Chinese Cinderella is a compelling autobiography by Adeline Yen Mah, a struggling child, yearning for acceptance and love in her dysfunctional family. In this novel of “a ‘secret story of an unwanted daughter”, Adeline presents her stepmother Niang, as a violent, impatient, biased, domineering and manipulative demon. Analysing the language used by the author, we can discover how effectively she does this. Although Niang explicitly demonstrates her blatant favouritism towards her actual birth kids, shunning the likes of her stepchildren, some of her nasty traits cannot be avoided by even the most loved of her children. In this case, her violence and impatience. Little Sister, being only a baby and having not seen her actual mother Niang, was understandably uneasy when meeting her for the first time. Not even thinking of letting Little Sister adapt to her new environment, Niang’s impatience at her less than warm welcome from her favourite daughter led her to slap the poor child. She began “beating her daughter in earnest”, with her blows landing “indiscriminately on Little Sister’s ears, cheeks, neck and head”. Such brutality demonstrated by a mother to her daughter shows vividly how Niang couldn’t control her destructive nature, choosing instead to let her exasperation take over. Immediately after moving into their new Shanghai house, Niang adopts an even more domineering, superior tone than ever before, not even bothering to disguise her biased feelings against her stepchildren, Ye Ye and Aunt Baba. This is elucidated in the Chapter 5, where she informs her stepchildren about the new living arrangements. It is visible to the reader how unfairly Niang treats her stepchildren, Ye Ye and Aunt Baba, having given separate rooms t... ... middle of paper ... ...She could move into a bedroom “on the first floor, their floor”. With Big Sister out of the picture, no one would be able to unmask Niang’s discrimination. With Big Sister having “allegiance to Niang written all over her face”, Niang managed to disband the cooperative step-siblings. This incident was one that displayed her scheming and conniving ways in full view. Niang is a professional in manipulating, and knows how to make things work in her favour. Adeline Yen Mah’s literary skills explain comprehensively how Niang’s flawed personality cause great agony for Adeline. However, it is being mistreated by Niang that ultimately fuels her to undertake the seemingly impossible task of trying to succeed in life. Adeline’s great accomplishments in life were the result of her unfaltering determination in the face of injustice. Niang inadvertently helped her achieve that.
The narrator said “Sophie is a three year years American age, but already I see her nice Chinese side swallowed up by her wild Shea side.” Sophie’s “wild side” which can be interpreted as her Irish side. Whenever Sophie misbehaves which include: taking off her clothes or attack/kick her mom, the Grandmother blames it on her “wide side” and she also believes that the only way to discipline Sophie is by spanking her. Of course Natalie will not allow her mother to spank Sophie because that clashes with American traditional way to discipline a kid which was to “talk” to Sophie. Again, the reader can see that the Grandmother was struggling to become accustomed to the way American family works. Because of this cultural conflict, the reader will conclude that Americans are selfish and we can see that in the story. Natalie wants her mother to help her in the house, babysit her daughter and do as much for her as she can, but doesn’t expect her mother to interfere with her way of discipline. This means that either Natalie has completely forgotten about her culture or that she simply moved on with the new identity second and third generation Chinese Americans were developing and also wants her daughter to follow the same
Using the detail,“Dinner threw me deeper into despair,” conveys the painful feelings caused by her family at dinner (Paragraph 5). This detail indicates that Tan was continuingly losing hope that the night would get better. Tan reveals these agonizing feelings to make the reader feel compunctious. In making the reader feel sorry for her, Tan knows she can continue to misreport details in the passage without being questioned. The detail,“What would he think of our noisy Chinese relatives who lacked proper American manners,” emblematizes the dishonor Tan feels towards her relatives and cultural background (Paragraph 2). This detail implies that due to Tan’s attraction to Robert, she will detract her feelings of others to better her relationship with Robert. Tan used this detail to reveal that if Tan cannot better her relationship with Robert, she will become despondent. As a result of distorting details, the passage illustrates Tan’s dishonorable feelings towards her cultural
In the book, “Nisa: The Life and Words of a !Kung Woman,” written by Marjorie Shostak; is a culturally shocking and extremely touching book about a woman who had gone through many struggles and horrific tragedies in her life. This book also emphasizes the perspective of most of the women in the society. There are many striking issues in this book that the people of the !Kung tribe go through.
