Abstract: The structure of Ba Jin's HAN YE is quite clear——the mother defends her son an d releases her daughter-in-law, the son defends both the mother and wife, and the wife defends another man and releases her husband. All of them are closely c onnected. The mother loves her son and defends him. The son does the same to his wife while the wife loves another man. However, they also abandon someone——th e mother abandons her daughter-in-law and the wife abandons her husband. Doubt ing and criticizing the traditional norms, she wants to be free. The deep signif icance derives from the structure of HAN YE diachronically and synchronically.