A Key to the Cage

Narrator’s Sheepskin Coat:

“I decided I would write directly onto the inside of my sheepskin coat… I copied out the chapter where Ursule somnambulates. I longed to be like her: to be able, while I lay asleep, to see what my mother was doing … Better still, like Ursule, I would visit, in my dreams, places I had never set eyes on before…” (58).

“After I had read the passage from Balzac to her word for word, he explained, “‘she took your coat and reread the whole thing, in silence. When she’d finish reading she sat there quite still, open-mouthed. Your coat was resting on the flat of her hands, the way a sacred object lies in the palms of the pious. “‘He touched the head of this mountain girl with an invisible finger, and she was transformed,carried away in a dream.It took a while for her to come down to earth. She ended up putting your wretched coat on.She said having Balzac’s words next to her skin made her feel good, and also more intelligent" (62).  

Four-Eyes’ Suitcase:

“So I could ask him what sort of treasure he had so securely hidden away in his secret cache” (49).

“We crept up to the suitcase. It was tied with a thick rope of plaited straw, knotted crosswise. We removed the rope and raised the lid in silence. Inside, piles of books shone in the light of our torch: a company of great Western writers welcomed us with open arms. On top was our friend Balzac, with five or six novels” (99).

Main Idea/Summary of the Two Symbols relating to a Novel Topic:

In the book Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, the locked suitcase full of books and the sheepskin coat represent Luo and the narrator’s journey to intellectual liberty during their re-education. The boys view the suitcase as a cage which locks their knowledge away and prevents them from learning. Once they get exposure to free thinking from the Balzac book, they want to experience the ability to think for themselves again. This makes the suitcase turn into their cage, because it denies them of the additional knowledge they want to gain. Eventually, the boys will do anything to break the cage open, which is for them stealing the suitcase from Four-Eyes. They succeed, allowing them a whole stash of books which gives them the knowledge they were craving. During the time that the knowledge is locked in the cage (when the books are in the suitcase), the narrator is desperate to feel close to this knowledge again. His sheepskin coat is the solution- he can feel close to the works and his intellectual freedom again when he writes the passage inside the coat. This allows him to remember the passages even when the book is gone, as well as feeling close to the books and reminding him to think freely despite this being something Mao looks down on. Overall, the books inside the suitcase represent the only knowledge the boys have access to up high on the mountain. The suitcase denies their ability to continue thinking freely, and to maintain this intellectual liberty, they turn to the writings inside the sheepskin coat for that access.

A Tang of Salt

"He took the chopsticks, picked up the pebble from the dish and slowly dipped it in the sauce as if performing a ritual. then he raised the pebble to his lips and sucked it with relish"(72).

"It's a remedy against cowardice. To gain courage, you must swallow it when it's still lukewarm and frothy... When he finished he sucked his fingers one by one, to make sure not a drop was wasted"(94).

Analysis:

Sijie uses the symbols of the jade dumplings and the buffalo’s blood to emphasize the hardships one faces while coming of age. Many aspects of one’s coming of age are rooted in relishing the little things in life and not taking gifts for granted. This is shown in the deep enjoyment and “relishing” the old man takes when simply dipping rocks into salty water. This intervenes with the idea of coming of age, because it shows that as one gets older they are faced with harder situations and more difficult tasks, yet they must remain grateful for the simple pleasures to be enjoyed. Like the jade dumplings, Four-Eyes choice of drinking the cure for cowardice shows a peak in the process of coming of age. Four-Eyes chooses to drink the bufallo blood in order to “cure himself from cowardice”. This is a choice made towards the goal of developing into an adult. Coming of age has everything to do with evaluating your personal self. By admitting his cowardice, Four-Eyes is growing and maturing. Drinking the buffalo blood shows that he is ready for change and is actually forces it upon himself. Using the blood as a “cure”, he believes that he will cure himself of cowardice, and subsequently his boyhood. Therefore, he is beginning to walk down the path of a developing adult.

