M Butterfly Essay

351 Words2 Pages
M. Butterfly by David Henry Hwang generated implications regarding sexuality, race, and ethnicity; however, in my perspective the largest issue was gender. M. Butterfly was a fictional account of a French diplomat who had an affair with a “Chinese opera singer”, who was uncovered to be a man and an international spy. Through all this tension, the play juxtaposed Eastern and Western cultures. For example, Gallimard harbored the stereotype of Oriental women to be perceived as beautiful, passive, and unselfish.
As the play advanced, the threat that gender brought to Gallimard’s life progressed. At first, Gallimard was fooled to believe that Liling was a woman, through her stage performance in Puccini’s Madame Butterfly. Then, he returns to his