Wives and concubines

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wives and Concubines is a novel by Su Tong that describes a college girl whose mind is broken by the concubine system in 1930s China. It was made into a film in 1991. It has since been republished in the United States under the title Raise the Red Lantern in order to capitalize on the success of the film.

[edit] Plot summary

Lotus is attending college when her father's tea business goes bankrupt and he commits suicide. She chooses to become a concubine in the rich Chen household in order to avoid having to work. From the beginning, she does not fit into the household with its three other wives. Initially, the first mistress Joy ignores her, the second mistress Cloud befriends her, and the third mistress Coral acts with outright hostility. Coral goes so far as to interrupt Lotus's wedding night with the lie that she has taken ill. In spite of this, Lotus is favored by Chen.

Shortly after her arrival, Chen's elder son Feipu, who is older than Lotus, comes home. He favors Lotus's company and she begins to fall for him, especially because he plays the flute so well and movingly. Meanwhile, one evening when they are playing mahjong, Lotus notices that Coral is flirting with a doctor.

Swallow, Lotus's special servant, hates her and neglects her duties whenever possible. One day, Lotus accuses Swallow of stealing her flute and searches Swallow's trunk. Instead of finding the flute, she finds a doll with pins stuck in its chest. The doll has "Lotus" written on it, and Lotus demands to know who wrote the word for the illiterate Swallow. It is revealed that Cloud was the one who helped her.

That night, Chen Zuoqian admits that he was the one who stole and destroyed her flute because he was afraid it was a lover's token. Instead of forgiving him, she bursts into tears and he leaves her. Cloud asks Lotus to cut her hair the next morning, and Lotus cuts her ear. Coral is impressed by Lotus's action and warms further to her. She reveals that Cloud attempted to abort Coral's child Feilan when they were both pregnant.

When Chen Zuoqian celebrates his 50th birthday, more domestic strife breaks out. Feilan and Yirong (Cloud's child) knock over a vase and the resulting fight gives Lotus a headache. She goes outside to help it go away and instead she ends up next to an abandoned well in which three concubines of previous husbands had died. She has a hallucination in which a hand reaches out of the well water and a voice tells her to come down.

Shaken, she returns to the party. Chen Zuoqian is extremely angry with her and he barely acknowledges her gift. Unfortunately, her gift is less expensive than the others'. She tries to make up for it by kissing Chen, but he gets angry. She leaves the room weeping.

Feipu arrives with his flute teacher and friend, Young Master Gu, as well as a replacement flute for Lotus. Joy interrupts the flute lesson, however, and Young Master Gu leaves because the mood is destroyed by Feipu's absence. Afterwards, Feipu tells Lotus she is different from other women, who frighten him, and leaves on a business trip.

Chen Zuoqian finally deigns to see Lotus. He is impotent for some reason, however, and does not know how to get an erection. Finally he asks Lotus whether she would be willing to have anal sex. She refuses and begins to cry. Chen leaves her in disgust. With the exception of Cloud, the other mistresses seem to have refused the same request. As a result, Chen favors Cloud more. Coral cannot stand this and hires a boy to beat up Cloud's daughter Yirong.

Lotus finds a drawing of her on a piece of soiled toilet paper and confronts Swallow with it. Swallow is afraid at being caught and does not want to be sent away. In a fit of anger, Lotus tells her to eat the toilet paper or be forced out of the Chen household. Swallow catches typhoid and Chen is infuriated with Lotus.

Lotus realizes that her twentieth birthday has gone by and determines to celebrate. When the new servant returns with wine, she announces Swallow has died. Lotus is regretful but says that "dying is better than living." Feipu arrives and a tipsy Lotus reveals how she feels about him. Feipu confesses that he likes her but he is too afriad of women to do anything. After he leaves in shame, Lotus gets very drunk and has a hallucination in which Swallow kills her.

The next morning, Lotus wakes up to see Coral leaving for town. When she comes back, she is escorted by several male servants; Cloud has caught her and the doctor in bed. Coral is locked in her room. That night, Lotus sits up expecting Swallow to return. Instead, she sees Coral taken from her room and thrown into the abandoned well that has been haunting Lotus since her arrival. Witnessing this murder is the final straw, and Lotus goes insane.