Foreshadowing Foreshadowing is a literary device used by writers to present hints about events yet to happen. Foreshadowing creates dramatic tension as the reader anticipates what is to come without always knowing exactly how it will come to pass or even if it will happen for sure. In The Bonesetter’s Daughter, for example, Baby Uncle…
Category: Literature
The Bonesetter’s Daughter: Themes
Family Relationships The Bonesetter’s Daughter tells the story of three generations of women, mother to daughter to granddaughter. Tan does not hesitate to reveal the pain and conflict in these relationships that cause the women to struggle with each other, as well as the love and loyalty that keeps them together. Throughout the novel, family…
The Bonesetter’s Daughter: Characters
Auntie Gal See GaoLing Liu Young Baby Uncle Baby Uncle, whose real name is Liu Hu Sen, is the youngest son of Great-Granny. He is thin and good-looking. He falls in love with Precious Auntie and a marriage is arranged between them but Baby Uncle dies on their wedding day when a horse kicks him…
The Bonesetter’s Daughter: Chapter Summaries
Truth (Prologue) The Bonesetter’s Daughter begins with LuLing’s childhood memory of waking with her nursemaid, Precious Auntie, when she is six years old. Precious Auntie helps LuLing bathe and dress, like they do every morning, then they go to the ancestral hall to pray before breakfast. Precious Auntie, who is mute, uses her hands to…
Woman Work by Maya Angelou: Analysis
The definition of protest literature is fluid and varies according to perspective. For example, social critics could insist that protest literature must include a specific political purpose. A feminist critic may look to protest literature to promote (or avoid promoting) a gender bias. The deconstructionist who is concerned only with language and definition and not…
Woman Work by Maya Angelou – Literary Devices – Tone
Rhyme Rhyme is a technique that often lends a singsong quality to a poem. Angelou’s use of rhyme in much of her poetry is one aspect critics tend to criticize because they believe it makes her poetry sound juvenile. Angelou’s use of rhyme in the first 14 lines of ‘‘Woman Work,’’ however, is appropriate and…
Woman Work by Maya Angelou: Themes
Slavery Upon first read, ‘‘Woman Work’’ may seem like a poem written about any woman with a family to care for. Lines 11 and 14 clearly change that impression because most women in modern America do not cut (sugar) cane or pick cotton. These two chores indicate that the woman is a slave. Considered in…
Woman Work by Maya Angelou: Summary
Lines 1–14 This first stanza of ‘‘Woman Work’’ is the most important in the poem because it is here the reader could infer that the woman speaking is a slave. Lines 11 and 14 talk about crops that need tending. These are not just any crops, but those grown in the Deep South and traditionally…
What For by Garrett Kaoru Hongo: Analysis
After one collaboration, two volumes of poetry, and a memoir, Garrett Hongo is an established voice in Asian American literature. His postmodern style variously utilizes different techniques, voices, sources, and forms. Hongo is more concerned with exploring and voicing his personal experience and the collective experience of Japanese Americans than he is with adhering closely…
What For by Garrett Kaoru Hongo: Summary
Stanza 1 The speaker of ‘‘What For’’ recalls the things he loved and looked forward to when he was six years old. In the first stanza, he describes his childhood sense of magic: a few Hawaiian words had the power to make it rain and sang through the nautilus like the sound of the sea….