“Mark Twain's racial ideologies and his portrayal of the Chinese” (Publication, 2010)
Year
2010
Text
Ou, Hsin-yun. Mark Twain's racial ideologies and his portrayal of the Chinese. In : Concentric : literary and cultural studies ; vol. 36, no 2 (2010). (Twa10)
Type
Publication
Mentioned People (1)
Twain, Mark
(Florida, Missouri 1835-1910 Redding, Conn.) : Schriftsteller
Subjects
Literature : Occident : United States of America
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References / Sources
Chronology Entries (8)
| # | Year | Text | Linked Data |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1850-1882 |
California and the Chinese immigrants. Most of the Chinese immigrants were railroad workers, miners, laundrymen and domestic servant. 1850 : California law provided that 'no black, or Mulatto person, or Indian shall be allowed to give evidence in favor of, or against a White man'. 1852 : California's Supreme Court declared that the Chinese could not be trusted as witnesses in a court of law. 1854 : The Times ; 26. Sept. Several Chinese vessels have lately been seized for carrying an excess of passengers... the Chinese were packed in the fashion of a hencoop... One hundred of the passengers died on the voyage, and nearly all the rest are sick with the scurvy and are dying off very fast. 1871 : A mob of over 500 Caucasians entered Los Angeles' Chinatown to ransack Chinese-occupied buildings, and killed more than 20 Chinese residents. 1873 Revided California Code of Civil Procedure : witnesses were admitted to the courts of California regardless of color and nationality. 1882 : The statute prohibited any Chinese laborer from entering the U.S., and barred any state or federal court from naturalizing any Chinese. |
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| 2 | 1852- |
Mark Twain and China : general 1852-2000 1987 Liu Haiming : Mark Twain's first appearance on the Chinese literary scene was not in the role of humorist. The style of his humor was not easy for literate Chinese, with their different cultural traditions, to understand and appreciate. The purpose of many translations of the late Qing was to introduce the social systems and customs of other countries to the Chinese people. Twain is usually termed a humorous satirist' in Chinese literary circles. He was a great literary pioneer and the first writer successfully to express American life using the language of the American people. Twain's humor was a unification, continuation and development of the traditional language, form and content of the American west. 2010 Ou Hsin-yun : Although the actual presence of the Chinese was rare on the American East Coast in the nineteenth century, frontier writings and dramas with Chinese characters were popular, because the readers and audiences were curious about the American West. Twain exhibited his fascination with and sympathy for the Chinese through his attack on the racist practices against the Chinese in his 'Disgraceful persecution of a boy', 'John Chinaman in New York', 'Goldsmith's friend abroad again', his novel 'Roughing it,' and the play 'Ah Sin'. Twain's writings demonstrate American Orientalism as influenced not only by the American's relations with the Orient, but also by their different social ideologies and self-identification of nationality. Since Twain endeavored to understand the Chinese and protest against Western imperialism, his writings offer different perspectives on Asian people. 2010 Martin Zehr : The conclusion that Twain's observations of the Chinese, direct and otherwise, influences his writings, especially in terms of his acute awareness of the roles of race, class, and ethnicity in his characters, is inescapable. One of the less controversial statements one can make regarding his personal and literary evolution is that a change did in fact take place in his personal attitudes with respect to each of these factors, even acknowledging, that Twain is still the subject of occasional charges of racism. A review of his writings on the Chinese reveals the importance of his observations in this regard, even though they rarely constitute a prominent role in his work. Nevertheless, from the time of his first focused writings on the Chinese, during his journalistic apprenticeships in the West, it is apparent that Twain is closely noting and, unlike many of his contemporaries, choosing not to ignore the fate of these immigrants. During Twain's lifetime, it is doubtful that his attitudes toward the Chinese ever represented anything more than a distinctly minority opinion in the United States, where the fears of 'yellow peril' or the protectionist proclivities of organized labor were continually leveraged by clever politicians into support for the official exclusionary policies against Chinese immigration beginning in 1882. |
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| 3 | 1866 |
Mark Twain and Anson Burlingame. Mark Twain's interest in China had been aroused and partially influenced by Anson Burlingame. Twain met Burlingame when he was working as a correspondent for the 'Sacramento Union' in Sandwich Islands, Hawaii. Letter from Mark Twain to Jane Lampton Clemens and Pamela A. Moffett ; Honolulu, Sandwich Islands, 21 June 1866. Hon. Anson Burlingame, U.S. Minister to China, & Gen. Van Valkenburgh, Minister to Japan, with their families & suits, have just arrived here en route. They were going to do me the honor to call on me this morning, & that accounts for my being out of bed now. You know what condition my room is always in when you are not around—so I climbed out of bed & dressed & shaved pretty quick & went up to the residence of the American Minister & called on them. Mr. Burlingame told me a good deal about Hon. Jere Clemens & that Virginia Clemens who was wounded in a duel. He was in Congress years together with both of them. Mr. B. sent for his son, to introduce him—said he could tell that frog story of mine as well as anybody. I told him I was glad to hear it, for I never tried to tell it myself, without making a botch of it. At his request I have loaned Mr Burlingame pretty much everything I ever wrote. I guess he will be an almighty wise man if by the time he wades through that lot. Letter from Mark Twain to Mrs. Jane Clemens and Mrs. Moffett ; Honolulu, June 27 (1866). Mr. Burlingame went with me all the time, and helped me question the men—throwing away invitations to dinner with the princes and foreign dignitaries, and neglecting all sorts of things to accommodate me. You know how I appreciate that kind of thing—especially from such a man, who is acknowledged to have no superior in the diplomatic circles of the world, and obtained from China concessions in favor of America which were refused to Sir Frederick Bruce and Envoys of France and Russia until procured for them by Burlingame himself—which service was duly acknowledged by those dignitaries. He hunted me up as soon as he came here, and has done me a hundred favors since, and says if I will come to China in the first trip of the great mail steamer next January and make his house in Pekin my home, he will afford me facilities that few men can have there for seeing and learning. He will give me letters to the chiefs of the great Mail Steamship Company which will be of service to me in this matter. I expect to do all this, but I expect to go to the States first—and from China to the Paris World's Fair. Letter from Mark Twain to Mrs. Jane Clemens and family ; San F., Dec. 4 (1866). The China Mail Steamer is getting ready and everybody says I am throwing away a fortune in not going in her. I firmly believe it myself. |
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| 4 | 1870 |
Twain, Mark. Disgraceful persecution of a boy [ID D29335]. In San Francisco, the other day, "a well-dressed boy, on his way to Sunday school, was arrested and thrown into the city prison for stoning Chinamen." What a commentary is this upon human justice! What sad prominence it gives to our human disposition to tyrannize over the weak! San Francisco has little right to take credit to herself for her treatment of this poor boy. What had the child's education been? How should he suppose it was wrong to stone a Chinaman? Before we side against him, along with outraged San Francisco, let us give him a chance -- let us hear the testimony for the defence. He was a "well-dressed" boy, and a Sunday-school scholar, and, therefore, the chances are that his parents were intelligent, well-to-do people, with just enough natural villany in their compositions to make them yearn after the daily papers, and enjoy them; and so this boy had opportunities to learn all through the week how to do right, as well as on Sunday. It was in this way that he found out that the great commonwealth of California imposes an unlawful mining tax upon John the foreigner, and allows Patrick the foreigner to dig gold for nothing -- probably because the degraded Mongol is at no expense for whiskey, and the refined Celt cannot exist without it. It was in this way that he found out that a respectable number of the tax-gatherers -- it would be unkind to say all of them -- collect the tax twice, instead of once; and that, inasmuch as they do it solely to discourage Chinese immigration into the mines, it is a thing that is much applauded, and likewise regarded as being singularly facetious. It was in this way that he found out that when a white man robs a sluice-box (by the term white man is meant Spaniards, Mexicans, Portuguese, Irish, Hondurans, Peruvians, Chileans, etc., etc.), they make him leave the camp; and when a Chinaman does that thing, they hang him. It was in this way that he found out that in many districts of the vast Pacific coast, so