Answer TWO of the following...
Q1: Bao is attempting to
save China
Q2: What lesson is Bao
forced to learn about the “secondary devils” during his crusade? Why does this
make it much more difficult to save China
Q3: The novel introduces
the very Chinese concept (discussed in ancient works such as the Tao te
Ching) of the Yin and Yang, the male and female principles of the universe.
What do various characters say about this force, and how does it affect Bao’s
relationship with Mei-Wei?
Q4: What do you make of
the name the rebellion takes, “The Society of the Righteous and Harmonious
Fist”? Can an armed revolution be both “righteous” and “harmonious?” Can you
follow romantic ideals with the edge of a sword? Can terrorists enforce a rigid
morality without doing evil themselves? Where do we see this tested in the book?
Q1: Bao seems to define being a hero as doing the right thing, while the first Emperor defines it as doing whatever needs to be done to take care of China. The Emperor seems more like a villain to me then the Christians. The Emperor throws all of the edicts that Bao uses, and thus changes how Bao sees what he needs to do. He makes Bao more heartless, forcing him in a way to do what he wants.
ReplyDeleteQ2: Bao learns that the secondary devils do not just contain men, that women and children also are involved. This message is enforced with the killing of his brother by a child. It makes it harder for him to save China because he does not want to kill the innocent, he wants to save the weak.
Q1: The emperor seems to define heroism as finding a cause and completely sticking to that cause, no matter what is in your way. He believes each individual, no matter if it is women and children, is a terrorist to the country of China if they are a Christian. Bao first starts out as being the hero who kills only the strong and dangerous but spares the weak. After being influenced by the emperor, he no longer spared anyone of the Christian beliefs because they were a threat to the Chinese people. In my opinion, Bao becomes less heroic by not forgiving the weak.
ReplyDeleteQ3: Red Lantern explains to Bao on page 58 that he must be careful because it is said that men can be polluted by a woman's Yin. Bao remembers this when they meet Mei-wen and his brother is so obviously attracted to Mei-wen and convinces Bao to stay in the village. Bao then becomes awestruck with Mei-wen and keeps the army in the village too long where they are found by the Imperial Army. Bao most obviously falls for Mei-wen when she begins to talk to him about operas.
Q1: The First Emperor of China was a despot. He united his country through war and force, denying any thought that was perpendicular to his own. He killed his own father for the “good of China”. The man-turned god has no qualms about crushing any and all that get in the way of what he believes is right for China. He even says that the words he utters “define good and evil” (210). He’s hardened by the life he was thrown into, and he believes that he is the final word on what is moral and what isn’t. Since he worked so hard to make China whole, he believes the most important thing is to keep it together. And he forces Bao to accomplish this at any cost. He questions Bao’s honor, his integrity, his own loyalty to his father to shame and warp Bao into the tool he requires for the task.
ReplyDeleteQ4: From a poetic stance, the entire rebellion is romantic. Mankind has always romanticized war and fighting for what you believe is right, even to the death, even to the end of all things. Bao is fighting for the righteousness of the gods of China, and he’s fighting to bring harmony back to his country. The fact that it requires force is completely separate from the ideals of righteousness and harmony. And from any person’s point of view, once you’ve reached the point of violence, everything is justified. Many of the people who commit acts of terror in our world today do so because they believe that it is the only way to unify the world and bring it to harmony. Just like Bao, they’re committing heinous acts of violence against other human beings because they believe that the evils the devils are practicing are worse than anything The Society of the Righteous and Harmonious Fist could do to them. The Society is freeing them from the devil’s control. Which (i’m assuming) is the same thing that many religious terrorists are attempting to do today.
Q1: Bao's idea of heroism is initially very romanticized due to the operas he watched. As time passed and he was faced with more decisions, he followed a path of doing what he believed was right. The first emperor, however, considered heroism to be protecting china. He was much more centered to taking care of everyone and everything that he considered to be true to his idea of China. This was a huge contrast to Bao's idea of doing what was right, even for individual's. The emperor ended up being very persuasive and convinced Bao to do thing's that he initially didn't believe were right.
ReplyDeleteQ2: Bao learns that there are men, women, and children that are not foreigners, but still follow the beliefs of the foreigners. This, especially the fact that it included innocents, women and children, caused great conflict for Bao, who believed in protecting the weak. He wanted to kill all those who were in league with the foreigners, but he didn't want to harm those who fall in with those he seeks to protect.
This is Amanda Kramer, it didn't let me use my name. I tried.
DeleteQ1: Bao has to deal with the fact that the First Emperor of China wants him to completely wipe out any trace of anything that isn’t Chinese in China. This leads to Bao ironically becoming what he hated most, somebody who ignores the cultures of others to place their own culture onto them. When Bao spares the women and children aboard the train, the Emperor scolds him for doing so, claiming that anything that isn’t Chinese cannot coexist with China. It could be said that Bao becomes more heroic in taking up the mantle of eliminating all of the “Devils” AND “Secondary Devils”, however, only if you were looking from the perspective that the Chinese are completely on the moral high ground here. Both sides of the conflict refuse to look at the other’s view, and that leads to a conflict where both sides are at fault for the same crime.
ReplyDeleteQ3: Yin and Yang seem to have a relationship that most of the characters in this book seem to want to avoid if it isn’t what they are supposed to have. The white soldiers are said to do terrible things because they are soldiers of Yin, instead of Yang. This makes it sound to the Chinese soldiers that they are manlier, and perhaps, more fitting to be good and rule justly. I think that it is interesting that it was decided to use such sexism as a backing point for the conflict, as it helps to further cement that the Bao and his rebellion are getting more and more “evil” as the conflict progresses.
Q2: At the beginning of his quest, Bao believed in a very strict moral code in which the Chinese people were the good guys and the foreign "devils" were the root of corruption and evil. He later starts to realize that these "secondary devils" also include his own people, largely innocents. This revelation forces Bao to forego all of his moral reservations in order to fulfill his vision of a China restored to its old ways. This sort of abandonment of morality is the kind of thing Akutagawa liked to comment on. In O-Gin, the protagonist abandons her religious beliefs in order to honor her parents.
ReplyDeleteQ3: Bao originally seems to encourage a balance between male and female forces. This is evident when he allows Mei-Wei to learn kung-fu and when he christens the Red Lanterns and encourages them to fight alongside the Society. The magistrate, Lu Pai, insists that the female "yin" force is an evil source of power used by the foreigners. This belief eventually forms a rift between Bao and Mei-Wei, because Bao is pressured to go along with Lu Pai's lies, most likely to fool himself and his followers into believing their actions are just.
Q1: The emperor seems to live with absolute. That if you are not with him, then you are against him. This is what he wants Bao to live by. He tells Bao that he must kill everyone that is a foreign devils. This is very difficult for Bao to do, he has Lu Pai to tell him the lies for him to burn the church. To me it makes Bao less heroic, by killing innocent people. By not showing mercy to children, how can he be a hero?
ReplyDeleteQ3: By getting involved with a women, it can be easily confuse of what Bao needs to do and what Bao wants to do selfishly. So Bao understood that and he didn't want to put his men's lives at risk, just so he can be with Mei-Wei. Which is a very unselfish act, in my opinion.