radical ideas and desires peace from gossip.
In her room, Chin reads from New Youth magazine. She is drawn to an excerpt from Ibsen's play, A Doll's House. The excerpt discusses self-determination and the fact that women are just as much people as men are. This statement, though inspiring and profound to Chin, carries a bit of irony, given that moments before, Chin had ordered around illiterate female servants and allowed herself to be carried in a sedan chair.
Chin writes a letter to her classmate Hsu Chien-Ju, using the new writing style, pai hua. Mrs. Chang finds pai hua vulgar and a corruption of culture. Writing in the classical sense was a simultaneously visual and poetic artform; Chin uses writing to expedite sending a pragmatic message. It is ironic that, Chin replicates the writing style she sees in New Culture publications, given that moments before she affirmed the importance of thinking things through for herself. Additionlly, Chin asks Hsu Chien-ju to help her fight for the rights of future girls through radical individualism and personal happiness.
Chueh-hsin's chapter conveys meaning through its form. The series of events are given in rapid succession, mimicking the feeling of Chueh-hsin's life spiraling out of his control. Continuing with the theme of Chueh-hsin's life being out of his control, themes of divination and fate are woven throughout the chapter. For example, Chueh-hsin's father randomly selects Jui-chueh to be Chueh-hsin's bride.
This chapter demonstrates how even the people who ostensibly benefit most from the patriarchal family system are victimized by it. Chueh-hsin's attempts to find happiness within the system are futile, because his responsibilities increase incrementally. For example, though Chueh-hsin intially enjoys his marriage, he is quickly given a position at the Sichuan Mercantile Company, which he does not want. As soon as Chueh-hsin becomes adept at business and begins to feel content, his father dies, and Chueh-hsin takes responsibility for his step-mother and siblings.
Chueh-hsin is not motivated by a strong sense of duty or ideals aligned with the patriarchal family system. Rather, Chueh-hsin's acceptance of his fate is passive; due to a consistent discomfort with confrontation, Chueh-hsin simply allows things to happen to him. He is even passive in his grieving; he weeps where no one will hear him, but mostly he feels numb and apathetic.
Chueh-hsin, his father, and the Venerable Master Kao operate in three different realities. Chueh-hsin's father believes he is doing his son a favor by providing a wife and career for him. The narrative frames Chueh-hsin's father as an ignorant, well-intentioned character rather than a tyrannical and malevolent force like the Venerable Master Kao. Yet, Chueh-hsin's father's actions have the most significant practical and emotional impact on Chueh-hsin's life. The Venerable Master Kao's orders, though ill-intentioned, are more irritating and symbolic than detrimental to Chueh-hsin's happiness.
On the day of his engagement, Chueh-hsin feels like a puppet, a passive prop with no agency in his life. Performance and puppetry are common themes throughout the text, invoking elements of Chinese culture to represent the characters' feelings. Chinese shadow puppetry is an ancient art form where large troupes of puppeteers manipulate colorful paper puppets against a screen, accompanied by singing and storytelling. These puppet shows can be forms of "entertainment or religious rituals," performed at special occasions such as weddings and funerals. Chueh-hsin is manipulated and pulled about by his entire family, who act as a puppeteering troupe. His family manipulates Chueh-hsin's story for the sake of appearances rather than to provide Chueh-hsin with happiness.
Chueh-hsin begins to engage in questionable, numbing behaviors between the engagement and the wedding itself, foreshadowing his later relationship with alcoholism. He frequents operas, drinks, and plays mahjong. Throughout the text, Mahjong represents a distraction from one's troubles and memories. Chueh-hsin, before he is even married, has given up hope and needs to be distracted from reality. Throughout the text, characters often confuse forgetting with happiness. Jui-chueh is "happy" when she can forget her sister; Mei is "happy" when she can lose herself in her memories.
Chueh-hsin enjoys his marriage until his father forces him into a career. Chueh-hsin's fleeting happiness with Jui-chueh typifies the ephemeral and surface-level happiness in the patriarchal family. This ephemeral happiness is also evident in other aspects of the plot: Ming-Feng's love for Chueh-hui, Mei's memories, Mrs. Chang's insistence that Chin will have a happy life if she marries wealthy, and Mrs. Chou's insistence that the life of a concubine is a favorable fate because it provides a girl with position and wealth.
Chueh-hui's job demonstrates the gentry's unique relationship to the idea of labor. The Kao family considers some forms of labor, like walking instead of riding in a sedan chair, unseemly, but Chueh-hsin is required to get a job because otherwise "people will talk." Chueh-hsins's earnings contribute little to the family's coffers; his salary is a symbolic pittance of a wage. Chueh-hsin's salary placates the family's desire for a respectable image.
When Chueh-hsin's father dies, Chueh-hsin inherits not only his father's responsibilities but also his father's guilt. Just as father Kao blamed himself for his wife and his child's unavoidable deaths, Chueh-hsin blames himself for his sister's untimely death by tuberculosis. Chueh-hsin's youth effectively ends when he takes his new position, not only because he shoulders new responsibilities but because he becomes a player in family politics. His uncles, who previously regarded him as a nephew, suddenly regard Chueh-hsin as an equal whom they can sabotage and manipulate.
When Chueh-hsin's son is born, Chueh-hsin's entire world changes. Chueh-hsin inherits his father's role in a new way. Chueh-hsin places his son at the center of his world, just as Father Kao did for Chueh-hsin; Chueh-hsin does interrupt the status quo only for the sake of his son, for example, asking his wife to breastfeed the child instead of hiring a wetnurse. However, by pouring his dreams into Hai-chen, Chueh-hsin inadvertently perpetuates the patriarchal family structure that will eventually victimize Hai-chen.
