SOURCE: Jiji, Vera. “The Plays of David Hwang: The Gaze of the Medusa.” In Staging the Rage: The Web of Misogyny in Modern Drama, edited by Katherine H. Burkman and Judith Roof, pp. 218-29. Madison, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1998.

In the following essay, Jiji studies the depiction of sexual roles, misogyny, and the interplay of dominance and submission in many relationships presented in Hwang's plays. Jiji argues that although Hwang attempts to reverse power roles, he still occasionally perpetuates gender myths.

I worry when I think about the coming millennium. Because it feels like all labels have to be rewritten, all assumptions reexamined, all associations redefined. The rules that governed behavior in the last era are crumbling, but those of the time to come have yet to be written. And there is a struggle brewing over the shape of these changing words, a struggle that begins...