strong is the wild, free love of justice in the hearts of the people, that whenever any secret and mysterious crime is committed, they say, "Let justice be done, though the heavens fall," and go straightway and swing a Chinaman. It was in this way that he found out that by studying one half of each day's "local items" it would appear that the police of San Francisco were either asleep or dead, and by studying the other half it would seem that the reporters were gone mad with admiration of the energy, the virtue, the high effectiveness, and the dare-devil intrepidity of that very police making exultant mention of how "the Argus-eyed officer So and-so" captured a wretched knave of a Chinaman who was stealing chickens, and brought him gloriously to the city prison; and how "the gallant officer Such-and-such-a-one" quietly kept an eye on the movements of an "unsuspecting almond-eyed son of Confucius" (your reporter is nothing if not facetious), following him around with that far-off look of vacancy and unconsciousness always so finely affected by that inscrutable being, the forty-dollar policeman, during a waking interval, and captured him at last in the very act of placing his hands in a suspicious manner upon a paper of tacks left by the owner in an exposed situation; and how one officer performed this prodigious thing, and another officer that, and another the other -- and pretty much every one of these performances having for a dazzling central incident a Chinaman guilty of a shilling's worth of crime, an unfortunate whose misdemeanor must be hurrahed into something enormous in order to keep the public from noticing how many really important rascals went uncaptured in the mean time, and how overrated those glorified policemen actually are. It was in this way that the boy found out that the Legislature, being aware that the Constitution has made America an asylum for the poor and the oppressed of all nations, and that therefore the poor and oppressed who fly to our shelter must not be charged a disabling admission fee, made a law that every Chinaman, upon landing, must be vaccinated upon the wharf, and pay to the State's appointed officer ten dollars for the service, when there are plenty of doctors in San Francisco who would be glad enough to do it for him for fifty cents. It was in this way that the boy found out that a Chinaman had no rights that any man was bound to respect; that he had no sorrows that any man was bound to pity; that neither his life nor his liberty was worth the purchase of a penny when a white man needed a scapegoat; that nobody loved Chinamen, nobody befriended them, nobody spared them suffering when it was convenient to inflict it; everybody, individuals, communities, the majesty of the State itself, joined in hating, abusing, and persecuting these humble strangers. And, therefore, what could have been more natural than for this sunny-hearted boy, tripping along to Sunday school, with his mind teeming with freshly-learned incentives to high and virtuous action, to say to himself: "Ah, there goes a Chinaman! God will not love me if I do not stone him." And for this he was arrested and put in the city jail. Everything conspired to teach him that it was a high and holy thing to stone a Chinaman, and yet he no sooner attempts to do his duty than he is punished for it -- he, poor chap, who has been aware all his life that one of the principal recreations of the police, out toward the Gold Refinery, was to look on with tranquil enjoyment while the butchers of Brannan street set their dogs on unoffending Chinamen, and make them flee for their lives.* Keeping in mind the tuition in the humanities which the entire "Pacific coast" gives its youth, there is a very sublimity of grotesqueness in the virtuous flourish with which the good city fathers of San Francisco proclaim (as they have lately done) that "The police are positively ordered to arrest all boys, of every description and wherever found, who engage in assaulting Chinamen." Still, let us be truly glad they have made the order, notwithstanding its prominent inconsistency; and let us rest perfectly confident the police are glad, too. Because there is no personal peril in arresting boys, provided they be of the small kind, and the reporters will have to laud their performances just as loyally as ever, or go without items. The new form for local items in San Francisco will now be: "The ever vigilant and efficient officer So-and-So succeeded, yesterday afternoon, in arresting Master Tommy Jones, after a determined resistance," etc., etc., followed by the customary statistics and final hurrah, with its unconscious sarcasm: "We are happy in being able to state that this is the forty-seventh boy arrested by this gallant officer since the new ordinance went into effect. The most extraordinary activity prevails in the police department. Nothing like it has been seen since we can remember." Sekundärliteratur Ou Hsin-yun : The writing is a sarcastic exposition of the arrest of a well-dressed boy in San Francisco, who 'on his way to Sunday-school was arrested and thrown into the city prison for stoning a Chinaman'. Twain condemns the injustice of the arrest, because the boy has been taught by his elders that it was 'a high and holy thing' to abuse the Chinese, and yet the boy 'no sooner attempts to do his duty than he is punished for it'. Twain's sympathy for the Chinese receives its angry expression, particularly because the San Francisco community collected unlawful mining taxes and various charges from the Chinese white police stood idly by when the Chinese were attached by white gangs. |
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| 5 | 1870 |
Twain, Mark. John Chinaman in New York [ID D29336]. A correspondent (whose signature, "Lang Bemis," is more or less familiar to the public) contributes the following: As I passed along by one of those monster American tea stores in New York, I found a Chinaman sitting before it acting in the capacity of a sign. Everybody that passed by gave him a steady stare as long as their heads would twist over their shoulders without dislocating their necks, and a large group had stopped to stare deliberately. Is it not a shame that we who prate so much about civilization and humanity are content to degrade a fellow-being to such an office as this? Is it not time for reflection when we find ourselves willing to see in such a being, in such a situation, matter merely for frivolous curiosity instead of regret and grave reflection? Here was a poor creature whom hard fortune had exiled from his natural home beyond the seas, and whose troubles ought to have touched these idle strangers that thronged about him; but did it? Apparently not. Men calling themselves the superior race, the race of culture and of gentle blood, scanned his quaint Chinese hat, with peaked roof and ball on top; and his long queue dangling down his back; his short silken blouse, curiously frogged and figured (and, like the rest of his raiment, rusty, dilapidated, and awkwardly put on); his blue cotton, tight-legged pants tied close around the ankles, and his clumsy, blunt-toed shoes with thick cork soles; and having so scanned him from head to foot, cracked some unseemly joke about his outlandish attire or his melancholy face, and passed on. In my heart I pitied the friendless Mongol. I wondered what was passing behind his sad face, and what distant scene his vacant eye was dreaming of. Were his thoughts with his heart, ten thousand miles away, beyond the billowy wastes of the Pacific? among the rice-fields and the plumy palms of China? under the shadows of remembered mountain-peaks, or in groves of bloomy shrubs and strange forest trees unknown to climes like ours? and now and then, rippling among his visions and his dreams did he hear familiar laughter and half-forgotten voices, and did he catch fitful glimpses of the friendly faces of a by-gone time? A cruel fate it is, I said, that is befallen this bronzed wanderer; a cheerless destiny enough. In order that the group of idlers might be touched at least by the words of the poor fellow, since the appeal of his pauper dress and his dreary exile was lost upon them, I touched him on the shoulder and said: "Cheer up -- don't be down-hearted. It is not America that treats you in this way -- it is merely one citizen, whose greed of gain has eaten the humanity out of his heart. America has a broader hospitality for the exiled and oppressed. America and Americans are always ready to help the unfortunate. Money shall be raised -- you shall go back to China --you shall see your friends again. What wages do they pay you here?" "Divil a cint but four dollars a week and find meself; but it's aisy, barrin' the bloody furrin clothes that's so expinsive." The exile remains at his post. The New York tea merchants who need picturesque signs are not likely to run out of Chinamen. Sekundärliteratur Ou Hsin-yun : It describes a man dressed like a Chinese man standing in front of a New York tea store 'acting in the capacity of a sign', scolded by passersby, and paid only four dollars a weed. The narrator initially objects to the use of a living man as an advertisement for 'one of those monster American tea stores' and expresses compassion toward the unfortunate Chinese man who suffered from ill treatment at the hands of white American. Astonished by the insult to the Chinese man's humanity, the narrator envisions himself in the role of a benevolent citizen, and delivers a self-righteous critique of white civilization. The narrator sees the Chinese as humans with a history and culture. His genteel humanism becomes a satirical target because of his inability to visualize the Chinese except through a set of ethnic stereotypes. Later in the sketch, sympathy for Chinese is further satirized when the 'poor Chinaman' turns out to be an Irishman in disguise. |