Secret Symbols

Secret Symbols

Sijie uses the symbols of the alarm clock and the sheepskin coat to represent Luo and the narrator’s expression of intellectual liberty. The alarm clock symbolizes the two boys’ intellectual superiority that allowed them to have more control over their situation. The sheepskin coat represents their hunger for knowledge and the curiosity they have once they have been exposed to Western literature. They both represent a form of rebellion against the barriers that had been put up around them. Manipulating the clock allows them to get more rest and take advantage of the headman. Writing on the sheepskin coat would definitely be considered reactionary, but their determination to learn outweighs their fear of the possible consequences for their actions.

Quotes

“After that historic morning we got into the habit of re-adjusting the time on the alarm clock” (15).

“In the end we had changed the position of the hands so many times that we had no idea what the time really was” (15).

Quotes

“It was the first time in my life that I had felt any desire to copy sentences from a book” (58).

“This fellow Balzac is a wizard … He touched the head of this mountain girl .. and she was transformed … She ended up putting on your wretched coat … She said having Balzac’s words next to her skin made her feel good, and also more intelligent.” (62)

Dissecting Loss

Dissecting Loss

Violin
   "'It's a toy,' said the headman solemnly.
     This verdict left us speechless. Luo and I exchanged furtive, anxious glances. Things were not looking good" (4).

"All music by Mozart or indeed by any other Western composer had been banned years ago. In my sodden shoes my feet turned to ice. I shivered as the cold tightened its grip on me" (5).





Alarm Clock
"Throughout the years of our re-education the house on stilts remained almost entirely unfurnished. There was not even a table or chair...Nonetheless, our home soon became the focal point of the village, thanks to another phoenix, a smaller version, miniature almost, and rather more earthbound, whose master was my friend Luo" (13).

"It was a tiny clock, and it was no doubt thanks to its size that it had escaped the notice of the village headman when we arrived. It fitted in the palm of your hand, and tinkled prettily when the alarm went off" (13-14).




     Sijie uses the symbols of the violin and the alarm clock to illustrate the idea of loss in the book, Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress. During the story, it is evident to the reader that Luo and the narrator have very few personal items to remind them of home. Because of the Cultural Revolution, most of their belongings have been confiscated because they are labeled as "Reactionary Items". The violin represents their old life in the city and the luxuries they were fortunate enough to have before they were all ripped from their grasp. In the new town they are living in, Luo and the narrator have close to nothing to furnish their make-shift home. The alarm clock acts as a similar symbol to the violin in the way that it is the one item that connects this new lifestyle to their old home. Although these objects are not physically lost, both items are used to remind the main characters of what they have lost.

Broken Spectacles, Broken Buffalo

Buffalo

Main Ideas/ Argument

The buffalo in the books is a symbol representing Four-Eyes depriving his “friends” of their intellectual liberty. When the buffalo is present, Four- Eyes’ true influence over Luo and the narrator is revealed. We constantly see that Four- Eyes’ has something that makes him more powerful than the other boys. The first time we see the buffalo, Four- Eyes’ glasses break and it is revealed that he holds a object of influence and power: the books. The next time we see the buffalo, it is when Four- Eyes is leaving the village. We see that when the buffalo is present, Four- Eyes gains power over his friends because of the intellectual liberty he holds. This means that the buffalo is a symbol of the fact that intellectual liberty is power.

Quotes

“The buffalo was still alive. I will never forget how affected I was by its long drawn-out, plaintive blows. Under normal circumstances the bellow of a buffalo is disagreeably harsh, but on this calm late summer’s day the sound echoing through the rocky mountains was imposing and sonorous, like the roaring of a lion in a cage.” (93)

“The poetess was nowhere to be seen. What would she have thought if she had been there with us to watch her son bury his face in his cupped hands and slurp the clotted buffalo blood, like a swine rooting in the mire? When he had finished he sucked his fingers one by one, to make sure not a drop was wasted. As he made his way up the steep incline I noted he was still smacking his lips to prolong the taste.” (94)

“They sat side by side, hunched over the bamboo-leaf hat filled with buffalo blood.

