Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress - Essay Example onto his country and as the result of purges a great number of intellectual people were sent to the so-called reeducation camps thus â€Å"ignorance was in fashion†. As in the story by Dai Sijie, two young sons of doctors were sent to a remote village to such a camp. Having a very slim chance of ever being allowed back to the city, the boys had to adjust to the life in the village; they had to endure humiliation and hard labor. The only books they were allowed to read were books approved by communists. Even playing the music could be dangerous if it was not a music approved by Chairman Mao. Most members of village the Narrator and Luo were sent to were illiterate and had low aspirations. They were uneducated: a clock was a novelty for them and, more so, the violin, which they considered a toy. The only person who ever saw such musical instrument was the tailor. However, he never heard the music it played. The â€Å"revolutionary peasants† were very ignorant. When Luo contracted malaria, the choice of cure was weeping and a â€Å"shock treatment† in the ice-cold water. When the narrator and Luo met a very beautiful little seamstress and her father, both of the young man became attracted to her. Luo confessed, though, that she was â€Å"too uncivilized† for him to fall in love. When, through the series of events, the Narrator and Luo obtained the â€Å"forbidden books†, they also started reading it to the Little Seamstress. Everyone felt the transformative power of the books. The Narrator told about the effect the book had on him: â€Å"To me it was the ultimate book: once you read it, neither your own life nor the world you lived in would ever look the same. ¨ (Sijie 107). The effect the book had on the little Seamstress was even greater. Her uneducated mind became a fertile soil for the new ideas that were coming from books. The life in the city fascinated her. In fact, the book reading or story telling became a favorite entertainment in Phoenix Mountain villages. The