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| 6 | 1870 |
Twain, Mark. Goldsmith's friend abroad again [ID D29337]. LETTER I SHANGHAI, 18—. DEAR CHING-FOO: It is all settled, and I am to leave my oppressed and overburdened native land and cross the sea to that noble realm where all are free and all equal, and none reviled or abused—America! America, whose precious privilege it is to call herself the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave. We and all that are about us here look over the waves longingly, contrasting the privations of this our birthplace with the opulent comfort of that happy refuge. We know how America has welcomed the Germans and the Frenchmen and the stricken and sorrowing Irish, and we know how she has given them bread and work, and liberty, and how grateful they are. And we know that America stands ready to welcome all other oppressed peoples and offer her abundance to all that come, without asking what their nationality is, or their creed or color. And, without being told it, we know that the foreign sufferers she has rescued from oppression and starvation are the most eager of her children to welcome us, because, having suffered themselves, they know what suffering is, and having been generously succored, they long to be generous to other unfortunates and thus show that magnanimity is not wasted upon AH SONG HI. LETTER II AT SEA, 18—. DEAR CHING-FOO: We are far away at sea now; on our way to the beautiful Land of the Free and Home of the Brave. We shall soon be where all men are alike, and where sorrow is not known. The good American who hired me to go to his country is to pay me $12 a month, which is immense wages, you know—twenty times as much as one gets in China. My passage in the ship is a very large sum—indeed, it is a fortune—and this I must pay myself eventually, but I am allowed ample time to make it good to my employer in, he advancing it now. For a mere form, I have turned over my wife, my boy, and my two daughters to my employer's partner for security for the payment of the ship fare. But my employer says they are in no danger of being sold, for he knows I will be faithful to him, and that is the main security. I thought I would have twelve dollars to begin life with in America, but the American Consul took two of them for making a certificate that I was shipped on the steamer. He has no right to do more than charge the ship two dollars for one certificate for the ship, with the number of her Chinese passengers set down in it; but he chooses to force a certificate upon each and every Chinaman and put the two dollars in his pocket. As 1,300 of my countrymen are in this vessel, the Consul received $2,600 for certificates. My employer tells me that the Government at Washington know of this fraud, and are so bitterly opposed to the existence of such a wrong that they tried hard to have the extor—the fee, I mean, legalised by the last Congress;—[Pacific and Mediterranean steamship bills.(Ed. Mem.)]—but as the bill did not pass, the Consul will have to take the fee dishonestly until next Congress makes it legitimate. It is a great and good and noble country, and hates all forms of vice and chicanery. We are in that part of the vessel always reserved for my countrymen. It is called the steerage. It is kept for us, my employer says, because it is not subject to changes of temperature and dangerous drafts of air. It is only another instance of the loving unselfishness of the Americans for all unfortunate foreigners. The steerage is a little crowded, and rather warm and close, but no doubt it is best for us that it should be so. Yesterday our people got to quarrelling among themselves, and the captain turned a volume of hot steam upon a mass of them and scalded eighty or ninety of them more or less severely. Flakes and ribbons of skin came off some of them. There was wild shrieking and struggling while the vapour enveloped the great throng, and so some who were not scalded got trampled upon and hurt. We do not complain, for my employer says this is the usual way of quieting disturbances on board the ship, and that it is done in the cabins among the Americans every day or two. Congratulate me, Ching-Foo In ten days more I shall step upon the shore of America, and be received by her great-hearted people; and I shall straighten myself up and feel that I am a free man among freemen. AH SONG HI. LETTER III SAN FRANCISCO, 18—. DEAR CHING-FOO: I stepped ashore jubilant! I wanted to dance, shout, sing, worship the generous Land of the Free and Home of the Brave. But as I walked from the gangplank a man in a gray uniform—[Policeman] —kicked me violently behind and told me to look out—so my employer translated it. As I turned, another officer of the same kind struck me with a short club and also instructed me to look out. I was about to take hold of my end of the pole which had mine and Hong-Wo's basket and things suspended from it, when a third officer hit me with his club to signify that I was to drop it, and then kicked me to signify that he was satisfied with my promptness. Another person came now, and searched all through our basket and bundles, emptying everything out on the dirty wharf. Then this person and another searched us all over. They found a little package of opium sewed into the artificial part of Hong-Wo's queue, and they took that, and also they made him prisoner and handed him over to an officer, who marched him away. They took his luggage, too, because of his crime, and as our luggage was so mixed together that they could not tell mine from his, they took it all. When I offered to help divide it, they kicked me and desired me to look out. Having now no baggage and no companion, I told my employer that if he was willing, I would walk about a little and see the city and the people until he needed me. I did not like to seem disappointed with my reception in the good land of refuge for the oppressed, and so I looked and spoke as cheerily as I could. But he said, wait a minute—I must be vaccinated to prevent my taking the small-pox. I smiled and said I had already had the small-pox, as he could see by the marks, and so I need not wait to be "vaccinated," as he called it. But he said it was the law, and I must be vaccinated anyhow. The doctor would never let me pass, for the law obliged him to vaccinate all Chinamen and charge them ten dollars apiece for it, and I might be sure that no doctor who would be the servant of that law would let a fee slip through his fingers to accommodate any absurd fool who had seen fit to have the disease in some other country. And presently the doctor came and did his work and took my last penny—my ten dollars which were the hard savings of nearly a year and a half of labour and privation. Ah, if the law-makers had only known there were plenty of doctors in the city glad of a chance to vaccinate people for a dollar or two, they would never have put the price up so high against a poor friendless Irish, or Italian, or Chinese pauper fleeing to the good land to escape hunger and hard times. AH SONG HI. LETTER IV SAN FRANCISCO, 18—. DEAR CHING-FOO: I have been here about a month now, and am learning a little of the language every day. My employer was disappointed in the matter of hiring us out to service to the plantations in the far eastern portion of this continent. His enterprise was a failure, and so he set us all free, merely taking measures to secure to himself the repayment of the passage money which he paid for us. We are to make this good to him out of the first moneys we earn here. He says it is sixty dollars apiece. We were thus set free about two weeks after we reached here. We had been massed together in some small houses up to that time, waiting. I walked forth to seek my fortune. I was to begin life a stranger in a strange land, without a friend, or a penny, or any clothes but those I had on my back. I had not any advantage on my side in the world—not one, except good health and the lack of any necessity to waste any time or anxiety on the watching of my baggage. No, I forget. I reflected that I had one prodigious advantage over paupers in other lands—I was in America! I was in the heaven-provided refuge of the oppressed and the forsaken! Just as that comforting thought passed through my mind, some young men set a fierce dog on me. I tried to defend myself, but could do nothing. I retreated to the recess of a closed doorway, and there the dog had me at his mercy, flying at my throat and face or any part of my body that presented itself. I shrieked for help, but the young men only jeered and laughed. Two men in gray uniforms (policemen is their official title) looked on for a minute and then walked leisurely away. But a man stopped them and brought them back and told them it was a shame to leave me in such distress. Then the two policemen beat off the dog with small clubs, and a comfort it was to be rid of him, though I was just rags and blood from head to foot. The man who brought the policemen asked the young men why they abused me in that way, and they said they didn't want any of his meddling. And they said to him: "This Ching divil comes till Ameriky to take the bread out o' dacent intilligent white men's mouths, and whir they try to defind their rights there's a dale o' fuss made about it." They began to threaten my benefactor, and as he saw no friendliness in the faces that had gathered meanwhile, he went on his way. He got many a curse when he was gone. The policemen now told me I was under arrest and must go with them. I asked