Monday, November 15, 2010
How Mad Was He or Was He Mad At All
In reading Diary of a Madman you have to think back to the time of the 1900's. The story really tells a story of the Chinese and their opression. It tells of its history, especially its social life. The Chinese people at this time were literally starving to death and some cannibalism did take place. The main point of cannibalism was used to represent the man eater society in China. The survival of the fitest. Only the strong survive. The madman tells us, "Savage as a lion, timid as a rabbit, crafty as a fox"(Lu Xun 1925). The narrotor visits a pair of brothers who were very close to him while in school. One of the brothers, the youngest, was stricken with a mental defect or diesase. Later in life he became better, took a job, and moved to another city. He kept a diary during his sickness that the narrator was allowed to read. How many really mentally ill people would think to keep a diary of his times through their illness. The younger brother tells of his paranoia of the people around him. He tells of the way they look at him an even mentions the way the dog looks at him. He believes that they are cannabls and he is confident that he is going to be eaten. He decides his older brother is also a cannibal. He wonders if his brother has been one all along or if he goes with the flow knowing it is wrong. "If I'm going to curse cannibals, I'll have to start with him. And if I'm going to convert cannibals, I'll have to start with him too"(LU Xun 1925).
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I can not tell whether the cannibalism is meant in a literal sense or a symbolic sense for how the society and culture were in China. The literal sense of cannibalism is supported with the way people where treating him - “…there was something funny about the way the Venerable Old Zhao looked at me: seemed as though he was afraid of me and yet, at the same time, looked as though he had it in for me” (Lu Xun 1921). There is a definite history with the Chinese people and cannibalism, but society as a whole in the Chinese culture was and still is so strict.
ReplyDeleteI have to wonder if Lu Xun is saying that the man who is paranoid about cannibalism is really looking at his own life being devoured by society.As if everyone is out to get him and destroy him.i think he is speaking about society when he says "They want to eat others and at the same time they're afraid that other people are going to eat them.That's why they're always watching each other with such suspicious looks in their eyes" (Lu 1926). In saying this Lu Xun is stating that society is comparable to cannibalism and that everyone is out their trying to take what they can and that they are out for themselves.
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