Retelling a Story: Should You?

As with any good story, there are two sides and then there's the truth. In "No Named Women" by Maxine Hong Kingston, she is retelling the story of her aunt as told to her by her mother. I feel the like the story began as a game of telephone. "You must not tell anyone... what I am about to tell you. In China your father had a sister who killed herself. She jumped into the family well. We say that your father has all brothers because it is as if she had never been born" (1568). Kingston's mother heard this story from her village. Although Chinese culture seems to be very involved in the affairs of its villages, I still feel like it would be difficult to have all of the necessary information about a family other than your own. Even with some personal experience, it would be difficult to have all of the facts without speaking to the person(s) directly involved. In this situation and others like it, the gathering of necessary information is not possible. Writing from a modern perspective, I believe that Kingston is doing more harm than good by retelling the story of her aunt. The reason is because she feels haunted by her aunt's story. "My aunt haunts me--her ghost drawn to me because now, after fifty years of neglect, I alone devote pages of paper to her, though not origamied into houses or clothes" (1577). I believe this haunting felt by Kingston is due to the lack of adequate information. No one other than her aunt knows exactly how or why she ended up in the family well. Her family and others within the village have speculated or romanticized this fantastical story of dishonor over the years. Even Kingston finds herself filling in the blanks of her aunt's story. "And she might have separated the rapes from the rest of living if only she did not have to buy her oil from him or gather wood in the same forest. I want her fear to have lasted just as long as the raped lasted so that the fear could have been contained" (1571). Assumptions such as these are what causes harm. Understanding your heritage is important, but without all of the facts I think it's easy to get lost in ideas that are not reality. Sometimes things such as these are better left alone.