one of them what wrong I had done to any one that I should be arrested, and he only struck me with his club and ordered me to "hold my yap." With a jeering crowd of street boys and loafers at my heels, I was taken up an alley and into a stone-paved dungeon which had large cells all down one side of it, with iron gates to them. I stood up by a desk while a man behind it wrote down certain things about me on a slate. One of my captors said: "Enter a charge against this Chinaman of being disorderly and disturbing the peace." I attempted to say a word, but he said: "Silence! Now ye had better go slow, my good fellow. This is two or three times you've tried to get off some of your d—-d insolence. Lip won't do here. You've got to simmer down, and if you don't take to it paceable we'll see if we can't make you. Fat's your name?" "Ah Song Hi." "Alias what?" I said I did not understand, and he said what he wanted was my true name, for he guessed I picked up this one since I stole my last chickens. They all laughed loudly at that. Then they searched me. They found nothing, of course. They seemed very angry and asked who I supposed would "go my bail or pay my fine." When they explained these things to me, I said I had done nobody any harm, and why should I need to have bail or pay a fine? Both of them kicked me and warned me that I would find it to my advantage to try and be as civil as convenient. I protested that I had not meant anything disrespectful. Then one of them took me to one side and said: "Now look here, Johnny, it's no use you playing softly wid us. We mane business, ye know; and the sooner ye put us on the scent of a V, the asier yell save yerself from a dale of trouble. Ye can't get out o' this for anny less. Who's your frinds?" I told him I had not a single friend in all the land of America, and that I was far from home and help, and very poor. And I begged him to let me go. He gathered the slack of my blouse collar in his grip and jerked and shoved and hauled at me across the dungeon, and then unlocking an iron cell-gate thrust me in with a kick and said: "Rot there, ye furrin spawn, till ye lairn that there's no room in America for the likes of ye or your nation." AH SONG HI. LETTER V SAN FRANCISCO, 18—. DEAR CHING-FOO: You will remember that I had just been thrust violently into a cell in the city prison when I wrote last. I stumbled and fell on some one. I got a blow and a curse; and on top of these a kick or two and a shove. In a second or two it was plain that I was in a nest of prisoners and was being "passed around"—for the instant I was knocked out of the way of one I fell on the head or heels of another and was promptly ejected, only to land on a third prisoner and get a new contribution of kicks and curses and a new destination. I brought up at last in an unoccupied corner, very much battered and bruised and sore, but glad enough to be let alone for a little while. I was on the flag-stones, for there was no furniture in the den except a long, broad board, or combination of boards, like a barn-door, and this bed was accommodating five or six persons, and that was its full capacity. They lay stretched side by side, snoring—when not fighting. One end of the board was four inches higher than the other, and so the slant answered for a pillow. There were no blankets, and the night was a little chilly; the nights are always a little chilly in San Francisco, though never severely cold. The board was a deal more comfortable than the stones, and occasionally some flag-stone plebeian like me would try to creep to a place on it; and then the aristocrats would hammer him good and make him think a flag pavement was a nice enough place after all. I lay quiet in my corner, stroking my bruises, and listening to the revelations the prisoners made to each other—and to me for some that were near me talked to me a good deal. I had long had an idea that Americans, being free, had no need of prisons, which are a contrivance of despots for keeping restless patriots out of mischief. So I was considerably surprised to find out my mistake. Ours was a big general cell, it seemed, for the temporary accommodation of all comers whose crimes were trifling. Among us there were two Americans, two "Greasers" (Mexicans), a Frenchman, a German, four Irishmen, a Chilenean (and, in the next cell, only separated from us by a grating, two women), all drunk, and all more or less noisy; and as night fell and advanced, they grew more and more discontented and disorderly, occasionally; shaking the prison bars and glaring through them at the slowly pacing officer, and cursing him with all their hearts. The two women were nearly middle-aged, and they had only had enough liquor to stimulate instead of stupefy them. Consequently they would fondle and kiss each other for some minutes, and then fall to fighting and keep it up till they were just two grotesque tangles of rags and blood and tumbled hair. Then they would rest awhile and pant and swear. While they were affectionate they always spoke of each other as "ladies," but while they were fighting "strumpet" was the mildest name they could think of—and they could only make that do by tacking some sounding profanity to it. In their last fight, which was toward midnight, one of them bit off the other's finger, and then the officer interfered and put the "Greaser" into the "dark cell" to answer for it because the woman that did it laid it on him, and the other woman did not deny it because, as she said afterward, she "wanted another crack at the huzzy when her finger quit hurting," and so she did not want her removed. By this time those two women had mutilated each other's clothes to that extent that there was not sufficient left to cover their nakedness. I found that one of these creatures had spent nine years in the county jail, and that the other one had spent about four or five years in the same place. They had done it from choice. As soon as they were discharged from captivity they would go straight and get drunk, and then steal some trifling thing while an officer was observing them. That would entitle them to another two months in jail, and there they would occupy clean, airy apartments, and have good food in plenty, and being at no expense at all, they could make shirts for the clothiers at half a dollar apiece and thus keep themselves in smoking tobacco and such other luxuries as they wanted. When the two months were up they would go just as straight as they could walk to Mother Leonard's and get drunk; and from there to Kearney street and steal something; and thence to this city prison, and next day back to the old quarters in the county jail again. One of them had really kept this up for nine years and the other four or five, and both said they meant to end their days in that prison. **—[**The former of the two did.—Ed. Mem.]—Finally, both these creatures fell upon me while I was dozing with my head against their grating, and battered me considerably, because they discovered that I was a Chinaman, and they said I was "a bloody interlopin' loafer come from the devil's own country to take the bread out of dacent people's mouths and put down the wages for work whin it was all a Christian could do to kape body and sowl together as it was." "Loafer" means one who will not work. AH SONG HI. LETTER VI SAN FRANCISCO, 18—. DEAR CHING-FOO: To continue—the two women became reconciled to each other again through the common bond of interest and sympathy created between them by pounding me in partnership, and when they had finished me they fell to embracing each other again and swearing more eternal affection like that which had subsisted between them all the evening, barring occasional interruptions. They agreed to swear the finger-biting on the Greaser in open court, and get him sent to the penitentiary for the crime of mayhem. Another of our company was a boy of fourteen who had been watched for some time by officers and teachers, and repeatedly detected in enticing young girls from the public schools to the lodgings of gentlemen down town. He had been furnished with lures in the form of pictures and books of a peculiar kind, and these he had distributed among his clients. There were likenesses of fifteen of these young girls on exhibition (only to prominent citizens and persons in authority, it was said, though most people came to get a sight) at the police headquarters, but no punishment at all was to be inflicted on the poor little misses. The boy was afterward sent into captivity at the House of Correction for some months, and there was a strong disposition to punish the gentlemen who had employed the boy to entice the girls, but as that could not be done without making public the names of those gentlemen and thus injuring them socially, the idea was finally given up. There was also in our cell that night a photographer (a kind of artist who makes likenesses of people with a machine), who had been for some time patching the pictured heads of well-known and respectable young ladies to the nude, pictured bodies of another class of women; then from this patched creation he would make photographs and sell them privately at high prices to rowdies and blackguards, averring that these, the best young ladies of the city, had hired him to take their likenesses in that unclad condition. What a lecture the police judge read that photographer when he was convicted! He told him his crime was little less than an outrage. He abused that photographer till he almost made him sink through the floor, and then he fined him a hundred dollars. And he told him he might consider himself lucky that he didn't fine him a hundred and twenty-five dollars. They are awfully severe on crime here. About two or two and a half hours after midnight, of that first experience of mine in the city prison, such of us as were dozing were awakened by a noise of beating and dragging and groaning, and in a little while a man was pushed into our den with a "There, d—-n you, soak there a spell!"