ABSTRACT
A well-adapted naturalized US citizen, Chiang is a far cry from the female hero in Hualing Nieh's novel Mulberry and Peach, While Chiang was able to garner international reputation and eventually revisited China as an esteemed guest, Hualing Nieh's female protagonist Mulberry/Peach not only fails to secure US citizenship but also cannot secure a home country for a celebrated return. This chapter focuses on Sau-ling Wong's theorization of textual coalition in her pioneering book on Asian American literary criticism, Reading Asian American Literature: From Necessity to Extravagance. It looks at "homelessness" and "rootlessness" as a strategy of resistance along the line of Gilles Deleuze's notion of nomadology. While male critics like Hsien-yung Pai and Leo Lee regard Peach's unrestrained sexuality as her downfall, and her schizophrenia as an indication of her weakness, the chapter considers her schizophrenia a defiant act against not only patriarchy but also Confucianism, as championed by the Chinese culture.
