63 pages • 2 hours read
Sui Sin Far (Edith Maude Eaton)Mrs Spring Fragrance
Fiction | Short Story Collection | Adult | Published in 1912A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Summary
Story Summaries & Analyses
“Mrs. Spring Fragrance”
“The Inferior Woman”
“The Wisdom of the New”
“Its Wavering Image”
“The Gift of Little Me”
“The Story of One White Woman Who Married a Chinese”
“Her Chinese Husband”
“The Americanizing of Pau Tsu”
“In the Land of the Free”
“The Chinese Lily”
“The Smuggling of Tie Co”
“The God of Restoration”
“The Three Souls of Ah So Nan”
“The Prize China Baby”
“Lin John”
“Tian Shan’s Kindred Spirit”
“The Sing Song Woman”
Character Analysis
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
Tools
Beta“The Sing Song Woman”Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Story Summary: “The Sing Song Woman,” Part 1
Ah Oi, the daughter of a fisherman, is a “despised actress in an American Chinatown” (135). She is lying on the floor of her room, looking through her window when her reverie is broken by footsteps outside her door. Her friend Mag-gee has been crying so hard that her makeup is smeared, giving her “a strange appearance” (135). Mag-gee, who is half Chinese and half white, tells Ah Oi: “I am to be married tonight to a Chinaman whom I have never seen” (135). Mag-gee says harsh things about Chinese men, but Ah Oi does not seem to take offense. Ah Oi quickly comes up with a plan to save her friend from this arranged marriage.
Story Summary: “The Sing Song Woman,” Part 2
Ah Oi stands in for Mag-gee at the wedding. When the veil is lifted, there is “a wild cry of anger and surprise” (136). Wedding guests point at Ah Oi and cry out, “The Sing Song Woman! The Sing Song Woman!” (136). The outcry confuses the groom, Ke Leang, who has never met Mag-gee. Mag-gee’s father, Hwuy Yen, walks threateningly toward Ah Oi, and Ke Leang stands between the “father-in-law” and his new bride, protecting her from the man’s anger.
Hwuy Yen tells Ke Leang they have been tricked and that this is not his daughter. He asks Ah Oi where Mag-gee is, and she laughs, saying, “Mag-gee has gone to eat beef and potatoes with a white man” (137).
Ke Leang asks Ah Oi to justify herself. Taken with his kindness, Ah Oi says to him, “You justify me” (137). Ke Leang turns to the crowd and defends her:
The daughter of Hwuy Yen cared not to become my bride and has sought her happiness with another. Ah Oi, having a kind heart, helped her to that happiness, and tried to recompense me my loss by giving me herself. She has been unwise and indiscreet; but the good that is in her is more than the evil, and now that she is my wife, none shall say a word against her(137).
When Ah Oi tells Ke Leang that he is giving her too much credit, he hushes her, and says, “I will marry you again and take you to China” (138). Ke Leang’s kindness breaks something open in Ah Oi, and crying, she tells him: “Oh, sir […] it takes a heart to make a heart, and you have put one today in the bosom of a Sing Song Woman” (138).
“The Sing Song Woman” Analysis
Ah Oi is reviled by members of her own community. She is relegated to the outskirts of society and treated as a fallen woman by the more “upstanding” citizens of Chinatown. The treatment she has received, especially by men, has made her hard-hearted and willing to flout custom. It is only when she experiences kindness that she feels herself soften. Ke Leang is a good-looking, strong, forgiving man who can change Ah Oi’s status with a single word. It shows the vulnerable state of women in traditional society.
