SOURCE: Pao, Angela. “The Critic and the Butterfly: Sociocultural Contexts and the Reception of David Henry Hwang's M. Butterfly.” Amerasia Journal 18, no. 3 (1992): 1-16.

In the following essay, Pao evaluates the positive and negative criticism Hwang's M. Butterfly has received. Pao contends that many of the negative reviews came from critics who were not receptive to the artistic endeavor or were unable to comprehend the meaning and the concepts of the play. Pao faults the reviews and not Hwang for this incomprehension.

Since the Broadway première of M. Butterfly in March 1988, there has been considerable debate over the representations and implications of the play. Asian Americans have been concerned primarily about the play's influence on Euroamerican perceptions of the Asian American community. While playwright David Henry Hwang conceived of his work as a critique of the racism, imperialism, and sexism implicit in East/West relations of the past...