China Diary Toni Onley Analysis

Toni Onley uses his 1988 “China diary” in various ways to construct himself as a kind of adventurer, artist and worldly figure. Jennifer Douglas in her text, “The Archiving “I”: A Closer Look in the Archives of Writers” argues that the real or historical versions of authors like Onley, are “unknown and unknowable” to the researcher (54). Rather Onley acts “the narrating I”, and decides what is included in his text, and construct the “narrated I” (54-55). The “narrated I” is the representation of Onley shown in the journal, that he wishes to share with an audience in his diary. Onley ultimately “creates a version of [himself] that exists only in the text” (55). Even though Onley is writing in a personal journal, there is evidence that suggests …show more content…
Beattie argues that, private journals do not have an intended audience and tend to be “relatively brief dated entries that include similar information day after day” and they offer little personal opinion (Beattie 91). Furthermore she argues that, “private diaries often lack enough detail to make them understandable to a reader unfamiliar with their context” (92). Firstly, Onley’s journal entries are not brief, and because Onley is travelling each entry differs from the next. For instance Onley’s March 8th 1988 journal entry takes up almost six pages of the journal. This entry includes real place names and people, and begins with Onley entering Shinyan (Onley 41-46). It covers Onley in several activities, such as climbing Mt Wudang, visiting numerous cultural sites, including the South Crag Palace, and Onley even describes an incident with some train tickets (41-46). During the train ticket encounter there was a mix up with Onley’s group’s tickets and the conductress was not particularly helpful. Onley argued that the conductress was an “extreme example of indifference the foreigner encounters when encountering anyone behind a counter. They are employees of the state, and are paid, if they serve you or not” (45-46). In this description, Onley highlights his negative views towards both the unhelpful woman and communism. Onley statement indicates that he thinks communist employees do not work hard enough for their wages. With these points in mind, Onley’s opinions, actions and locations are recognizable to the reader. Therefore, Onley’s journal was likely not intended to be private. Rather Onley’s journal aligns more with Beattie’s description of a public journal, as a “record of the writer's reactions to the world around [him]”(92). With this in mind, Onley’s 1988 “China Diary” was to meant be