—and then the gate was closed and the officers went away again. The man who was thrust among us fell limp and helpless by the grating, but as nobody could reach him with a kick without the trouble of hitching along toward him or getting fairly up to deliver it, our people only grumbled at him, and cursed him, and called him insulting names—for misery and hardship do not make their victims gentle or charitable toward each other. But as he neither tried humbly to conciliate our people nor swore back at them, his unnatural conduct created surprise, and several of the party crawled to him where he lay in the dim light that came through the grating, and examined into his case. His head was very bloody and his wits were gone. After about an hour, he sat up and stared around; then his eyes grew more natural and he began to tell how that he was going along with a bag on his shoulder and a brace of policemen ordered him to stop, which he did not do—was chased and caught, beaten ferociously about the head on the way to the prison and after arrival there, and finally thrown into our den like a dog. And in a few seconds he sank down again and grew flighty of speech. One of our people was at last penetrated with something vaguely akin to compassion, may be, for he looked out through the gratings at the guardian officer, pacing to and fro, and said: "Say, Mickey, this shrimp's goin' to die." "Stop your noise!" was all the answer he got. But presently our man tried it again. He drew himself to the gratings, grasping them with his hands, and looking out through them, sat waiting till the officer was passing once more, and then said: "Sweetness, you'd better mind your eye, now, because you beats have killed this cuss. You've busted his head and he'll pass in his checks before sun-up. You better go for a doctor, now, you bet you had." The officer delivered a sudden rap on our man's knuckles with his club, that sent him scampering and howling among the sleeping forms on the flag-stones, and an answering burst of laughter came from the half dozen policemen idling about the railed desk in the middle of the dungeon. But there was a putting of heads together out there presently, and a conversing in low voices, which seemed to show that our man's talk had made an impression; and presently an officer went away in a hurry, and shortly came back with a person who entered our cell and felt the bruised man's pulse and threw the glare of a lantern on his drawn face, striped with blood, and his glassy eyes, fixed and vacant. The doctor examined the man's broken head also, and presently said: "If you'd called me an hour ago I might have saved this man, may be too late now." Then he walked out into the dungeon and the officers surrounded him, and they kept up a low and earnest buzzing of conversation for fifteen minutes, I should think, and then the doctor took his departure from the prison. Several of the officers now came in and worked a little with the wounded man, but toward daylight he died. It was the longest, longest night! And when the daylight came filtering reluctantly into the dungeon at last, it was the grayest, dreariest, saddest daylight! And yet, when an officer by and by turned off the sickly yellow gas flame, and immediately the gray of dawn became fresh and white, there was a lifting of my spirits that acknowledged and believed that the night was gone, and straightway I fell to stretching my sore limbs, and looking about me with a grateful sense of relief and a returning interest in life. About me lay the evidences that what seemed now a feverish dream and a nightmare was the memory of a reality instead. For on the boards lay four frowsy, ragged, bearded vagabonds, snoring—one turned end-for-end and resting an unclean foot, in a ruined stocking, on the hairy breast of a neighbour; the young boy was uneasy, and lay moaning in his sleep; other forms lay half revealed and half concealed about the floor; in the furthest corner the gray light fell upon a sheet, whose elevations and depressions indicated the places of the dead man's face and feet and folded hands; and through the dividing bars one could discern the almost nude forms of the two exiles from the county jail twined together in a drunken embrace, and sodden with sleep. By and by all the animals in all the cages awoke, and stretched themselves, and exchanged a few cuffs and curses, and then began to clamour for breakfast. Breakfast was brought in at last—bread and beefsteak on tin plates, and black coffee in tin cups, and no grabbing allowed. And after several dreary hours of waiting, after this, we were all marched out into the dungeon and joined there by all manner of vagrants and vagabonds, of all shades and colours and nationalities, from the other cells and cages of the place; and pretty soon our whole menagerie was marched up-stairs and locked fast behind a high railing in a dirty room with a dirty audience in it. And this audience stared at us, and at a man seated on high behind what they call a pulpit in this country, and at some clerks and other officials seated below him—and waited. This was the police court. The court opened. Pretty soon I was compelled to notice that a culprit's nationality made for or against him in this court. Overwhelming proofs were necessary to convict an Irishman of crime, and even then his punishment amounted to little; Frenchmen, Spaniards, and Italians had strict and unprejudiced justice meted out to them, in exact accordance with the evidence; negroes were promptly punished, when there was the slightest preponderance of testimony against them; but Chinamen were punished always, apparently. Now this gave me some uneasiness, I confess. I knew that this state of things must of necessity be accidental, because in this country all men were free and equal, and one person could not take to himself an advantage not accorded to all other individuals. I knew that, and yet in spite of it I was uneasy. And I grew still more uneasy, when I found that any succored and befriended refugee from Ireland or elsewhere could stand up before that judge and swear away the life or liberty or character of a refugee from China; but that by the law of the land the Chinaman could not testify against the Irishman. I was really and truly uneasy, but still my faith in the universal liberty that America accords and defends, and my deep veneration for the land that offered all distressed outcasts a home and protection, was strong within me, and I said to myself that it would all come out right yet. AH SONG HI. LETTER VII SAN FRANCISCO, 18—. DEAR CHING FOO: I was glad enough when my case came up. An hour's experience had made me as tired of the police court as of the dungeon. I was not uneasy about the result of the trial, but on the contrary felt that as soon as the large auditory of Americans present should hear how that the rowdies had set the dogs on me when I was going peacefully along the street, and how, when I was all torn and bleeding, the officers arrested me and put me in jail and let the rowdies go free, the gallant hatred of oppression which is part of the very flesh and blood of every American would be stirred to its utmost, and I should be instantly set at liberty. In truth I began to fear for the other side. There in full view stood the ruffians who had misused me, and I began to fear that in the first burst of generous anger occasioned by the revealment of what they had done, they might be harshly handled, and possibly even banished the country as having dishonoured her and being no longer worthy to remain upon her sacred soil. The official interpreter of the court asked my name, and then spoke it aloud so that all could hear. Supposing that all was now ready, I cleared my throat and began—in Chinese, because of my imperfect English: "Hear, O high and mighty mandarin, and believe! As I went about my peaceful business in the street, behold certain men set a dog on me, and— "Silence!" It was the judge that spoke. The interpreter whispered to me that I must keep perfectly still. He said that no statement would be received from me—I must only talk through my lawyer. I had no lawyer. In the early morning a police court lawyer (termed, in the higher circles of society, a "shyster") had come into our den in the prison and offered his services to me, but I had been obliged to go without them because I could not pay in advance or give security. I told the interpreter how the matter stood. He said I must take my chances on the witnesses then. I glanced around, and my failing confidence revived. "Call those four Chinamen yonder," I said. "They saw it all. I remember their faces perfectly. They will prove that the white men set the dog on me when I was not harming them." "That won't work," said he. "In this country white men can testify against Chinamen all they want to, but Chinamen ain't allowed to testify against white men!" What a chill went through me! And then I felt the indignant blood rise to my cheek at this libel upon the Home of the Oppressed, where all men are free and equal—perfectly equal—perfectly free and perfectly equal. I despised this Chinese-speaking Spaniard for his mean slander of the land that was sheltering and feeding him. I sorely wanted to sear his eyes with that sentence from the great and good American Declaration of Independence which we have copied in letters of gold in China and keep hung up over our family altars and in our temples—I