Chinese Flower in the English Garden: Hybridity and Cultural Translation in Liu Hong's The Magpie Bridge1

1. This paper is based on my verbal presentation at the conference “Postcolonial Studies: Changing Perceptions”, University of Trento, Italy, on 2 July 2005. I would like to thank my colleagues John Gilmore and Lynn Guyver at Warwick University for their critical comments on this written version. I am also indebted to the anonymous reviewer's suggestions for revision.

Abstract

This paper investigates the possibility of reading literary texts of diasporic writers as that of hybridity and cultural translation. Through a close study of motifs and narratives in the novel, this paper regards The Magpie Bridge as a metaphor of how migrants of contemporary societies evolve in an organic field of intercultural conflicts and reconciliation. The novel presents forbearance and hybrid cross-fertilisation as answer to the reconciliation between oppositional (albeit hierarchical) cultures, values or beliefs; and it goes beyond the theme of “reclaiming history and justice” that characterises postcolonial literature. The novel is read both as a feminine and a feminist celebration of the beauty of hybridity borne out of intercultural appropriation (translation).

Keywords:

• Chinese Migrant Writer
• Cultural Appropriation
• Diasporic Literature
• Hybrid Identity
• Translation Studies

Notes

1. This paper is based on my verbal presentation at the conference “Postcolonial Studies: Changing Perceptions”, University of Trento, Italy, on 2 July 2005. I would like to thank my colleagues John Gilmore and Lynn Guyver at Warwick University for their critical comments on this written version. I am also indebted to the anonymous reviewer's suggestions for revision.

2. The Gold Rush of 1849 brought the first wave of Chinese to California (hence the nickname “Gold Mountain” for San Francisco). The building of the Transcontinental Railroad allowed more Chinese to land in America from 1865 onwards. But the Exclusion Act of 1882 made the Chinese the first immigrant group to be excluded (denied citizenship) in the USA. The great San Francisco earthquake of 1906 was a disaster which nevertheless helped the Chinese: the widespread destruction of written records allowed many Chinese to claim they were born in America, giving them the right to stay in the country and later bring their relatives over from China. For historical and sociological studies of Chinese (and Asians) in the USA (see Sucheng Chan; Jack Chen; Sheong Chen; Joann Faung Jean Lee; Robert G. Lee; Charles McClain; Dusanka Miscevic and Peter Kwong; Henry Yu) (for more on American-Chinese literature see Xiao-huang Yin) (for a general overview of the Chinese diaspora worldwide see Lynn Pan Sons of the Yellow Emperor, Encyclopedia of the Chinese Overseas).

3. Hugh Baker (1994), Kathleen Paul (1997) and Sinan Akilli's work offer good empirical studies of immigrants in Britain. No particular barriers were used against Chinese or other immigrants in Britain before the Second World War. The 1914 British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act was just an “attempt to standardize the confusing naturalization procedures throughout the empire” (Paul 11). It was not meant to stop the influx of British subjects to the “Mother Country”. After the Second World War, however, various legislative measures had been taken by the British government to control the number of immigrants. For example, the Commonwealth Immigrants Act of 1962 was almost exclusively operating on coloured immigrants (Paul 166 quoted in Sinan Akilli). According to Baker, early Chinese immigrants in Britain were mostly from the former colony of Hong Kong, who formed “the third largest ethnic minority in Britain after those of West Indian and Indian subcontinent origin” (298). The increase of Mainland Chinese in Britain (legally or otherwise) started in the late 1970s. The dead bodies of 58 illegal immigrants in the back of a tomato lorry in Dover, June 2000, and the deaths of 23 cockle pickers in Morecambe Bay, February 2004, aroused widespread public concern over the situation of illegal Chinese immigrants in the UK. For studies of Chinese in Britain, please see Chang, Pan, and Zhao (1994); Brown and Foot (1994); Chan, Sucheng, and Wong (1998); Modood et al. (1997); Pan (1999) and Parker (1995).

4. This is a loose term to refer to writers who are ethnically Chinese, who may be descendants of Chinese immigrants or are themselves first-generation migrants.

5. One can think of an obvious example: Wei Hui the Shanghai baby.

6. London has inspired many literary works by immigrant writers, for example, V. S. Naipaul's Half a Life (2001), Maggie Gee's The White Family (2002), Monica Ali's Brick Lane (2003) and the five anthologies compiled from the biennial London New Writing Competition (the 5th anthology is entitled Diaspora City: The London New Writing Anthology ( 2003 )).

7. At a talk given at the University of Warwick, UK, in February 2006, Liu Hong was prompted with the request to verify whether the grandmother is meant to be a ghost or not. She said, “The reader can make their choice. If they think the grandmother is a ghost, then she is; if they think she's the protagonist's own imagination, then she is.”

8. When Tie Mei met the man who would become her lover, he asked for her name. She pronounced it to him, then he said, “Which character Tie? Iron or sticky?” (119). This question struck a chord in her self-awareness: her husband never asked about her name; her husband also never wanted to teach her how to write. The question on her name opened a door for her, to love, and to literacy.

9. Some examples: Chapter 1 is “Yu Shui – Rainwater, 19 February”; Chapter 3 is “Chun Fen – Spring Equinox, 21 March”, Chapter 5 is “Gu Yu – Grain Rain, 20 April”, Chapter 6 is “Li Xia – Summer Begins, 6 May”, Chapter 7 is “Xiao Man – Wheat Seeds Begin to Grow, 21 May”, Chapter 9 is “Xia Zhi – Summer Arrives, 22 June”, Chapter 15 is “Qiu Fen – Autumn Equinox, 23 September”, Chapter 18 “Li Dong – Winter Begins, 8 November” and the last Chapter 24 is “Li Chun – Spring Begins, 4 February”.

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Red Chan

Dr Red Chan teaches at the Centre for Translation and Comparative Cultural Studies, University of Warwick. She has published in subjects of translation, literary and cultural studies. Her academic profile is available at: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/ctccs/staff/chan/