Who is Anna Leonowens

nna, a British governess has come to Siam at the request of the King. She is to teach his many young children about the world. She brings with her Louis, her nine- or ten-year-old son and a photograph of her beloved dead husband, Tom. Anna is a strong-willed woman who shows her character immediately by demanding that the King provide her with the house outside the palace walls that she had stipulated in her negotiations with him. She is also a warm-hearted woman, however, and the instant she meets the King's charming children, she submits to live in the palace "for now." She makes it clear, however, that the issue of the separate home is not over. In other ways, too, Anna defies the authority and machismo of the King, as when she deliberately orders a new map to replace the King's map that showed Siam in exaggerated proportions. She is, as the King wanted her to be, a "scientific person" which is why the King's many wives and children insist on calling her' "Sir." Lady Thiang explains that they call her this because she is "scientific, not lowly like woman." Throughout the play, Anna's soft-hearted, womanly side vies with her precise, rational side in dealing with the King's traditional, chauvinistic attitude toward all women, even her. She finally wins her battle with the King for a house, but she does so through womanly charm rather than through scientific logic.