Reviews - The Woman Warrior

The Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston

752 reviews for:

Mmm, not a huge fan. Ought to write up a thinky review, with lots of discussion of representation and acknowledgment that it's unfair to expect every Chinese-American writer to describe the entire Chinese(-American) experience, but I am too lazy to do that right now. I think most of my issues with this book would've been solved if Hong Kingston stopped saying "Chinese blah blah blah", as if all Chinese people were one great homogeneous block and did the same thing, all the time and everywhere. (She kind of acknowledges this issue, in that she is like, I don't know what about me is Chinese and what is from my family and what is from the village etc. etc., but she then proceeds not to do anything about it.)

Also that kind of very deep ambivalence about being Chinese/Chinese culture is quite strange to me, so it kind of put me off. (As far as I can recall, Amy Tan had a similar thing -- like, you could tell she had Issues -- and similar issues with her mom.)

bookishgoblin's review against another edition

5.0

This completely blew me away. This book should be required reading for everyone, it's a beautiful work of art and I have such a deep respect for anyone willing to look to their family past and see something beautiful even if it's a distressing history. This isn't a coherent review because I'm still a bit emotional.

velvetcelestial's review against another edition

3.25

emotional medium-paced

fuckoff_imreading's review against another edition

4.5

emotional inspiring mysterious slow-paced

kxiong5's review against another edition

4.0

Unsure in some ways. Would like to reread, but it was a little too close to home and yet also discordant and odd in too-noticeable ways. Don’t know what to think...

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cremefracas's review against another edition

3.0

For me this book started out slow (not that it was bad, just that the beginning was not my taste). But I really liked the second half, which involved the daughter herself more. I'm glad I stuck it out.