"R “The Chinese Woman in America” Sui Seen Far [Edith Eaton] Born in Cheshire, England, to an English father, Edward Eaton, and a Chinese mother, Grace Trepesis (or Trefusious), Edith Maud Eaton (1865–1914) wrote for the Canadian Montreal Star and Dominion Illustrated, and brie?y for the Kingston, Jamaica, Gall’s Daily News Letter, before moving to a series of cities, primarily on the West Coast of the United States, in search of work. Adopting a number of pseudonyms during her career, including Fire Fly, Sui Seen Far, Sui Sin Far, and even a male persona Wing Sing, she crafted essays and stories that often challenged the prevailing “yellow peril” rhetoric in the white press, even as they perpetuated Asian stereotypes. The New Woman is a prominent theme in much of Eaton’s work. In “The Story of Iso,” written in 1896 for the Kansas City–based journal the Lotus, Sui Seen Far depicts a rebellious Chinese daughter who criticizes male privilege and, after speaking to a mysterious “red-headed stranger,” rejects ancestor worship and arranged marriages. Writing for the Gall’s Daily News Letter in Jamaica in 1897, society columnist Fire Fly offered a defense of the female bicyclist, the divided skirt, and the bicycle generally as “the greatest temperance reformer of the present day, for no man can drink and bicycle.” And in a number of her stories collected in Mrs. Spring Fragrance (1912), she endorsed some aspects of the New Woman even as she criticized what she saw as the unacknowledged class bias and sel?sh indi- 1 vidualism of American men and women advocating New Woman causes. Sui Seen Far’s “The Chinese Woman in America” was published in the Land of Sunshine: An Illustrated Monthly of Southern California, which originally was Land of Sunshine (Los Angeles), Jan. 1897, 59–64. 140temperance, social purity, and maternalism 141 conceived as a magazine to promote southern California; it received signi?cant backing from the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce. When in 1895 Charles F. Lummis accepted the offer to edit the magazine, however, he envisioned it as more than a vehicle for regional boosterism. Characterizing the magazine as “exclusively Western in text, unswervingly American in spirit,” Lummis believed the West’s often maligned ethnic populations could temper the fervent entrepre- neurial spirit of Anglo-Saxons by adding “to them something of the charm of a less anxious and more contented spirit.” Lummis advocated miscegenation, Indian rights, and historic preservation and decried lynching, the Indian indus- trial school movement, anti-Chinese prejudice, and U.S. imperialism. The heav- ily illustrated magazine sold for ten cents an issue or a dollar a year, and although Lummis claimed in 1899 that the magazine had 50,000 readers, the actual circu- 2 lation that year was closer to 10,000. The photographs that accompanied Sui Seen Far’s essay emphasized the exotic nature of her subject. One depicted a Chinese bride, and the other two showed Chinese mothers seated with their children; in these last two photographs the women were wearing traditional Chinese dress, their expressions remote. Yet even though Sui Seen Far makes the Chinese woman in America seem an exotic ethnic Other, she refutes the popular conception of the Chinese woman as pros- titute; by dressing for herself alone, the Chinese woman eschews the corruptive potential of the male and female gaze alike. With her commitment to her family, the Chinese “New Woman” promises none of the social divisiveness of her 3 American counterpart. With her quaint manners and old-fashioned mode of life, she carries our minds back to times almost as ancient as the earth we live on. She is a bit of olden Oriental coloring amidst our modern Western lights and shades; and though her years be few, she is yet a relic of antiquity. Even the dress she wears is cut in a fashion designed centuries ago, and is the same today as when the ?rst nonfabulous Empress of China begged her husband to buy her a new dress—of a tunic, a pair of trousers and a divided skirt, all of ?nest silk and embroidered in many colors. A Chinese woman in a remote age invented the divided skirt, so it is not a “New Woman” invention. The Chinese woman in America differs from all others who come to live their lives here, in that she seeks not our companionship, makes no attempt to know us, adopts not our ways and heeds not our customs. She lives among us, but is as iso- lated as if she and the few Chinese relations who may happen to live near were the only human beings in the world. So if you wish to become acquainted with her, if you wish to glean some knowl- edge of a type of which very little is known, you must seek her out. She will be pleased with your advances and welcome you with demure politeness, but you might wait for all eternity and she would not come to you.142 american new woman revisited Having broken the ice, you ?nd that her former reserve was due to her training, and that she is not nearly so shy as report makes her. You also ?nd, despite the pop- ular idea that the Chinese are a phlegmatic people, that she is brimful of feelings and impressions and has sensibilities as acute as a child’s. That she is content to live narrowly, restricted to the society of one man and perhaps a couple of females, does not prove lack of imagination; but merely that she is ignorant of any other life. She was born in China, probably in Canton or near that city. When a little girl, she played Shuttlecock, Guessing Pennies and Blind Man’s Bluff with childish playfel- lows, boys and girls; and grandfather and uncles kept her awake, when her mother put her to bed, by telling her stories of hobgoblins and ghosts. Amongst her mem- ories of home are little pagodas before which she and her brothers and sisters were taught to burn incense, and an