Monday, March 29, 2010

Bound by Donna Jo Napoli (2004)

I came upon this young adult book when looking to see what we have on Chinese foot binding. I have never read anything by Napoli, but I saw she had a shelf full of interesting young adult books. This is a Chinese version of the Cindarella tale, where the lovely stepdaughter has naturally small feet, but her stepsister has large feet that the mother is binding to get her a husband. The Cindarella part of the story happens relatively quickly in the last few chapters, but most concentrates on the village life, the disability caused by the bound feet, the relationship between the mother, daughter, stepdaughter and spirits of the dead parents.

I also went and looked at some of the foot binding books we have. I knew the feet were deformed by this process, but when I saw some of the photos of the mis-formed feet with very thick heels and tiny scrunched toes, I was quite revolted. And this was supposed to be the height of eroticism? OK, the little slippers were cute, but for guys to swoon over these small feet, even though if they actually saw or touched these mis-formed feet I don't know how they could be called little lotus flowers. I understood that the women kept some bindings on at all times, so the men didn't see these feet bare. Never mind that the women could barely walk and do their chores, plus were in pain much of the time.

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