The Overstory

by

Richard Powers

The Three Jade Rings Symbol Analysis

The Three Jade Rings Symbol Icon

The Ma family’s three jade rings symbolize the passage of time and how it can be perceived differently by different beings. The rings first appear when Ma Shouying gives them to his son Ma Sih Hsuin (later Winston Ma) to take to the U.S. when he flees the coming Communist Revolution in China. The rings are priceless artifacts, each intricately carved to portray scenes involving trees. Shouying describes one ring as the Lote tree (a sacred tree in the Quran) that represents the past; the second ring is Fusang (a mulberry tree in a mysterious Eastern land) that represents the future; the third tree is a pine, representing the present or “Now.” Years later, Winston shows his own daughter Mimi Ma the rings and repeats his father’s explanations.

Throughout The Overstory, the narrator plays with different perceptions of time, challenging readers to consider how time might pass differently for a tree than for a human being. Introduced early in the book, the jade rings serve an important purpose by connecting the motif of trees with the idea of time. Further, the very idea of rings as related to trees points to the “rings” of a tree’s trunk. Most trees grow a new outermost ring each year, building on the rings of their past years. This, the book suggests, is a different way of experiencing time than people are used to. Instead of time moving like an arrow from a past that is left behind and toward a distant future, it moves concentrically outward, always containing the past (like the tree’s inner rings) even as it exists in the present and grows toward the future. Mimi Ma herself experiences a similar sensation after first seeing the three jade rings: she feels like time becomes “a column of central circles,” with her timeless self at the center and her present existing on the outermost ring. This idea of different ways of experiencing time is then important to The Overstory’s general goal of getting readers to step outside of their own limited perspective and consider other kinds of consciousness (namely, that of trees) as having meaning and value.

The Three Jade Rings Quotes in The Overstory

The The Overstory quotes below all refer to the symbol of The Three Jade Rings. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
).
Part 1: Roots—Mimi Ma Quotes

“They see every answer. Nothing hurt them anymore. Emperor come and go. Qing, Ming, Yuan. Communism, too. Little insect on a giant dog. But these guy?” He clicked his tongue and held up his thumb, as if these little Buddhas were the ones to put money on, in the run of time.

At that click, a teenage Mimi lifted from her own nine-year-old shoulders to gaze at the arhats from high up and years away. Out of the gazing teen rose another, even older woman. Time was not a line unrolling in front of her. It was a column of concentric circles with herself at the core and the present floating outward along the outermost rim. Future selves stacked up above and behind her, all returning to this room for another look at the handful of men who had solved life.

Related Characters: Ma Sih Hsuin/Winston Ma (speaker), Mimi Ma/Mulberry
Related Symbols: The Three Jade Rings
Page Number: 35
Explanation and Analysis:
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The Three Jade Rings Symbol Timeline in The Overstory

The timeline below shows where the symbol The Three Jade Rings appears in The Overstory. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Part 1: Roots—Mimi Ma
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Time Theme Icon
Human Nature, Psychology, and Storytelling Theme Icon
...safe hidden behind a filing cabinet. Inside are many treasures. First, Shouying removes three jade rings, each intricately carved to show three different trees. “Look the color!” Sih Hsuin exclaims when... (full context)
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Time Theme Icon
Human Nature, Psychology, and Storytelling Theme Icon
Consciousness, Value, and Meaning Theme Icon
Shouying hands Sih Hsuin the third ring, explaining that the third tree is the tree of “Now,” the tree that is all... (full context)
Human Nature, Psychology, and Storytelling Theme Icon
Complexity, Branching, and Interdependence Theme Icon
Consciousness, Value, and Meaning Theme Icon
...customs official questions Sih Hsuin and looks through his luggage. She doesn’t find the jade rings, which have been baked into moon cakes, but the scroll is out in plain sight.... (full context)
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Time Theme Icon
Human Nature, Psychology, and Storytelling Theme Icon
Winston then took Mimi into his study and showed her the three jade rings and the arhat scroll. About the arhats, Winston said, “They solve life. They pass the... (full context)
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Time Theme Icon
...sister, something special. Then they sneak into Winston’s office, and Mimi shows her sisters the rings and the scroll. (full context)
Time Theme Icon
Destruction, Extinction, and Rebirth Theme Icon
Consciousness, Value, and Meaning Theme Icon
...keep the peace. Later, the daughters decide to each take one of the three jade rings. They reach in blindly to pick at random, and Mimi receives the ring representing the... (full context)
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Time Theme Icon
Destruction, Extinction, and Rebirth Theme Icon
...Later Mimi waits at the airport for her flight back to Portland, twisting the jade ring around her finger nervously. She has the arhat scroll in her carry-on bag. Mimi feels... (full context)
Part 4: Seeds
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Time Theme Icon
Human Nature, Psychology, and Storytelling Theme Icon
Complexity, Branching, and Interdependence Theme Icon
Consciousness, Value, and Meaning Theme Icon
Mimi still sits under the same pine tree, twisting her jade ring—Fusang, the tree of the future—around her finger, but unable to remove it. Then she remembers... (full context)
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Time Theme Icon
Destruction, Extinction, and Rebirth Theme Icon
Complexity, Branching, and Interdependence Theme Icon
Consciousness, Value, and Meaning Theme Icon
...the pine tree as darkness falls over Dolores Park. She manages to remove the jade ring from her finger and places it in the grass. At midnight she achieves a kind... (full context)