Emily Hahn Analysis

 From Times and Places by Emily Hahn:

“Though I had always wanted to be an opium addict, I can’t claim that as the reason I went to China” (p. 344).

“‘I don’t feel a thing,’ I told him […] He said, ‘Look at your watch.’ I cried out in surprise; it was 3 o’clock in the morning” (p.348).

“‘We opium smokers, I reflected, are detached, and that is one of our advantages. We aren’t troubled with unpleasant emotions” (p.351).

    I found the first line, as I quoted on page 344, to draw my attention to why would this woman want to be an opium addict. Emily was a very adventurous woman she loved to travel and traveled to China during the time that the opium drug was a highly used substance.  When she smoked opium for the first time, she did not think she was feeling any different. Yet several hours had passed without her knowledge. It was like time stopped for her but for the rest of the world, it kept going. As she continued using opium her addiction began, she just thought at first how time was stopping for her, but then she started to rely on it. Hahn thinks that she is able to use it as she pleases and can quit at any time, yet it was not that easy. Breaking any addiction is not easy. I found it interesting how she talked about being detached. She felt excited and alive inside her mind yet on the outside she was weeping and looked tired. This power that opium had over her was concerning and crazy to think about what she went through being addicted. For her time still, she avoided issues this way. Emily used opium to escape the real world. I think traveling would have been an escape for me that would have been a positive rather than getting hooked on a drug to escape. Thank goodness Hahn was able to be strong enough with some help to detox and not continue to let opium have power over her.


Word Count: 344

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