mean the one about all men being created free and equal. But woe is me, Ching Foo, the man was right. He was right, after all. There were my witnesses, but I could not use them. But now came a new hope. I saw my white friend come in, and I felt that he had come there purposely to help me. I may almost say I knew it. So I grew easier. He passed near enough to me to say under his breath, "Don't be afraid," and then I had no more fear. But presently the rowdies recognised him and began to scowl at him in no friendly way, and to make threatening signs at him. The two officers that arrested me fixed their eyes steadily on his; he bore it well, but gave in presently, and dropped his eyes. They still gazed at his eyebrows, and every time he raised his eyes he encountered their winkless stare—until after a minute or two he ceased to lift his head at all. The judge had been giving some instructions privately to some one for a little while, but now he was ready to resume business. Then the trial so unspeakably important to me, and freighted with such prodigious consequence to my wife and children, began, progressed, ended, was recorded in the books, noted down by the newspaper reporters, and forgotten by everybody but me—all in the little space of two minutes! "Ah Song Hi, Chinaman. Officers O'Flannigan and O'Flaherty, witnesses. Come forward, Officer O'Flannigan." OFFICER—"He was making a disturbance in Kearny street." JUDGE—"Any witnesses on the other side?" No response. The white friend raised his eyes—encountered Officer O'Flaherty's—blushed a little—got up and left the courtroom, avoiding all glances and not taking his own from the floor. JUDGE—"Give him five dollars or ten days." In my desolation there was a glad surprise in the words; but it passed away when I found that he only meant that I was to be fined five dollars or imprisoned ten days longer in default of it. There were twelve or fifteen Chinamen in our crowd of prisoners, charged with all manner of little thefts and misdemeanors, and their cases were quickly disposed of, as a general thing. When the charge came from a policeman or other white man, he made his statement and that was the end of it, unless the Chinaman's lawyer could find some white person to testify in his client's behalf, for, neither the accused Chinaman nor his countrymen being allowed to say anything, the statement of the officers or other white person was amply sufficient to convict. So, as I said, the Chinamen's cases were quickly disposed of, and fines and imprisonment promptly distributed among them. In one or two of the cases the charges against Chinamen were brought by Chinamen themselves, and in those cases Chinamen testified against Chinamen, through the interpreter; but the fixed rule of the court being that the preponderance of testimony in such cases should determine the prisoner's guilt or innocence, and there being nothing very binding about an oath administered to the lower orders of our people without the ancient solemnity of cutting off a chicken's head and burning some yellow paper at the same time, the interested parties naturally drum up a cloud of witnesses who are cheerfully willing to give evidence without ever knowing anything about the matter in hand. The judge has a custom of rattling through with as much of this testimony as his patience will stand, and then shutting off the rest and striking an average. By noon all the business of the court was finished, and then several of us who had not fared well were remanded to prison; the judge went home; the lawyers, and officers, and spectators departed their several ways, and left the uncomely court-room to silence, solitude, and Stiggers, the newspaper reporter, which latter would now write up his items (said an ancient Chinaman to me), in the which he would praise all the policemen indiscriminately and abuse the Chinamen and dead people. AH SONG HI. Sekundärliteratur Ou Hsin-yun : The satire is a vigorous attack on discriminatory practices against the Chinese in California. In this letters, a candid Chinese immigrant Ah Song-Hi writes to his friend Ching-Foo back in China about his excitement while leaving for America, about his ill reception in this country, and his confusion about American values. Twain's tale of black humor employs and ironic approach to unveil the dark side of America as a land of corruption and oppression, rather than a heaven with equal rights. These letters depict the Chinese as individuals with human rights by relating them to their history. Twain's tale alludes to the historical fact that the California gold rush fueled impoverished Chinese immigrants to America. Twain modeled on the epistolary device and self-criticism in Citizen of the world by Oliver Goldsmith. He employs a Chinese persona to satirize American racism and violence and he emphasizes that his narrative of the mistreatment of the Chinese was based on his observations of real American life. The story realistically represents white American's attitude toward the Chinese during the late nineteenth century. Thinking of the U.S. as the land of freedom and opportunity, many Chinese willingly left their families and made the long trip, hardly knowing that they would be facing a life filled with discrimination and injustice. Through the portrayal of the Chinese narrator who suffers from unfair treatments on the street, in the prison, and even in the court, Twain indicates his sympathy for the victims of racism. |
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| 7 | 1872 |
Twain, Mark. Roughing it [ID D29326]. Chapter LIV. : The gentle, inoffensive Chinese. Of course there was a large Chinese population in Virginia—it is the case with every town and city on the Pacific coast. They are a harmless race when white men either let them alone or treat them no worse than dogs; in fact they are almost entirely harmless anyhow, for they seldom think of resenting the vilest insults or the cruelest injuries. They are quiet, peaceable, tractable, free from drunkenness, and they are as industrious as the day is long. A disorderly Chinaman is rare, and a lazy one does not exist. So long as a Chinaman has strength to use his hands he needs no support from anybody; white men often complain of want of work, but a Chinaman offers no such complaint; he always manages to find something to do. He is a great convenience to everybody—even to the worst class of white men, for he bears the most of their sins, suffering fines for their petty thefts, imprisonment for their robberies, and death for their murders. Any white man can swear a Chinaman's life away in the courts, but no Chinaman can testify against a white man. Ours is the "land of the free"—nobody denies that—nobody challenges it. [Maybe it is because we won't let other people testify.] As I write, news comes that in broad daylight in San Francisco, some boys have stoned an inoffensive Chinaman to death, and that although a large crowd witnessed the shameful deed, no one interfered. There are seventy thousand (and possibly one hundred thousand) Chinamen on the Pacific coast. There were about a thousand in Virginia. They were penned into a "Chinese quarter"—a thing which they do not particularly object to, as they are fond of herding together. Their buildings were of wood; usually only one story high, and set thickly together along streets scarcely wide enough for a wagon to pass through. Their quarter was a little removed from the rest of the town. The chief employment of Chinamen in towns is to wash clothing. They always send a bill, like this below, pinned to the clothes. It is mere ceremony, for it does not enlighten the customer much. Their price for washing was $2.50 per dozen—rather cheaper than white people could afford to wash for at that time. A very common sign on the Chinese houses was: "See Yup, Washer and Ironer"; "Hong Wo, Washer"; "Sam Sing & Ah Hop, Washing." The house servants, cooks, etc., in California and Nevada, were chiefly Chinamen. There were few white servants and no Chinawomen so employed. Chinamen make good house servants, being quick, obedient, patient, quick to learn and tirelessly industrious. They do not need to be taught a thing twice, as a general thing. They are imitative. If a Chinaman were to see his master break up a centre table, in a passion, and kindle a fire with it, that Chinaman would be likely to resort to the furniture for fuel forever afterward. All Chinamen can read, write and cipher with easy facility—pity but all our petted voters could. In California they rent little patches of ground and do a deal of gardening. They will raise surprising crops of vegetables on a sand pile. They waste nothing. What is rubbish to a Christian, a Chinaman carefully preserves and makes useful in one way or another. He gathers up all the old oyster and sardine cans that white people throw away, and procures marketable tin and solder from them by melting. He gathers up old bones and turns them into manure. In California he gets a living out of old mining claims that white men have abandoned as exhausted and worthless—and then the officers come down on him once a month with an exorbitant swindle to which the legislature has given the broad, general name of "foreign" mining tax, but it is usually inflicted on no foreigners but Chinamen. This swindle has in some cases been repeated once or twice on the same victim in the course of the same month—but the public treasury was no additionally enriched by it, probably. Chinamen hold their dead in great reverence—they worship their departed ancestors, in fact. Hence, in China, a man's front yard, back yard, or any other part of his premises, is made his family burying ground, in order that he may visit