I just finished reading "Memoirs of a Geisha" by Arthur Golden. It took me 2 days to finish it because I couldn’t put it down. It’s really a good read, and I thought it was fascinating because I learned more about a different culture. I hope the movie won’t ruin the good impression I have of the novel. Since I took Literature in English for my SPM, I decided to use some of my… uhhmm… "English literary skills" to analyze the story. Yeah. I answered these questions by myself. TFNTD (Too Free Nothing To Do) lol. Ok. Here goes…
Synopsis (for those who haven’t read the book yet)
The strikingly pretty child of an impoverished fishing family, Chiyo is taken to faraway Kyoto and sold into slavery to a renowned geisha house where she is renamed Sayuri. Initially reluctant, Sayuri must finally invent and cultivate an image of herself as a desirable geisha in order to survive in Gion’s cruel hierarchy. Through her eyes, we are given a backstage view of the ancient and secretive geisha district, Gion, and of the lives of the women who learn and practice the rigorous arts of the geisha. Behind its facade of haunting beauty the district turns out to be a viciously competitive place where women vie desperately for men’s favor and largess, where a young girl’s virginity is auctioned off to the highest bidder, where personal trust is almost nonexistent, and where no woman can afford even to dream about love or happiness. A timeless pocket of the world, Gion cannot remain cut off from the bustle of the modern era forever. When Japan enters the Second World War, Gion’s isolation is finally breached and Sayuri must once again reinvent herself and her way of existence.
Clairine’s Q & A Session with Herself
1. Many people in the West think of geisha simply as prostitutes. After reading Memoirs of a Geisha, do you see the geisha of Gion as prostitutes? What are the similarities, and what are the differences? What is the difference between being a prostitute and being a "kept woman," as Sayuri puts it [p. 291]?
I still do see them as prostitutes but of a different kind. The similarities between actual prostitutes and geisha’s are that they receive money for sex or sexual favors. But geisha’s can be choosy and they are more trained in the "art of entertaining men" rather than just full-blown sex and nothing else. Geisha know how to dance and play the shamisen and various other instruments of entertainment whereas prostitutes don’t. Geisha are trained to have clever conversation and dress elaborately whereas prostitutes… well… don’t. Being a kept woman I perceive is a woman inconspicuously trying to hide that she is with a man for his money, hiding beneath all the elegance and jewellery that is seen on the outside. Whereas the difference between her and a prostitute isn’t that great after all the outer layer is stripped away. They both want men for money.
2. "The afternoon when I met Mr. Tanaka Ichiro," says Sayuri, "really was the best and the worst of my life" [p. 7]. Is Mr. Tanaka purely motivated by the money he will make from selling Chiyo to Mrs. Nitta, or is he also thinking of Chiyo’s future? Is he, as he implies in his letter, her friend?
Mr. Tanaka was probably not that motivated by money but more by his belief that he had made a wise decision by sending Sayuri away from Yoroido in what, he probably believed was a gateway of escape from poverty. He may have been in a small part motivated by money, but not purely. He was most likely just obsessed and impressed with the art of the geisha that he thought it would be the best future for Chiyo since she was already so naturally pretty. He is not her friend, but in a way he was trying to help her as a friend. However, friends should never make decisions for each other without consultation first, which in this case, never happened.
3. How does Sayuri’s status at the Nitta okiya resemble, or differ from, that of a slave? Is she in fact a slave?
Her status does indeed resemble a slave, as she has to do as she is told or risk getting beaten or thrown out. However, it differs from an actual slave because she is allowed to attend lessons and have some free time of her own. But in a sense, she is completely a slave, while waiting to be trained to become a geisha, since she is given no choice and no other option in her life except for that.
4. Do you see Sayuri as victimized by Nobu’s attentions, or do you feel pity for Nobu in his hopeless passion for Sayuri? Do you feel that, in finally showing her physical scorn for Nobu, Sayuri betrayed a friend, or that real friendship is impossible between a man and a woman of their respective stations?
I don’t see it that Sayuri is victimized by Nobu, rather I see it the other way round. I feel pity for Nobu because technically Sayuri has been the one leading him on and using him to spite Hatsumomo. Real friendship is possible, I believe, even between a high-ranking businessman and a first-class geisha. Real friendship is possible between anyone. But by showing her physical scorn for Nobu, Sayuri had betrayed him, and hurt him in such a horrible way that although it was not her intention to do so in the end, she should never have began the special friendship with him in the beginning.
