Summary of “The Paper Menagerie”
Introduction
In Ken Liu’s short story “The Paper Menagerie”, the protagonist, Jack, reflects on his childhood and the relationship with his mother, who is a Chinese immigrant. The story explores the themes of love, cultural identity, and the distance that can grow between immigrant parents and their children. Central to the story is the origami art that Jack’s mother practices, making paper animals that come to life through her magic. The story blends elements of science fiction with a deeply emotional family drama.
Jack’s Happy Childhood
The story opens with Jack’s mother making a paper tiger (Laohu in Chinese) for him in order to soothe him. Jack likes it and plays with it. Jack’s mother has a special magic skill. She breathes into her paper animals and they come alive.
Jack’s father is an American. But his mother comes from China where she learned the magical art of creating paper animals. Jack’s father, perhaps, had a liking for Asian wife and picked her out of a catalogue by falling for her as soon as he saw her picture there.
Her new life in Connecticut, America is challenging, as she struggles with language barriers and the complexities of assimilating into a new culture.
But when Jack is born, she is very happy and spends her time raising her child and playing with him with her paper animals. She makes various such animals like a deer, a goat, a water buffalo and even a shark – all out of colourful wrapping paper which she saved on top of the fridge from the Christmas Gifts.
Jack has a happy childhood with his mother and all her magical paper animals. Sometimes, Laohu, the paper tiger would chase the other animals and press them down until the air gets out of them. Once the water buffalo jumped into a dish of soy sauce. When Jack puts the paper shark in the sink filled with water, it gets soggy and his mother has to make a new one out of tinfoil, so that it doesn’t get wet again.
Jack’s Embarrassment and Growing Tensions
The problem begins when Jack is ten and they move to a new house across town. One day he overhears two neighbour women talking about the mismatch between Jack’s parents. They even talk lowly about Jack’s looks and their Chinese language and culture.
Mark, one of the neighbourhood boys comes with his Star Wars action figures to play with Jack and laughs at her paper animals made out of ‘trash’, calling them ‘stupid cheap Chinese garbage’. Jack with Laohu has a fight with Mark.
But his fight with Mark doesn’t end here. It continues in his school in the following two weeks. After the two weeks of school when Jack returns home, he is completely changed now.
He is now embarrassed with his ‘chink face’ as remarked by other boys in school. He is ashamed of his resembling his Chinese mother. He is ashamed of Chinese food, and above all, of Chinese language. “We should eat American food”, Jack says while pushing the chopsticks and the bowl away. He commands his mother, “English, speak English.”
Jack’s Dad tells her that it was going to happen someday and she needs to try and learn English. She explains that in Chinese she can convey her feeling more accurately. For example, when she says ‘love’ she feels it in her lips but when she says ‘ai’ in Chinese, she feels it by heart.
However, Jack embraces the American culture by both hands. He buys a full set of Star Wars action figures. He plays video games and studies French.
He now has no interest in the paper animals anymore. He packs the paper menagerie in a shoebox and puts it under the bed. When they escape from the box and take their old favourite spots, Jack catches them again and puts them back into the shoebox, taping the lid shut. But the animals make noise. So he finally throws the box into the corner of the attic, far away from his room.
Jack even refuses to answer her mother if she speaks to him in Chinese. She tries hard to speak English, but it sounds poor. So, eventually, she stops speaking altogether when Jack is around. She rather uses gestures to communicate with him. She even tries to imitate the American culture as she sees on TV in order to please Jack. But he finds her movements ‘exaggerated, uncertain, ridiculous and graceless’. Seeing him annoyed, she stops all this.
Jack’s Dad tries to make Jack understand his mother’s problem, but in vain. He is also troubled with the realisation that his expectation of a Chinese peasant girl to fit in the American society was probably a mistake.
Jack’s Mom learns to cook American style. Sometimes she makes a paper animal, trying to maintain the bond she once shared with her son. But Jack dislikes those animals now. He just catches, squeezes the air out of them and stuffs them away in the box in the attic. She finally stops making paper animals when Jack is in high school. And by the time her English becomes better, he has no interest in what she has to say. That childhood bond between them is completely gone.
Mother’s Illness and Death
Jack’s mother gets seriously ill and hospitalised before she becomes forty. She looks much older than her age. She has refused treatment for years of her pain and now the cancer has spread beyond the limits of surgery.
Jack and his Dad both are present in the hospital room, one on each side of her. But Jack’s mind is not in the room. He is thinking of the on-campus recruiting season, resumes, transcripts and interview schedules. He is afraid of missing his flight.
When Jack’s Dad leaves, she tells Jack not to be too sad and hurt his health if she doesn’t recover. She says to him, “Just keep that box you have in the attic with you, and every year, at Qingming, just take it out and think about me. I’ll be with you always.”
