"Woman Warrior"

Paper Summary:

This paper reviews the book, "Woman Warrior," written by Maxine Hong Kingston. The paper examines how Kingston uses dream and fantasy to tell her story. The paper explains that, for Kingston, dreams and fantasies are equally as important as real-life narratives, which only provide a sliver of the truth and a partial rendering of a person's experiences. The paper contends that all people spend a considerable number of hours dreaming, and Kingston's approach to memoirs honors and respects this essential aspect of human existence. The paper explains that dreams mirror and reflect our psychic impressions of daily life, and they offer insight into our egos, alter-egos, hopes, and fears.

From the Paper:

""Night after night my mother would talk-story until we fell asleep. I couldn't tell where the stories left off and the dreams began, her voice the voice of heroines in my sleep," (19). Maxine Hong Kingston's surreal memoir Woman Warrior weaves between dream life and waking reality, especially in the two chapters "White Tigers" and "Shaman." In these two chapters of the book, Kingston includes the rich imagery, content, and themes of her dreams, nightmares, and fantasies to more clearly illustrate her mundane daily experiences as a Chinese immigrant in the United States. In many ways her dreams more accurately reflect her psychological development, dreams, and desires than her real-life narratives do."

More papers on "Woman Warrior":

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• Book Review # 105059 : "Maxine Hong Kingston's "The Woman Warrior"
• Book Review # 119803 : "Feminism in "The Woman Warrior"

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