Book 2 Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden, Week 1, Blog 1 pages 1 - 140

“I’d never for a moment given up the belief that I would one day find a better life elsewhere with at least part of the family I’d always known. I was living only half in Gion; the other half of me lived in my dreams of going home. This is why dreams can be such dangerous things: they smolder on like a fire does, and sometimes consume us completely.” (Golden, Memoirs of a Geisha 106)

This quote is said by Chiyo, the protagonist, while she reminisces about her past memories about her family, and dreams that she will one day be with them again, as happy as they were long ago. She feels hope, faith and belief in a dream that will come to influence her future greatly.

This quotation reveals Chiyo’s strong willed and perseverant character, as well as one of the dominant themes in the novel – overcoming difficult obstacles in life for a better future, which is connected to coming of age.

Chiyo introduces herself as a determined and adamant character as she overcomes extremely difficult situations in her young life and continues with the passionate hope of one day being released from her hardships and destitutions.

She explains that dreams can be dangerous things because they surmount one’s true existence and can lead one to believe in a greater, more perfect reality. Dreams, for Chiyo are a sense of escape. They are a utopia that she hopes she can one day be a part of. But dreams can, as she says, “consume us completely” and that to her is dangerous because they can create a false image of reality. If Chiyo finds herself consumed into these dreams, she will experience great disappointment and misery if life fails to fulfill her expectations.

Arthur Golden, the author, felt it was important for Chiyo to say this line because he wanted to relay the significance of hope as it applies to the novel’s theme. He also wanted to foreshadow the importance of dreaming dangerously as it may result in heartbreak and devastation on Chiyo’s part.

The reader is left thinking whether Chiyo is being foolish or optimistic when dreaming about reconciliation with her family, and if in fact dreams can be crushed as easily a fire smolders. Maybe the fire or the essence of a dream is not lost, but burns on in a different form, and it is up to the person to ignite it once more. Maybe dreaming dangerously is the beauty of dreaming in the first place.