Qingming is the Chinese festival for the Dead. When Jack was young, his Mom used to write a letter on Qingming to her dead parents back in China. “Haizi, mama ai ni” (Mom loves you) are her last words to Jack. She coughs repeatedly while speaking.
Dad comes back and Jack leaves. His Mom dies when his plane is somewhere over Nevada.
Mom’s Letter and Jack’s Realisation
Jack’s Dad ages rapidly after his Mom’s death. When he decides to sell the house as it is too big for him, Jack and his girlfriend Susan goes to help him with packing and all. Susan finds the shoebox in the attic and likes the paper animals, faded with time. She feels Jack’s Mom was ‘an amazing artist’.
One day, two years after his Mom’s death, when Susan is out on her job trip, Jack stumbles upon a documentary on sharks on the TV and it reminds him of his Mom making the tinfoil shark in his childhood, while Laohu and he watched on. Soon, he hears a rustling sound, and finds a ball of paper on the floor. As he picks it up, it unfurls itself and it is Laohu, the paper tiger. As he tries to interact with Laohu, it gets up into his lap and unfolds itself. It was a handwritten letter of his mother written to him in Chinese. He quickly searches the internet and comes to know that today is Qingming.
Jack takes the help of a young woman to read the letter. In the letter Jack’s Mom describes her poverty-stricken childhood in her native village of Sigulu in Hebei Province, how she learned the art of paper creatures from her mother, how after becoming an orphan she was smuggled to Hong Kong, how the Chin family there bought her and ill-treated her for six years and how she got into the catalogue from where her husband picked her.
In the letter she states her feelings and hopes at Jack’s birth. She was very happy with him and got a new lease of life in the midst of the uncomfortable American society. She also writes how devastated she felt when Jack stopped talking to her and won’t let her speak in Chinese. She felt she was losing all over again.
Jack experiences overwhelming regret. He understands that the paper animals were not just magical creations, but expressions of love, cultural connection, and the mother’s desire for him to understand and appreciate his roots. His realization comes far too late, and Jack is left with an immense sense of loss, as he realizes that he never truly understood his mother’s love.
Critical Analysis of “The Paper Menagerie”
Publication and Context
“The Paper Menagerie” was first published in 2011 in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. The context of the story is deeply tied to the Chinese-American experience and the immigrant identity, with themes of cultural assimilation, generational gaps, and the loss of language and tradition. Liu, as a Chinese-American author, brings a unique perspective to the narrative, blending his cultural heritage with speculative fiction.
It won the Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Awards, making it the first work to win all three major speculative fiction awards.
Narrative Technique
The story is told from the first-person perspective of Jack, allowing the reader to experience his inner conflict and emotional growth firsthand. This perspective deepens the emotional impact of the narrative, as we see the world through his eyes, from the innocent wonder of his early years to the regret and sorrow he feels as an adult.
The story’s structure shifts between past and present, with flashbacks to Jack’s childhood woven throughout the narrative. This non-linear progression emphasizes the distance between Jack’s earlier innocence and the disillusionment that comes with maturity.
Themes
- Cultural Identity: The story grapples with the idea of balancing one’s cultural heritage with the desire to assimilate into American society. Jack’s rejection of his mother’s Chinese culture reflects the internal conflict that many children of immigrants face.
- The Bond Between Parent and Child: The relationship between Jack and his mother is central to the story. The paper animals symbolize not only the love between them but also the sacrifices the mother makes for her child, often going unrecognized by him.
- Regret and Lost Opportunities: The story explores the theme of regret, particularly Jack’s realization too late that he has neglected his mother’s love and the significance of the traditions she tried to pass on. This theme is amplified by the magical realism element—the fading of the paper animals symbolizes the fading of the cultural connection and, more tragically, the loss of the mother.
Symbols
- The Paper Animals: These represent the mother’s love and her connection to her homeland. They also symbolize the traditions and cultural values that are passed down through generations, often overlooked or forgotten by those who assimilate into a different culture.
- The Chinese Language: The language barrier in the story signifies the emotional distance between Jack and his mother as he grows older. It also represents the broader linguistic and cultural gaps that exist between immigrant parents and their children, particularly when those children begin to assimilate into mainstream American society.
- The Mother’s Illness: The mother’s declining health symbolizes the fading of cultural traditions and the generational gap that develops between immigrants and their children. Her physical decline mirrors the emotional distance between her and Jack.
Conclusion
“The Paper Menagerie” is a poignant and beautifully crafted story that blends magical realism with the exploration of cultural identity and family dynamics. Ken Liu’s writing effectively captures the tension between tradition and assimilation, using the powerful symbol of paper animals to evoke the deep emotional connections that bind family members together. The story highlights the often-painful process of growing up, the loss of innocence, and the regret that comes with the realization of what has been lost. It is a meditation on love, sacrifice, and the complexities of identity, making it a deeply resonant and emotionally charged narrative.