“A thousand years in the past, a thousand years in the future - no matter where you live or how rich or poor you are - the four phases of a woman’s life are the same,” Respectful Lady says. “You are a little girl, so you are still in milk days. When you turn fifteen, you will enter hair- pinning days. The way we style your hair will announce to the world that you are ready for marriage.”
Those are the opening lines to the "Milk Days" chapter of Lisa See’s newest novel Lady Tan’s Circle of Women. The daughter is Tan Yunxian. When her mother, Respectful Lady, dies from a bound foot infection, eight-year-old Yunxhian goes to live with her grandparents until she turns fifteen, enters hair-pinning days and marries.
It’s 1469-1511, during the Ming dynasty in China. Her grandparents are both doctors, but her grandmother only treats women. They decide that Yunxian should learn how to treat women’s illnesses alongside a young midwife-in-training, Meiling. This is very unusual because they are from different societal classes, but it begins a life-long friendship.
The story spans the life of Yunxian from age eight, when she begins her training, through her marriage and pregnancies until age fifty when she serves as a woman’s doctor. This story is a window into how women in different classes were expected to act, the painful custom of foot binding and how upper-class Chinese women were totally removed from anything outside their property walls.
In her acknowledgements, the author reveals that this story is based on a real woman Chinese doctor who wrote a book detailing best practices for common female ailments. See’s extensive research makes this book a fascinating glimpse into life in China during the Ming Dynasty.
If you’re interested in women’s lives in 15th century China, then you must read Lady Tan’s Circle of Women by Lisa See.
