Sexuality as a Performance in David Henry Hwang’s M. Butterfly

Abstract

David Henry Hwang’s M. Butterfly, through Rene Gallimard, a western diplomat stationed at Peking,challenges the traditional notion of identifying gender and sexuality. Gallimard had been a happily married man for years, until, he falls in love with Song Liling, a female, who is in fact a male.He was contend with the relationship with Song; however, when the reality is exposed, of him being used as a prey to milk important information to the east making a trap in oriental concept of beauty; he commits suicide to save his western ego of masculinity, because of his inability to save western masculinity.