“What are they doing down there?” I asked the man standing next to me. “They’re waiting for the blood to congeal,” he replied. “It’s a remedy against cowardice. To gain courage, you must swallow it when it’s still lukewarm and frothy” (93-94).

Four-Eyes’ Glasses

Main Ideas/ Arguments

Four-Eyes’ glasses represent the coming of age during this novel. We can see that as the boys come of age as they begin to be motivated by their loss, rather than simply sulk about it. As soon as we see that Four-Eyes loses something, the boys begin to manipulate each other in order to get what they want: intellectual liberty. We can also observe the fact that as the boys come of age their motives become more clear and they have more to lose and gain.

The loss of Four-Eyes’ glasses could also represent him losing his humility and revealing his true nature. At first, when Four-Eyes’ glasses fall and he begins to search for them, the narrator immediately enters the area intent on assisting Four-Eyes. However, the narrator describes, “Four-Eyes was not eager for me to help search for his spectacles, fearing that I would be a hindrance,” which reveals a great deal about Four-Eyes’ character. His wanting to search by himself and not have the help of others shows that he is solely focused on himself, and he does not want others to get in the way of him being able to eventually go back to the city. After the narrator unintentionally steps on Four-Eyes glasses, he states, “Fortunately they were still in one piece,” which shows how the narrator had truly had good intentions and it glad that he did not make Four-Eyes’ life more difficult by causing his glasses to be even more destroyed.

Four Eyes’ glasses also end up showing the power he has. While the narrator and Luo are unable to contact their families, Four-Eyes has been able to write to his mother, who is sending him new glasses. This shows that he has more power in their community than the narrator and Luo have because while the narrator and Luo only have each other to rely on for support in their harsh situation, Four-Eyes is able to have support from his mother back at home which gives him an advantage in the situation.

Quotes

“I took off my shoes, rolled up my trousers and stepped into the paddy field, leaving Luo seated by the wayside. Four-Eyes was not eager for me to help search for his spectacles, fearing that I would be a hindrance, but in the end it was I who stepped on them inadvertently as I groped in the mud. Fortunately they were still in one piece.” (47)

“I’ve written to my mother. She’s going to send me a new pair as soon as possible, but I can’t sit and do nothing until they arrive. I’ve got to work, that’s what I’m here for. At least that’s what the headman says.” (53)

The High Brow

The High Brow
In Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, the narrator’s coat and Four-Eyes glasses are used to symbolize perspective and intellectual liberty. The glasses are a symbol for perspective. When you look through glasses you see things in a new way. The characters all have different views on other characters and to justify the motives of characters requires you to see through different peoples “glasses.” To Four-Eyes the boys are mischievous, manipulative kids who can’t be trusted. Yet, for the narrator Four-Eyes is a selfish man who has succumbed to the communist control. The many different perspectives make this story interesting so it is quite important to look through different perspectives to see why the characters do certain things and how that might benefit them.

The narrator’s coat is the only outlet the narrator has to cherish and connect more to Balzac’s words, as shown in the quote, “It was the first time in my life that I had felt any desire to copy sentences from a book. I ransacked the room for paper, but all I could find was a few sheets of notepaper intended for letters to our parents. I decided I would write directly onto the inside of my sheepskin coat,” (58). Being able to have such a focus on the text allows him to see new perspectives. He can now identify with the author’s perspective, as well as seeing how people who don’t live in China may think. The jacket is his way of connecting and being closer to the words. It also touches on the severity of which intellectual liberty was banned, that he’s secretly writing banned words from a banned book on the hidden inside of a jacket. He has become so desperate to bask in the knowledge from the book that he has gone to the extreme of writing in his jacket. Intellectual liberty was harshly limited, and that can be seen in how desperately and committed he was writing, “By the time I had covered the entire inside of the jacket, including the sleeves, my fingers were aching so badly it felt as if the bones were broken,” (59).

