John Luther Long

Madame Butterfly John Luther Long

Publisher Marketing: "Madame Butterfly" is a short story by American lawyer and writer John Luther Long. It is based on the recollections of Long's sister, Jennie Correll, who had been to Japan with her husband-a Methodist missionary, and was mainly influenced by Pierre Loti's 1887 novel Madame Chrysantheme. It was published in Century Magazine in 1898, together with some of Long's other short fiction. An American naval officer, Lieutenant Benjamin Franklin Pinkerton, arrives in Japan to take up his duties on a ship docked in Nagasaki. On the suggestion of his friend Sayre, he takes a Japanese wife and house for the duration of his stay there. His young bride, Cho-Cho-San, is a geisha whose family were strongly in favor of the marriage until Pinkerton forbade them from visiting. When they learned that they would not be allowed to visit they disowned Cho-Cho-San. Pinkerton's ship eventually sets sail from Japan. In his absence and unbeknownst to him, she gives birth to their child, a son whom she names Trouble. As time goes by, Cho-Cho-San is still convinced that Pinkerton will return to her some day, but her maid, Suzuki, becomes increasingly skeptical. Then Goro, a marriage broker, arrives and proposes that she divorce Pinkerton, telling her that even if he does come back, he will leave her and take the child with him. He proposes a Japanese husband to look after her-Yamadori, a prince who had lived a long time in America. Although she has no intention of going through with Goro's plan, she tells him to arrange a meeting with Yamadori.