Bernard Boursicot

Bernard Boursicot (born 1944) is a French diplomat who was caught in a honeypot trap (seducing him to participate in Chinese espionage), by Shi Pei Pu, a male Peking opera singer who performed female roles, whom Boursicot believed to be female. This espionage case became something of a cause célèbre in France in 1986, as Boursicot and Shi were brought to trial, due to the nature of the unusual sexual subterfuge alleged.^[1] The case was again back under a public spotlight when a play loosely based on this affair, M. Butterfly by David Henry Hwang, premiered in 1988 and yet again as the film adaptation of the play of the same name directed by David Cronenberg was released in 1993. Periodic re-stagings of the play and television airings of the film based on it continue to spark interest in the espionage case at the heart of the fictional works of art.

Biography

Boursicot was born in 1944 and first met Shi Pei Pu in China while posted to the French Embassy in Peking as an accountant in 1964. He was 20 years old and Shi was 26. They met at an embassy reception and shortly began a relationship.^[2]

Spy

In 1965, Shi claimed to be pregnant and was able to use a baby, called Shi Du Du (later called Bernard by Boursicot and his family), who had been bought from a doctor in the Xinjiang province of China.^[3] Over the next decade, they continued their on-again off-again affair as Boursicot moved from posting to posting in Southeast Asia. Boursicot has stated that he began passing documents to Shi when the Chinese Cultural Revolution made it difficult for him to see her. He was approached by Kang Sheng, a member of the Chinese secret service who offered him access to Shi in exchange for his passing documents. He believed Shi's safety was at risk if he failed to participate.^[4][5]

Return to France, trial and aftermath

Boursicot returned to France in 1979 and lost contact with Shi. In 1982, Boursicot was able to get the now 16-year-old Shi Du Du out of China and to Paris where they lived as a family. Boursicot was questioned by authorities and confessed to having passed at least 150 classified documents to Shi.^[4] In 1983, Boursicot and Shi Pei Pu were arrested for spying for China.^[6] The prosecution then dramatically revealed Shi's real sex to Boursicot. He refused to believe it until he was permitted to see proof in the form of Shi's body. Not long after, he attempted suicide while in prison but was unsuccessful.^[2] In 1986, after a two-day trial, Boursicot and Shi were convicted of spying against the French government. Each received a sentence of six years in prison.

Shi was pardoned in 1987.^[7] After his release Shi remained in Paris, where he enjoyed his notoriety and performed as an opera singer.^[8][9] Boursicot, also released early, was last reported to be living contentedly with a longtime male partner and has apparently made peace with the nature of his relationship with Shi. Shi and Shi Dudu had no contact with Boursicot until Shi's death in 2009. In Shi's obituary, it was reported that Shi Dudu was living in Paris and believed by Boursicot to have a family with three sons.^[10]

Cooperation with Joyce Wadler, author of Liaison

Boursicot cooperated fully with reporter Joyce Wadler, seeking information for her book on the espionage case and affair, Liaison, granting her lengthy interviews about deeply personal subjects as well as access to all records and his closest family members. He is frequently quoted in the book.

In a separate but lengthy article, published in the New York Times Sunday Magazine section in 1993, titled "The True Story of M. Butterfly; The Spy Who Fell in Love With a Shadow," Wadler reveals in intimate detail how Boursicot came to believe the fiction that Shi Pei Pu was a woman despite having first come to know him socially, and in a close friendship, as a man.

Boursicot relates, through Wadler, that Shi first told him the story of an opera about a Chinese girl who swaps clothing with her brother so she may be educated. She falls in love with another student but is called home to participate in an arranged marriage. The male student is driven to suicide and, eventually, the girl does the same at the grave of her true love. The opera is called the story of the butterfly. Boursicot reports that it is only when he has the opportunity to leave his dull job that Shi Pei Pu tells him the story of the butterfly again with an added twist that he, Shi Pei Pu, has been a woman masquerading as a man all his life to prevent his father from taking a second wife and shaming his mother who had two older daughters. Upon Shi's birth, this fiction was created. Boursicot accepts the lie, their affair begins and all that came after.^[11]

Boursicot's and Shi Pei Pu's public comments regarding their affair

In his obituary, Shi Pei Pu was reported to have disliked answering questions about the sexual specifics of the affair; in 1988 he was quoted in an interview as having said "I used to fascinate both men and women. What I was and what they were didn’t matter."^[12]

About the affair, Boursicot is quoted as saying, "When I believed it, it was a beautiful story."^[2]

Legacy of the affair and espionage case

• The play M. Butterfly by David Henry Hwang is based on this affair as is the 1993 movie of the same name directed by David Cronenberg.
• Kang Sheng, Shi Pei Pu's control agent in the Tewu, the Chinese Secret Service, has had his career covered in a book The Chinese Secret Service.^[13]

See also

• Chevalier d'Eon

References