image of a goddess called “Mother,” to whom she used to kneel till her little knees ached. Until about twelve years old, she enjoyed almost as much healthful liberty as an American child; but in China it is not deemed proper for girls beyond that age to have boy playmates. Then she learned to sew and embroider, to do light cooking and sing simple bal- lads. She was taught that whilst with them, her ?rst duty was obedience to her father and mother; and after marriage, to her husband and his parents. She never had a sweetheart, but with girl friends would pass the hours in describing the beau- ties and virtues of future husbands. In spite of these restraints, her years slipped away happily until time came for her to become an American bride—for the Chinese woman who comes to America generally comes as a bride, having been sent for by some Chinaman who has been some years in the States or in Canada and has prospered in business. She has never seen her future husband, she has never perhaps ventured outside her native village; yet upon being apprised that for good and valuable consideration— for the expectant bridegroom, like Isaac of old when courting Rebecca, sends pres- ents of silver and presents of gold to the parents or guardians of his chosen—she must leave home and friends and native land, she cheerfully sets about preparing for her journey. She may shed a few tears upon her mother’s breast and surrepti- tiously hug her little sisters; but on the whole, she is pleased.... The bride comes from a respectable middle-class Chinese family. Aristocratic or wealthy people would not give a daughter to a man living in exile; and Wah Ling, being a big enough man to keep a wife in America, feels himself too big to take a girl from the laboring classes. He wishes his friends to think that he marries well; if he were to choose a girl of mean condition he might he ridiculed. The Chinaman knows little of natural selection; though in his youth he had a sweetheart, when he wants a wife he sends for a stranger. In China it is deemed altogether wrong for girls “in society” to have men acquain- tances; but very poor girls choose their associates as they please without causing remark. Now and then a poverty stricken or outcast maid wins the heart of a Chinaman brave enough to marry her in spite of what his world may say; but such cases are rare. Very few Chinamen are introduced to their wives until after marriage.temperance, social purity, and maternalism 143 The Chinese woman in America lives generally in the upstairs apartments of her husband’s dwelling. He looks well after her comfort and provides all her little mind can wish. Her apartments are furnished in American style; but many Chinese orna- ments decorate the tables and walls, and on the sides of the room are hung long bamboo panels covered with paper or silk on which are painted Chinese good-luck characters. In a curtained alcove of an inner room can be discerned an incense vase, an ancestral tablet, a kneeling stool, a pair of candlesticks—my lady-from-China’s private chapel. She will show you all her pretty ornaments, her jewelry and ?ne clothing, but never invite you near her private chapel. There she burns incense to her favorite goddess and prays that a son may be born to her, that her husband may be kind, and that she may live to die in China—the country which heaven loves.... While there are some truly pleasant to behold, with their little soft faces, oval eyes, small round months and raven hair, the ordinary Chinese woman does not strike an observer as lovely. She is, however, always odd and interesting. Needless to say she is vain. Vanity is almost as much part of a woman’s nature as of a man’s; but the Chinese woman’s vanity is not that of an American woman. The ordinary American dresses for the eyes of her friends and enemies—particularly the latter—and derives small pleasure from her prettiest things unless they are seen by others. A Chinese woman paints and powders, dresses and bejewels herself for her own pleasure; puts rings on her ?ngers and bracelets on her arms—and carefully hides herself from the gaze of strangers. If she has Golden Lily feet (Chinese small feet) she is proudly conscious of it; but should she become aware that a stranger is 4 trying to obtain a glimpse of them, they quickly disappear under her skirt. She is deeply interested in all matters of dress; and, if an American woman calls on her, will politely examine the visitor’s clothing, with many an expression of admira- tion. She will even acknowledge the American dress prettier than her own, but you could not persuade her to adopt it. She is interested in all you may tell her about America and Americans; she has a certain admiration for the ways of the foreigner; but nothing can change her reverence for the manners and customs of her own country. “Why do you do that in such a way?” she is asked, and her answer is, “Oh, because that is Chinese way.” “Do it like this,” she is told. She shakes her head smilingly: “No, that not Chinese way.” As a mother, she resembles any other young mother—a tri?e more childish, per- haps, than young American matrons, but just as devoted. When the baby seems well, she is all smiles and Chinese baby-talk; when he is ill, or she fancies so, she weeps copiously and cannot be comforted. She dresses him in Chinese dress, shaves his head and strings amulets on his neck, wrists and ankles. She is very superstitious with regard to her child, and should you happen to know the date and hour of his birth, she begs with tears that you will not tell, for should some enemy know, he or she may cast a horoscope which would make the child’s life unfortunate. Do not imagine for an instant that she is dull of comprehension and unable to distinguish friendly visitors from those who merely call to amuse themselves at her"