the graves at any and all times. Therefore that huge empire is one mighty cemetery; it is ridged and wringled from its centre to its circumference with graves—and inasmuch as every foot of ground must be made to do its utmost, in China, lest the swarming population suffer for food, the very graves are cultivated and yield a harvest, custom holding this to be no dishonor to the dead. Since the departed are held in such worshipful reverence, a Chinaman cannot bear that any indignity be offered the places where they sleep. Mr. Burlingame said that herein lay China's bitter opposition to railroads; a road could not be built anywhere in the empire without disturbing the graves of their ancestors or friends. A Chinaman hardly believes he could enjoy the hereafter except his body lay in his beloved China; also, he desires to receive, himself, after death, that worship with which he has honored his dead that preceded him. Therefore, if he visits a foreign country, he makes arrangements to have his bones returned to China in case he dies; if he hires to go to a foreign country on a labor contract, there is always a stipulation that his body shall be taken back to China if he dies; if the government sells a gang of Coolies to a foreigner for the usual five-year term, it is specified in the contract that their bodies shall be restored to China in case of death. On the Pacific coast the Chinamen all belong to one or another of several great companies or organizations, and these companies keep track of their members, register their names, and ship their bodies home when they die. The See Yup Company is held to be the largest of these. The Ning Yeong Company is next, and numbers eighteen thousand members on the coast. Its headquarters are at San Francisco, where it has a costly temple, several great officers (one of whom keeps regal state in seclusion and cannot be approached by common humanity), and a numerous priesthood. In it I was shown a register of its members, with the dead and the date of their shipment to China duly marked. Every ship that sails from San Francisco carries away a heavy freight of Chinese corpses—or did, at least, until the legislature, with an ingenious refinement of Christian cruelty, forbade the shipments, as a neat underhanded way of deterring Chinese immigration. The bill was offered, whether it passed or not. It is my impression that it passed. There was another bill—it became a law—compelling every incoming Chinaman to be vaccinated on the wharf and pay a duly appointed quack (no decent doctor would defile himself with such legalized robbery) ten dollars for it. As few importers of Chinese would want to go to an expense like that, the law-makers thought this would be another heavy blow to Chinese immigration. What the Chinese quarter of Virginia was like—or, indeed, what the Chinese quarter of any Pacific coast town was and is like—may be gathered from this item which I printed in the Enterprise while reporting for that paper: CHINATOWN.—Accompanied by a fellow reporter, we made a trip through our Chinese quarter the other night. The Chinese have built their portion of the city to suit themselves; and as they keep neither carriages nor wagons, their streets are not wide enough, as a general thing, to admit of the passage of vehicles. At ten o'clock at night the Chinaman may be seen in all his glory. In every little cooped-up, dingy cavern of a hut, faint with the odor of burning Josh-lights and with nothing to see the gloom by save the sickly, guttering tallow candle, were two or three yellow, long-tailed vagabonds, coiled up on a sort of short truckle-bed, smoking opium, motionless and with their lustreless eyes turned inward from excess of satisfaction—or rather the recent smoker looks thus, immediately after having passed the pipe to his neighbor—for opium-smoking is a comfortless operation, and requires constant attention. A lamp sits on the bed, the length of the long pipe-stem from the smoker's mouth; he puts a pellet of opium on the end of a wire, sets it on fire, and plasters it into the pipe much as a Christian would fill a hole with putty; then he applies the bowl to the lamp and proceeds to smoke—and the stewing and frying of the drug and the gurgling of the juices in the stem would well-nigh turn the stomach of a statue. John likes it, though; it soothes him, he takes about two dozen whiffs, and then rolls over to dream, Heaven only knows what, for we could not imagine by looking at the soggy creature. Possibly in his visions he travels far away from the gross world and his regular washing, and feast on succulent rats and birds'-nests in Paradise. Mr. Ah Sing keeps a general grocery and provision store at No. 13 Wang street. He lavished his hospitality upon our party in the friendliest way. He had various kinds of colored and colorless wines and brandies, with unpronouncable names, imported from China in little crockery jugs, and which he offered to us in dainty little miniature wash-basins of porcelain. He offered us a mess of birds'-nests; also, small, neat sausages, of which we could have swallowed several yards if we had chosen to try, but we suspected that each link contained the corpse of a mouse, and therefore refrained. Mr. Sing had in his store a thousand articles of merchandise, curious to behold, impossible to imagine the uses of, and beyond our ability to describe. His ducks, however, and his eggs, we could understand; the former were split open and flattened out like codfish, and came from China in that shape, and the latter were plastered over with some kind of paste which kept them fresh and palatable through the long voyage. We found Mr. Hong Wo, No. 37 Chow-chow street, making up a lottery scheme—in fact we found a dozen others occupied in the same way in various parts of the quarter, for about every third Chinaman runs a lottery, and the balance of the tribe "buck" at it. "Tom," who speaks faultless English, and used to be chief and only cook to the Territorial Enterprise, when the establishment kept bachelor's hall two years ago, said that "Sometime Chinaman buy ticket one dollar hap, ketch um two tree hundred, sometime no ketch um anything; lottery like one man fight um seventy—may-be he whip, may-be he get whip heself, welly good." However, the percentage being sixty-nine against him, the chances are, as a general thing, that "he get whip heself." We could not see that these lotteries differed in any respect from our own, save that the figures being Chinese, no ignorant white man might ever hope to succeed in telling "t'other from which;" the manner of drawing is similar to ours. Mr. See Yup keeps a fancy store on Live Fox street. He sold us fans of white feathers, gorgeously ornamented; perfumery that smelled like Limburger cheese, Chinese pens, and watch-charms made of a stone unscratchable with steel instruments, yet polished and tinted like the inner coat of a sea-shell. As tokens of his esteem, See Yup presented the party with gaudy plumes made of gold tinsel and trimmed with peacocks' feathers. We ate chow-chow with chop-sticks in the celestial restaurants; our comrade chided the moon-eyed damsels in front of the houses for their want of feminine reserve; we received protecting Josh-lights from our hosts and "dickered" for a pagan God or two. Finally, we were impressed with the genius of a Chinese book-keeper; he figured up his accounts on a machine like a gridiron with buttons strung on its bars; the different rows represented units, tens, hundreds and thousands. He fingered them with incredible rapidity—in fact, he pushed them from place to place as fast as a musical professor's fingers travel over the keys of a piano. They are a kindly disposed, well-meaning race, and are respected and well treated by the upper classes, all over the Pacific coast. No Californian gentleman or lady ever abuses or oppresses a Chinaman, under any circumstances, an explanation that seems to be much needed in the East. Only the scum of the population do it—they and their children; they, and, naturally and consistently, the policemen and politicians, likewise, for these are the dust-licking pimps and slaves of the scum, there as well as elsewhere in America. Sekundärliteratur Ou Hsin-yun : Roughing it is a non-fictional account based on Twain's travels through Nevada and northern California in the 1860s. Chapter LIV focuses on the Chinese in Virginia city, Nevada, where the promising West was ironically also a land of racial prejudices, with white Christians acting against racial minorities. The accompanying illustrations exhibit nineteenth-century representations of Chinese physiognomy such as the queue and slit eyes, seemingly offering caricatures of negative personality. Some scholars suggest that Twain's writing still perpetuates racism, as it relies on the stereotypes in conventional yellowface minstrelsy. I would argue that, in expressing outrage at the abuse of Chinese laborers in California, Twain also attempts to criticize the injustices of his fellow countrymen, and to condemn American prejudice against the Chinese in spite of their peculiar appearance. Twain describes Chinese laborers who helped build the transcontinental railroad, and expresses indignation at anti-Chinese discrimination. He praises the diligence of the Chinese, and respects them for their virtues. He agrees with some of his contemporaries who appreciated the Chinese for their patience and peacefulness. Twain also mentions that, in April 1850, California enacted a tax on all foreigners working mining claims, but in fact the 'foreign' mining tax was usually inflicted on no foreigners but Chinese. Furthermore, he describes the Chinese as harmless sufferers of violence, and attacks the San Francisco police for their indifference, while stressing that he is merely describing what has really happened in his days. |
