M+Butterfly

__**Summary**:__ M. Butterfly is a short play that takes place in a Paris prison in the present and in recall during the years 1960-1970 in Beijing, and from 1966 to the present in Paris. The main characters in this play is Rene Gallimard and Song Liling. Rene Gallimard was a French diplomat who had an affair with Song Liling a Chinese opera singer for twenty years, who eventually turns out to be a man. Song is a Communist agent who is gaining information about the Vietnam War. While things don't go in Gaillimards favor with East-West relations he is sent back to France. Years later, Communist send Liling to France to finish his affair with Gallimard. Eventually, Gallimard is caught and tried for infiltration they reveal Song is a man to everyone in the court room. He stands to the side and removes his makeup, wig and kimono and changes into men clothes. At the end Gallimard and Song change roles, Gallimard becomes the submissive feminine figure and Song becomes the dominant masculine figure still asking Gallimard to love him. The play ends with Gallimard choosing an honorable death over a dishonorable death, he then becomes the "butterfly" dressing up in Liling's wig, kimono and makeup and taking his own life.
 * M. Butterfly**

__**Topics:**__ There are many different topics and themes from this play, most which are cruel. The main topics that stood out to me are love, betrayal, manipulation, power, reality and fantasy.

I really enjoyed this story much more than I though I was going to. The beginning started out slow and was hard to follow at times but as the story went on and I was given more information it started to come together much more. I loved how you felt as if you were there the whole time with Gallimard and watching him fall in love with Song as well as her falling in love with him. The transition from finding out who Songs was, was amazing and it was very smooth. It didn't happen to fast or to slow it was perfect. I felt as if I was sitting there in the court room when we found out the truth about everything and as Song was trying to get Gallimard to take her back even as man. I thought this play was amazing and plot and twists were even better.
 * __Evaluation:__**

= Wiki Part 2: =
 * Resources-**

Internet Data Base: Information about [|David Henry Hwang]
This site, by Ed.Steven G. Kellman, is very useful because it gives bibliographic information on David Hwang. It gives all information that anyone could ever want on his as an author as well as before. There are more than one bibliography's about David on this website so that you are able to compare and contrast what they all say. That has to be the best thing about this website because it is a one stop shop.

"Biography" __Masterpieces of American Literature __ Ed. Steven G. Kellman. eNotes.com, Inc. 2006 __eNotes.com __ 1 Apr, 2015 

Database: [|Interview with author]
The author of M.Butterfly had done an interview about this play with John Louis DiGaetani in New York September 1988, this interview was also part of a book. This interview helps us understand the meaning and reasoning behind the play. Hwang starts the interview with saying that him writting this play was a way to help him deal with the ideas and assumptions of orientalistism that was going on around that time. John Louis tells him that he feels that his play is "a kind of rascim mixed with sexism", Hwang agrees. This interview takes the meaning and the perception of this play to a while other level, you are able to hear it from the author up front very cut and dry.

David Henry Hwang and John Louis DiGaetani TDR (1988-) Vol. 33, No. 3 (Autumn, 1989), pp. 141-153 Published by: The MIT Press