“Luo and I set out at once to visit Four-Eyes. We had heard about his stroke of bad luck: as was bound to happen, the lenses of his spectacles had been broken. I was sure however, that he wouldn’t allow this mishap to interfere with his work, in case his myopia was taken as a sign of physically deficiency by the revolutionary peasants and they thought he was a slacker” (52)  

“‘Without your glasses you won’t be able to manage that mountain path...I’ve got an idea: we’ll help you carry your hod to the rice station, and when we get back you can lend us some of those books you’ve got hidden in your suitcase. How’s that for a deal’” (53)

“By the time I had covered the entire inside of the jacket, including the sleeves, my fingers were aching so badly it felt as if the bones were broken” (59).

“It was the first time in my life that I had felt any desire to copy sentences from a book. I ransacked the room for paper, but all I could find was a few sheets of notepaper intended for letters to our parents. I decided I would write directly onto the inside of my sheepskin coat” (58).

"Movie"ing Towards Responsibility: A Coming of Age "Tail"

"Movie"ing Towards Responsibility: A Coming of Age "Tail"

Buffalo: coming of age

“... We spotted Four-Eyes crouching by the inert mass of the dead buffalo: he was collecting the blood pouring from the gash in a big upturned hat woven of bamboo leaves” (93).

“‘To gain courage, you must swallow it when it’s still lukewarm and frothy”’ (94).

Movies: coming of age

“The local girls were gorgeous, but we forced ourselves to concentrate on the screen, paying close attention to the dialogue, to the actors’ costumes and gestures, to the setting of every scene, even to the music” (19).

“The headman sat in the middle of the front row, holding his long bamboo pipe in one hand and our ‘phoenix of the earth’ in the other, to time the duration of our performance” (19).

Sijie uses the symbols of the buffalo and the movies to illustrate how the narrator and his peers experience adolescence and coming-of-age during their re-education. The buffalo that broke Four-Eyes’s glasses is slaughtered for his leaving ceremony. This ceremony is to celebrate the completion of Four-Eyes’s re-education, which is part of him growing up and fitting in with the rest of the new proletarian society. The headman of Four-Eyes’s village encourages him to drink the buffalo blood to symbolize him gaining courage, leaving behind his childish cowardice and bourgeois ways.  

At the movies, even though the narrator and Luo are distracted, they acknowledge that as they become older, their responsibilities hold more weight and. This causes them to be very attentive during the movie even though there are a lot of other distractions.This demonstrates the maturity that they have gained during their re-education.

Thinking on Fuzz

In Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, the author, Dai Sijie, uses the symbolism of the narrator’s sheepskin coat and Balzac’s book in order to exemplify the effects of the restrictions of intellectual liberty on adolescents.

Balzac Book

“The magic of translation! The ponderousness of the two syllables as well as the belligerent, somewhat old-fashioned ring of the name were quite gone” (56).

This quote suggests the limitation of western influence in China and also illustrates an analogy to how the Cultural Revolution deprived Chinese people of refined culture and intellectual liberty. When the narrator is in awe at the “magic of translation,” he hints that translation of Balzac’s French name into Chinese drastically changes the sound and the feel of the name. When he follows up by saying that the “ponderousness” and the “old-fashioned ring” of the name were “quite gone,” he suggests that the Chinese translation strips away much of the essence of Balzac’s name. One can infer that Mao’s regime accomplishes something similar by censoring and altering intellectual materials such as literature, music, and art that comes from Western cultures. This drastic alteration alludes to the fact that the Cultural Revolution took over people’s lives and stripped them of their intellectual liberty through the teaching of revolutionary propaganda and the limitation of outside influence on Chinese thinking.

“Picture, if you will, a boy of nineteen, still slumbering in the limbo of adolescence, having heard nothing but revolutionary blather about patriotism, communism, ideology and propaganda all his life, falling headlong into a story of awakening desire, passion, impulsive action, love, of all the subjects had, until then, been hidden from me” (57).