5. How do Japanese ideas about eroticism and sexuality differ from Western ones? Does the Japanese ideal of femininity differ from ours? Which parts of the female body are fetishized in Japan, which in the West? The geisha’s ritual of preparing herself for the teahouse is a very elaborate affair; how essentially does it differ from a Western women’s preparation for a date?
Eroticism in a Japanese sense concentrates more on the mystery of being a woman. But the sexuality between Japanese and Western cultures are basically the same. Men only want to see what is beneath all the clothing. But eroticism in Japanese sense is such as geisha pouring tea only to reveal a small part of the inner wrist, which in the West would do absolutely nothing for a man. The Japanese ideal of femininity is different as those who are considered feminine are also obedient, polite, and conservative. In Japan, the neck is fetished while in the West, the legs are fetished. Essentially, a geisha’s preparations for a date differ from the West because a geisha has many robes to put on in hopes of tantalizing the man’s senses by realizing how many robes he has to go through to take off, however in the West it is more like, the less you wear the better, in order to waste less time taking off the clothes in that moment of passion.
6. Does the way in which the Kyoto men view geisha differ from the way they might view other women, women whom they might marry? What are the differences? How, in turn, do geisha view men? Is the geisha’s view of men significantly different from that of ordinary women?
Kyoto men view geisha differently, since they see geisha as objects of pleasure, entertainment, and beauty. Whereas they view women they might marry as women of integrity, loyalty, and possibly those who might elevate their social status in society. Although it may seem like geisha view men as a source of income, deep down the view of normal women and geisha of men are the same. They want those with money, the more the better, and those that can elevate their social status in society, the higher the better. Only a few exceptions will do it for love, it seems.
7. During Sayuri’s life, Japan goes through a series of traumas and unprecedented cultural change: the Great Depression, the War, the American Occupation. How do the inhabitants of Gion view political events in the outside world? How much effect do such events have upon their lives? How aware are they of mainstream Japanese culture and life?
The inhabitants of Gion are basically just shut off in their own little world of elegance, beauty, and entertainment. They do not have concerns for political events in the outside world unless it starts to affect them directly. The events do not have an effect on their lives because they do not see it. What they see are tea parties and endless entertainment for men with money because this is their only source of income. They are not that very well aware of mainstream Japanese culture and life because they have their own special culture of the geisha and are shut off in Gion that they do not see the true poverty and suffering lined up on the streets.
8. What personal qualities do Sayuri and Mameha have that make them able to survive and even prosper in spite of the many cruelties they have suffered? Why is Hatsumomo, for example, ultimately unable to survive in Gion?
Sayuri and Mameha have intelligence and think for the future. Hatsumomo may be calculative and intelligent in her own way, but she never thought of the future when she committed all her cruel deeds. In the end, she was not able to survive in Gion because no one would help her based on knowledge of her past wickedness, whereas Mameha and Sayuri had built a strong and good reputation from the very beginning with influential men and the mistresses of the top tea houses.
9. Is Sayuri the victim of a cruel and repressive system, a woman who can only survive by submitting to men? Or is she a tough, resourceful person who has not only survived but built a good life for herself with independence and even a certain amount of power?
Sayuri was a victim from the start of the cruel and repressive geisha system. She did submit to men, many times in her life. But she did find a way around the system, which makes her tough and resourceful. She played her cards well and ended up one of the most successful geisha in Gion by turning her circumstances around to become independent and with a certain amount of power over her life. She knew what she wanted from the very beginning - that motivation was what drove her to success.
10. Why might Golden have chosen to begin his narrative with a "Translator’s Note"? What does this device accomplish for him?
I think it accomplished a lot for him, because I thought I had been deceived, I honestly finished reading the whole book thinking that it was a true story! I admit it must sound really foolish of me but I didn’t realize that it was a complete work of fiction until I read the acknowledgments at the back. I read the whole book, imagining that those events were real, that sometime 70 years before, those things had really happened to a geisha named Nitta Sayuri. It was only after I finished reading the whole story that I found out it wasn’t true. But it was a great idea, to begin with a translator’s note. Really brilliant idea.
