Women of the Silk
by Gail Tsukiyama
List Price: $12.95
Pages: 211
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 0312144075
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
A first novel exceptional for its exquisite writing and for its rich portrait of a woman's life in a China now lost. Her story is rendered with exceptional grace, with the clear, shining dignity of legend or song; Tsukiyama lends her voice to figures of women emboldened by their dream of growth and personal power.
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1. One of Gail Tsukiyama's talents
is her ability to reveal a whole world and a culture though subtle details. This novel
opens with a very graphic scene, in which Pei's mother gives birth to yet another
daughter. How does this one scene introduce the dynamics in Pei's family-and thus a
Chinese family-to its audience? What details are important and what larger issues do they
signify?
2. The theme of the Chinese family
remains in the foreground of the novel throughout. Once Pei arrives at the girls' house
how does her own experience in her family compare to the other girls' experiences?
Mei-li's family, for example?
3. Once Pei arrives at the girls'
house she is struck by the fact that all the girls there look the same-same hairstyle,
same clothes. How does this homogeneity affect Pei? For example, examine the scene where Pei looks at herself in the mirror for the first time after being dressed like the others.
4. What are the dynamics between the
girls at the silk house? For example, how does Moi affect the girls? How do they regard
Chen-Li?
5. On page 90, Lin's mother is
described as having lost her "voice" after her husband's death. What
implications does this statement have? How does it relate, for example, to Pei's later
statement that her own family remained "silent"-meaning they never responded to Pei's letter, nor did they ever come to visit her.
6. Compare the hairdressing ceremony
with the wedding ceremony of Lin's brother. How are they similar or different, and what do
they symbolize?
7. What drives Pei to participate in
the hairdressing ceremony and join "the sisterhood?"
8. What does the ending scene, with
Pei leaving for a "new life" in Hong Kong, suggest? How does it affect the way
you view the novel and Pei's progress?
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"An engrossing richness of
detail."
—The New York Times Book Review
"Tsukiyama brings a fluid,
smooth elegance to the complicated story she tells."
—San Francisco Chronicle
"Tsukiyama's writing style has
a controlled flu- idity, that hints at explosive passions lurking beneath the surface....
A sensory experience."
—Los Angeles Japanese Daily
