No Name Woman

In class we just started reading Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts by Maxine Hong Kingston. So far in the first chapter, Maxine's mother has told Maxine a story about her aunt being pregnant, but the baby couldn't be the husband of the aunt's baby since the husband had been gone for years. When Maxine's aunt was about to give birth, the villagers raided her house. Maxine's mother hasn't ever told Maxine about this aunt until now. She didn't go into great detail about Maxine's aunt because she just wanted Maxine to know that she shouldn't become pregnant. If she ever did become pregnant before getting married, her family would forget about her just like how they forgot about Maxine's mysterious aunt. The rest of the chapter is about Maxine coming up with all of these different theories of how her aunt became pregnant. The main question we were supposed to think about while reading this section of the book was: What do we learn about Maxine by the way she imagines the rest of the story about her aunt?

One thing that we learn about Maxine is that she has a very wild imagination. We can see this because she comes up with so many different theories, and all of them are different from each other. Also we learn that she must care about looks because she mentions fashion and hair. One time when she mentions fashion is when she starts fabricating all of her different theories. "If I want to learn what clothes my aunt wore, whether flashy or ordinary." (Hong Kingston 6). What I don't understand is, why does she care what her aunt wore? It doesn't really change the story.

Also as I said she talks about her aunt's hair. One of her theories was that her aunt took a lot of time getting ready and her hair was beautiful compared to the other women, and thats why all the men liked her. "At the mirror my aunt combed individuality into her bob... She brushed her hair back from her forehead, tucking the flaps behind her ears. She looped a piece of thread, knotted into a circle between her index fingers and thumbs." (Hong Kingston 9). Just the way that Maxine can go into so much detail about something she is totally making up about her aunt is kind of bizarre. Also the grooming of her aunt's hair isn't even a significant part of her theories, but for some reason she goes into such precise details. This shows that Maxine has a very vivid imagination since she can go into such detail of something that she is totally making up.