Hwang's M. Butterfly Clip 1

Hwang's M. Butterfly Clip 2

Themes Portrayed in the Play

Hwang's works do not simply elaborate these poststructuralist moves; each addresses a specific historical context: M. Butterfly interprets the Vietnam era through the metaphor of the gay male body, while Golden Gate dramatizes McCarthyism in terms of Asian American masculinity and homosocial desire. These works criticize the sexual and ethical construction of Western masculinity through the deviance of two white principals who challenge the cultural roles available to them. The French diplomat's fantasy of the perfect Oriental woman mediates homosexual desire in the face of pervasive homophobia, masking the wish to be the woman with the more acceptable desire for possession. Similarly, the FBI agent refuses the imperatives of his office, assuming the role of the Chinese American labor organizer whom he has destroyed, thus constructing his identity according to an ethical standard in violent opposition to Hoover and McCarthyism. Rather than offering positive images of Asian Americans, a virtually impossible task given the competing demands of various audiences, Hwang turns Orientalism against the West's own interests, opening up a world of proliferating masks in which two white men reinvent themselves by donning the personae of the East. Hwang thus invests the image with greater importance than the symbol, the realm of custom, convention, law. (Source)