The lack of intellectual liberty during the cultural revolution greatly affects the adolescent youth. As one of many victims of resettlement, these teens are sent to the mountains to have all signs of western development wiped from their knowledge. While under the rule of Mao, the entire community of China is responsible to surrendering anything bourgeois to Mao’s communist views. However, with the great impact of western influences in only first edition of Balzac’s literature, it can only be inferred that with more reading, Luo and the Narrator are bound to resist their re-education even more. Luo and the Narrator’s growing thirst for outside knowledge can only seem to lead them into mischievous activities, getting them in trouble with the headmaster of the village while they could possibly watch their chance of going home dissipate.

Narrator’s Sheepskin Coat

“‘When she’d finished reading she sat there quite still, open-mouthed. Your coat was resting on the flat of her hands, the way a sacred object lies in the palms of the pious’” (62).

This passage compares the sheepskin coat to a holy object. The author is suggesting that the words written on the coat are “holy” and carry a special weight to them. This shows the power of ideas and how the right ideas can sway people’s opinions dramatically. Despite their lifetimes of communist propaganda, Luo, the narrator, and the Little Seamstress are all quickly enraptured by the western ideas inside of Balzac’s book. This quote shows that despite bad odds, intellectual liberty will always be able to break through.

“‘She ended up putting your wretched coat on (which looked very good on her, I must say). She said having Balzac’s words next to her skin made her feel good, and also more intelligent’” (62).

This quote shows that the sheepskin is an important object that relates to intellectual liberty. The narrator writes his favorite quotes and passages on the coat in case that the never get their hands on the book again after returning to Four Eyes. This shows that they really embrace Western literature. They are awed by the power of words, and their imagination expands drastically. From reading the book, they learn more about the outside world. Even though their life is about communism, they are still captured by the words of Western literature. This shows that just by reading and being surrounded by words itself makes them feel more exposed to the outside world and more intelligent.

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Balzac Symbolism Project

Arushi Lakhan-Pal

Priya Dixit

Drew Guggeis

Kelly Tan

Sophia Hwang

Balzac Symbolism Project

Loss: Ticks Away

Symbol: Rooster Alarm Clock

“We were surprised to see how the alarm clock seized the imagination of the peasants. It became an object of veneration, almost. Everyone came to consult the clock, as though our house on stilts was a temple”(14).

“In the end we had changed the position of the hands so many times that we had no idea what the time really was” (15).

The symbol of the alarm clock illustrates the theme of loss through its usage and perception throughout the novel. Luo and the narrator keep the the alarm clock and manipulate the time in order to keep any amount of power they can over their own lives despite the losses they have faced. The alarm clock is one of the few last links to their past, and is used as a coping mechanism for the difficulties they must face.

Symbol: Lice

“I had a vision of my body as a rallying ground for armies of lice, all thrilled at the change of diet, ravenous for the delights offered by my poor veins” (71).

“It was not hard to imagine the scene : the bug-infested bed upon which Four-Eyes lay, fighting to stay awake in case the old man happened to sign snatches of sincere, authentic folk songs in his sleep, while the lice swarmed out of their hiding places to attack in the dark, sucking his blood skating on the slippery lenses of his spectacles, which he hadn’t removed for the night” (65).

The recurring motif of the lice represents the gnawing and draining effect of loss on the main characters and their companions. After enduring the hardships of the mountain village, the parasitic lice represent the sapping effect of re-education and the attendant sense of loss. The omnipresent lice exacerbate their situation in life, injuring them and needling them. Just as the lice are reduced to draining the blood of Luo, Four Eyes, and the narrator, they are forced to make the most situation by any means necessary.

Restrained Wisdom

Thesis Statement: Sijie uses the symbols of “jade dumplings” and the “suitcase” to illustrate how there was almost no intellectual liberty in the time of the Cultural Revolution, downgrading intellectuals to peasants, who in contrast, lived a very simple lifestyle completely unaffected by the Revolution. The peasants lived in a life of poverty, which is exemplified by the miller’s love of jade dumplings, or rocks in saltwater. The burgoise class had their intellectual liberty seriously restricted by the Cultural Revolution and most of the bergoise class was desperate to maintain their intellectual liberty, which is evident in the boys’ desperation to hide and obtain the suitcase and its contents.

