Jul 30, 2005 05:52 PM
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(Updated Sep 28, 2006 08:37 PM)
What difference would a beam of lightt through a window make in a room well lit? It doesn’t make any. It will surely make its presence felt in a dark room. A dark room which was thought well lit. If you take the Wu house to be the room its lamps were lit by Madame Wu.
::THE ROOM AND ITS LIGHTS: Madame Wu looked after the Wu house under whose roof live some 60odd people. Madame Wu is the light of the house. She along with her beauty is endowed a very wise mind. Her husband though looked after all the outside house affairs, asked Madame Wu for many advices. Her sons heeded what ever she said. When she turned forty, she asked her husband to take a concubine (This is where the book begins). At a time in China when the birth of a girl was considered ill, Madame Wu stressed on the equality of both Man and Woman. She even arranged marriages for her sons. Though her second son unconventionally brought home a girl he loved, he was given consent for marriage.
So what ever rules Madame Wu broke were considered correct as she was the Wisest under the Wu roof and her province. She loved peace everywhere. So, did this room really need any more light? Yes!! It did.There was darkness unseen. Not seen even by the lighter herself.
::THE DARKNESS: Madame Wu much against the will of her husband arranges a concubine to him. All her life Madame Wu had been stuck with a misconception that men seek nothing but pleasure in bed. All her life being a good wife to her husband she never ''loved'' him.Her husband who loves Madame Wu very much goes into deep agony. The new concubine fails to give him all the sweet talks and bubbly chatter Madame Wu could give, beside him in bed. In despair, he goes to ‘flower houses’(brothels) and falls in love with a prostitute.The concubine is brought home by Madame Wu as she just bought as a piece of flesh. Though she was looked after very well by Madame Wu, she doesn’t get all the love from the person she sleeps with.This concubine gives birth to a girl and feels shameful about it. Then she attempts to do suicide.
Whatever Madame Wu does she does for the good of everybody around. But, she was doing this ‘good’ with a very selfish heart, which even she didn’t know existed. She did everything as a sense of duty but not out of love. She raised children out of duty but not out of love. She didn’t want the children to cry ever but never loved them. All the 24yrs as wife she did everything as a sense of duty very selfishly to retire from it one day.
::THE LIGHT BEAM: One fine day Madame Wu meets a priest named Brother Andre, a hairy giant from Venice.Madame Wu gets influenced a lot by his preaching. He teaches her about life about the world about the stars and in the end unknowingly induces into her Love. The Love all these years she never gave to anybody. Madame Wu slowly realizes that all the care she gave to her daughter-in-laws, to her sons and husband was not out of Love but out of duty. She now understands the real meaning of Love.Brother Andre dies one day in the hands of some ruffians. When she goes to his house, then she realizes that all these days she was actually in love this man.Madame Wu starts loving this dead man. The true Love she is in, enables her to talk Brother Andre who takes a special place in her heart. With his preaching and advices she practices the Love she learnt. She looks after the orphaned girls Brother Andre looked after when he was alive. She regards these girls Brother Andre’s and her children.
Pearl S. Buck , a Noble laureate, very effectively drives home the meaning of Love. Madame Wu who mistakes all the care she gives people as Love at the end gets to know what true Love is. Pearl Buck in thisbook very effectively put forward all the miseries and agonies Chinese face.The hall mark of a Noble Lauereate is theydon’t appear to preach but they get their ideas into our minds very effectively. She stresses over a lot of problems China faced and is still facing like the ever increasing population, inequality between genders etc.
::Some Extracts which move you The Delivery Scene: Madame Kang and Mr. Kang exemplify China’s cause for ever increasing population. These are people who think the job of a woman is begetting as many children as one can and make their husbands proud. Madame Wu having read a lot of books is called for Madame Kang’s complex parturition. Madame Kang is with a baby at an age of 45. But inspite of her, the moment she touched sore skin Madame Kang groaned…… ”Hold her hands.” Madame Wu said to Mr. Kang. “Give her your strength.”
He could not disobey her. Her great eyes were fixed on him with stern power.He stepped forward caught her hands and looked into her eyes.
This alone could make her open her eyes. “You”, Madame Kang gasped. ”You – Father of my sons.”…..Madame Wu slipped her hands around the baby and Madame Kang screamed.
Mr.Kang burst into sweat……. ”If only you live now…I swear..swear..” “Swear – nothing.”, she gasped.”I am glad – your child.” “Children are nothing to me beside you.” He shouted.
“If you die I’ll hang myself.” “Then you – do - love me?”,she gasped.”heart of my heart”………………………..”all over.”,Madame Wu said.
“The child?”,Madame Kang asked. “The child is dead. You don’t need any children do you?” “Certainly not.”,Mr. Kang babbled.”No more children. I promise..I promise….”
“Let this child be the proff of what you have told.”,Madame Wu said.”Remember forever this weight(weight of the dead baby) in your arms……….” …………………
”Has she suffered each time like this she gave birth to a baby?”Mr.Kang asked. “Like what?”,Madame Wu pressed.
“Near to death – “ “Birth for any woman is always near to death.”
Then Madame Wu tells him a man never staysbeside his wife while parturition and so he doesn’t know all the pain she suffers and thus teaches him a listen.
The book is written in a very simple English. This book is very gripping. You might initially get scared that it is some family drama or something. But it is nothing of that sort. This book is an epitome of the various hallmarks of a Noble Prize winning author.