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| 8 | 1877.2 |
Twain, Mark ; Harte, Bret. Ah Sin [ID D29331]. The New York Times ; Aug. 1, 1877. http://twain.lib.virginia.edu/onstage/playscripts/ahsinrev03.html. Amusements : Fifth-Avenue Theatre. The representation of the play called "Ah Sin" at the Fifth Avenue Theatre yesterday evening afforded frequent gratification to a very large audience. The fact that a good many spectators grew perceptibly weary as the performance approached an end, and the still more significant fact that the audience left the house without making the slightest demonstration of pleasure when the curtain fell upon the last scene, may imply that the piece, as a whole, is scarcely likely to secure a really strong hold upon the favor of the public. But it is certain that there was much laughter and applause heard as "Ah Sin" progressed, and the causes of the merriment and plaudits appeared sufficiently numerous to give some vitality to the composition of which they are the principal element. It need hardly be said that Messrs. Bret Harte and Mark Twain's play is by no means a very dramatic or symmetrical work. Humorists, romance writers, and poets are never born and seldom become dramatists, and both authors of "Ah Sin" are now truing their 'prentice hand in seeking fame and fortune through the medium of the stage. "Ah Sin," however, is not so bad a piece as might have been anticipated. It has a plot, well-worn and transparent though it is at once discovered to be, and hence there is a reason for almost everything said or done during the disentanglement of the narrative. Its weakness lies in a paucity of striking events, in an almost invariable disregard of the absolute necessity of providing a strong tableau at the close of each act, and in a superabundance of dialogue, mainly coarse, and often inexcusably so, because it has not the excuse of being characteristic. Its merit is to be sought, firstly, in the somewhat novel personage who bestows his name upon the drama; secondly, as mentioned above, in its rather unexpected coherence, and, lastly, in the strange atmosphere into which it transports the listener. Most of the characters do not indeed differ in any essential traits from the everyday heroes and heroines of melodrama, but their language, their attire, and their surroundings breathe an air of freshness over the picture. M. Dennery might turn them into Frenchmen, Mr. Boucicault into Irishmen, and Mr. Daly into Massachusetts saints and sinners, but the charm of local color is of great weight in dealing with Messrs. Harte and Twain's joint production. And the character of Ah Sin has unquestionably originality and newness. The typical Chinaman, who acts, too, as a sort of deus ex machina, presents a variety of phases of Chinese humor, cleverness, and amusing rascality. His comical naiveté, his propensity to beg and steal, his far-seeing policy, thanks to which a happy denouement of this particular story is brought about, are happily illustrated. Naturally enough Ah Sin finally becomes a little monotonous; there is, however, so much idle gabble in he drama that his appearance is usually welcome. Of the serious business intrusted to the other personages there is, as we have said, more than a sufficiency. We shall, therefore, not waste much space upon the story of "Ah Sin." It turns upon the rascality of one Broderick, who all but murders Bill Plunkett--"the champion liar of Calaveras"--and then accuses York, a "gentleman miner," of the crime. Just as a committee of lynchers are about to act upon a verdict of guilty, Ah Sin fastens the guilt of the deed upon Broderick by the exhibition of the murderer's coat, which Broderick thought he had long since done away with, and Plunkett being subsequently brought into court safe and sound, the piece terminates happily. If Messrs. Harte and Twain had handled all their material as deftly as in the first act, "Ah Sin" would have been a very praiseworthy effort. Although the longest of the four divisions of the play, the first awakens interest and closes with an ingenious surprise. The second act, concluding with an attempt to arrest Ah Sin on a charge of murder, and with the flight of the "vigilantes," who are routed by Ah Sin expectorating water upon them as though he were dampening linen in the Chinese fashion, is tedious, and the third drags sadly. The vicissitudes of a trial before a "border jury" enliven the fourth act, which would round off the piece very neatly if something besides a scene of extravagant joy worthy a burlesque prefaced the fall of the curtain. "Ah Sin" was capitally acted, last night, and admirably placed upon the stage. Mr. Parsloe's Chinaman could scarcely be excelled in truthfulness to nature and freedom from caricature. Mr. P. A. Anderson pictured with marked force and freedom from conventionality Bill Plunkett. Mr. Davidge, as the "chief of the Vigilantes," distinguished himself especially in the trial scene, and the remaining male roles found suitable interpreters in Messrs. Crisp, Collier, Weaver, Varrey, and Vining Bowers. Among the softer sex Mrs. Gilbert bore off the honors, in a new rival of Mrs. Malaprop--Mrs. Plunkett by name. Much of the language put into Mrs. Plunkett's mouth is far from refined, but some of it is funny, though the character and her peculiarities are become well-nigh threadbare. A still more offensive type of femininity--Caroline Anastasia Plunkett--was represented by Miss Edith Blande with becoming masculinity. Miss Dora Goldthwaite endowed Shirley Tempest with appropriate personal charms, and finally, Miss Mary Wells did all that could be done with Mrs. Tempest. After the third act, Mr. Clemens stepped before the footlights, and delivered an address in his familiar vein, but with less than his wonted felicity of style and more than his wonted drawl. "Ah Sin" is to be repeated at the Fifth Avenue Theatre every evening until further notice. Sekundärliteratur 1989 James S. Moy : In keeping with tendencies in portrayals of other ethnic groups, the emergence of a play with a Chinese character in the title role, especially by the likes of Mark Twain and Bret Hart, would seem to suggest the assimilation of Chinese into the mainstream of American life. It becomes obvious that this is not the case. While it is not entirely clear why the appearance of such a Chinese character on the American stage does not follow the pattern of other ethnic immigrant populations, it is hoped that an examination of the tensions which define the space of the Chinese character in the American west will result in a deeper understanding of the position occupied by the Chinese on America's Western frontier. Since 1863 the Chinese had been forbidden the right to testify against whites in courts of law. This and other similar laws effectively legislated the Chinese out of existence as legal entities, giving rise to the saying that to have a 'Chinaman's chance' was to have no chance at all. Given the legal status of the Chinese, Ah Sin's participation in the play serves as a subversion of the existence, in the legal sense, of the Chinese character, but not one which promises a positive future. While Ah Sin cannot provide action in the play, it becomes clear that monetary exchange is the play's driving force. Ah Sin overcomes his scruples regarding complicity in illegal actions, when offered sufficient monetary return. As constituted within the American legal system of the nineteenth century, a good Chinaman came to be defined as one who made no impact whatsoever, or as Ah Sin announced : 'Me not done nothing, me good Chinaman'. 2010 Ou Hsin-yun : The play, a collaboration between Twain and Harte, was intended to exploit the success of the Chinese role in Harte's celebrated poem and his play 'Two men of Sandy bar', thought it was also based on Twain's 'Roughing it'. Twain's curtain speech for the New York production predicted the fate of the Chinese as the scapegoat for social problems, and emphasized : 'I wish to say also that this play is didactic rather than anything else. It is intended rather for instruction than amusement'. The play intervened in the national imaginary by revising the Chinese stereotypes on the American stage, and by challenging the contemporary ideology of racial minorities' inferiority. Ah Sin offers a favorable view of the Chinese on the Western frontier, in which Ah Sin's seemingly clumsy and idiotic imitative manners are presented in contrast to his final scheming victory. Ah Sin was short-lived, neither a success in the New York season nor on the road. Twain and Harte considered the Chinaman entitled to justice, the failure of Ah Sin might suggest, apart from its weak stagecraft, that the theatre audience on the East Coast, who was assured of white superiority, was not comfortable with the Chinese character's ability to manipulate the destiny of so many white characters. The play's presentation of a smart Chinese man during the peak of the anti-Chinese movement in the 1870s very likely contributed to its failure, because the audience could only enjoy a miserably clownish Chinamen, instead of a triumphantly dominant one. Twain argued against the injustices the Chinese suffered, anti-immigrationists adopted his seemingly negative portrayals of the Chinese to support their cause. |
Cited by (1)
| # | Year | Bibliographical Data | Type / Abbreviation | Linked Data |
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| 1 | 2000- | Asien-Orient-Institut Universität Zürich | Organisation / AOI |
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