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Imagery
Explanation and Analysis—Meeting the Tiger:
When capturing the aliveness of the first paper animal that Jack’s mother makes for him, Liu uses imagery, as seen in the following passage:
I reached out to Mom’s creation. Its tail twitched, and it pounced playfully at my finger. “Rawrr-sa,” it growled, the sound somewhere between a cat and rustling newspapers.
I laughed, startled, and stroked its back with my index finger. The paper tiger vibrated under my finger, purring.
Liu uses imagery here in order to help readers understand that Jack’s mother’s paper animals are fully alive. Readers can picture the tiger’s twitching tail and playful bouncing, while also hearing the way that the tiger’s “Rawrr-sa” growl sounds "somewhere between a cat and rustling newspapers." Readers can also feel how the paper tiger vibrates under Jack’s finger as it purrs.
Liu does not include much imagery in “The Paper Menagerie” and, as such, this moment is particularly significant. It is likely that Liu chose to highlight this moment with imagery to make it clear to readers that this is a magical realist element—the animals do not seem alive in the eyes of a child but are alive, as evidenced by the way that the tiger leaps and growls and purrs. This is one of the ways that Liu tries to communicate how real art (such as the Chinese art of zhezhi papercraft) comes alive.
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