Pg 72 - Jade dumplings

“He took his chopsticks, picked up a pebble from the dish and slowly dipped it in the sauce as if perfoming a ritual. Then he raised the pebble to his lips and sucked it with relish” (72).  

“‘Pebbles!... He dips them in salty water, puts them in his mouth, rolls them around and spits them out again. He says the dish is called ‘jade dumplings with miller sauce’” (64).

This represents how intellectual liberty, or lack therof, can be interpreted differently based on one’s social class. This showed how simple the Old Miller’s lifestyle was. He thinks it is a speciality to offer his infamous “jade dumplings” to guests. He is virtually unaffected by the Cultural Revolution. The lives of those living in the cities is very different from the peasants in the village. Luo and the narrator are disgusted at the fact of sucking a “pebble” which was “dipped in the sauce”.  However, the boys realize that they have to respect the Old Miller’s ways, thus joining him in his special meal. Their reactions were quick and well thought out, being polite to the Old Miller’s offer of jade dumplings, showing how they were growing up. Also, they are shown the real world outside of the cities.  They are shockingly shown the poverty that most peasants live in, and realize just how different the two worlds are.

Pg 49 - suitcase

“‘I expect they’re books,’ he said. ‘The way you keep your suitcase locked up and hidden away is enough to betray your secret: you’ve got a stash of forbidden books’”(49).

“Inside, piles of books shone in the light of our torch: a company of great Western writers welcomed us with open arms” (99).

This quote showed how there was limited intellectual liberty. Four Eyes was acting as a symbol of the cultural revolution, changing authentic mountain songs to become pro-revolutionary poems and hiding “forbidden books” in a suitcase. The government burned books that contradicted Mao’s beliefs. Books are a great collection of perspectives and information. By confiscating them, people are not open to new ideas and become close-minded. Without any books to read, excluding the ones Mao wrote himself, people have no freedom of expression and are made to obey Mao’s ways, whether they agree with them or not. The fact that Four Eyes was keeping banned books in his suitcase illustrates how intellectual liberty was “locked up” during the Cultural Revolution and educated people tried to sneak bourgeois items, representing their knowledge, into their relocated settlement.

The only way to feel accepted is being accepted by yourself

Being who you are will not make you a burden

Don’t listen to the words of others

Don’t listen to the magazines

Don’t listen to anyone but yourself

Once you are content with who you are

You will be able to be content with others

Although before that may occur,

You must always have good intent for yourself and the outside 

Perspective poem

Do we really think we’re the best

That we’re all powerful standing over others

Do you think that your answer is better than another's

Do you think that your ideas are better than others

Do you think that the way you see things

Are better than someone else’s

The way you think is better than someone else

Well we’re not the best

People who start at the bottom can still make their way up

People don’t need to stand on top of others

We will stand with othe

All our ideas can be essential and helpful

Yours answers may be as good as the common man

The way that we see things may be different

Yets we all look in the same direction

Towards the future

It’s all about our perspective

Yin and Yang

The yin and the yang

The light and the dark

The sun and the moon

The Tao creates balance between all

And to learn you must become unbalanced

to appreciate the new

To progress, you must first reach your lowest point

And learn your own goals,

And then strive up from that

The Lessons on Goals

The Lessons on Goals

How does one complete a task?

Finishing a task is not enough,

The true lesson is in how you achieved that goal.

What is achieving a goal?

Is it doing all that is required

And then stopping?

Is it doing your best

And accepting the result?

No.

It is so much more than that.

Achieving a goal is like growing from a child to an adult.

It is a caterpillar becoming a butterfly.

It is a seed becoming a mighty tree.

This is the lesson of achieving a goal.
What you can gain and what you can learn from the task

is the only true purpose of accomplishing a goal.