The Distant Tree Falling Yangchun Character Analysis

Women played an important role in the history of China. According to Confucius beliefs, women were considered as educators, household managers and wives who were supposed to take care of the family as well as the state. The orthodox system of Confucianism also enforced the status of relationships arranged in order of rank. Even though this was compulsory between husband and wife, father, and son, and between a ruler and subject, a husband must also treat his wife with respect while the wife must obey her husband’s commands. However, now there are circumstances where women have become highly educated instead of putting their family issues first. Women’s modern transformation in China happened in the 19th Century after the Opium Wars. This was …show more content…
For example, in The Distant Tree Falling, Yangchun learns how to take control over her life and leaves her home. Yangchun’s father, Old Gui, had no son as his successor and his wife died after giving birth to his daughter, Yangchun. He only liked his apprentice, Qiaogiao, and wanted his apprentice to inherit his ink marker and ruler and take care of his daughter. Yangchun was a young woman who cooked three meals a day, took care of the household, learned knitting on her own because she did not have a mother to teach her. She was tired of the life she lived and rejects her father’s idea of marrying the apprentice. Therefore, she leaves home to find a job on her own. Yangchun did not like her father’s plan and the guy her father chose for her and she wanted to be independent therefore she chose to leave everything behind. In, The Dark Road, women were considered as property to their government and families. The government only allowed one child and therefore Meili had to abort her child. The government did not even give her a choice to keep her baby. She wanted her next child to be a son so he can carry on her husband’s name. Unfortunately, the government gave her a lot of disappointment and forced her to abort the baby. In the novel, The Dark Road, Meili also struggles to defend for her family while she wants to make a better life for herself. She was very poor and suffered but she realized she cannot always depend on her husband. Meili was a woman strictly deemed to be a wife and obey her husband but she also wanted to find a job to live up to her own dreams. She fights until she gets a job to provide for her family and gained more respect from her husband. Therefore, at the end of the novel, she worked hard and was successful to start a small shop of her own. These two women, Meili and Yangchun were