Duong Thu Huong’s novel, ‘Paradise of the Blind’ creates a reflective, often bittersweet atmosphere through the narrator Hang’s expressive descriptions of the landscapes she remembers through her life. Huong’s protagonist emphasises the emotional effects these landscapes have on her, acknowledging, “many landscapes have left their mark on me.”
This title stuck out for me. Instinctively I knew that the title foreshadows the events of the novel. By the end of the chapter I found the symbols that Foster had so greatly stressed in his novel. One symbol that I considered important is the fact that Liu Lang doesn’t seem to remember Precious Auntie’s name. This seems to pose a question and mystery about Precious Auntie’s identity and is the start of the journey towards Ruth gaining the answers. In the chapter Truth Liu Lang placed Precious Auntie’s name in the “trunk of best things” (Tan 8). This indicates that Precious Auntie is important, cherished, and crucial to the plot; through such foreshadows, I learned the plot of the novel was a journey of remembering Precious Auntie’s name, and the theme was of revelations and realizations. For this reason I consider the main protagonist to be Precious Auntie because it’s through her that the plot and theme are
Since Sister was affected the most by certain actions of the family, Welty narrated this short story through Sister’s point of view to show how the function of the family declined through these actions. Sister was greatly affected when her sister broke the bonds of sisterhood by stealing her boyfriend and marrying him. Secondly, Sister was affected by the favoritism shown by her family towards her younger sister. Since her sister was favored more than her, this caused her to be jealous of her sister. For example, Sister shows a lot of jealousy by the tone she uses when describing what Stella-Rondo did with the bracelet that their grandfather gave her. Sister’s description was, “She’d always had anything in the world she wanted and then she’d throw it away. Papa-Daddy gave her this gorgeous Add-a-Pearl necklace when sh...
Unfortunately, Eileen and Sami both like Dave during the process they get to know each other, but Dave loves Eileen. Eileen struggles from this tough situation and she makes the right choice to break up with Dave. So she can still have family with her daughter. Eileen has the Third Eye when she deals with hard issue between partner and her child. She sees the future forest. If she chooses to stay with Dave, the relationship between her and Sami will break and it’s hard to repair again. Her child is just a student who will go to attend higher education soon. Maybe someday Dave will abandon her, but her daughter is always her closest relative. She also controls herself to stop the tumultuous passions. She loves Dave and they get along together well. It’s difficult to give up a person who you love deeply. Thus, Eileen sacrifices her emotions to Dave and chooses her daughter. Moreover, Eileen is also intellect to distinguish how to use the right way to solve problems. She knows there is no future between her and Dave from Dave’s thought, “If I were to marry an infertile woman, it would devastate my parents. I’m their only son, and they expect me to carry on the family line”. (71) In China, carrying on the family line is important to the whole family, especially for the family that only owns
Oftentimes when reading fictional texts with similar themes, readers will find themselves encountering similar characters. In the realm of modern literature, elderly Asian women are often portrayed with many similarities; they are seen as protective, caring people who possess great wisdom. Ayako Nakane, also known as Obasan, the title character of Joy Kogawa’s Obasan, and the character Poh-Poh in Wayson Choy’s novel The Jade Peony, are very similar in this regard. Both Obasan and Poh-Poh drive forwards their respective narratives with their strong personalities. They have each suffered through troublesome pasts and as a result have become very wise. Obasan and Poh-Poh share many similarities but they also have their differences. Both women are very compassionate and do not hesitate to care for and protect their loved ones, however, the ways in which they interact with their loved ones are very different. Obasan is a very gentle and passive woman who takes on the role of a mother for the children in her care. Poh-Poh, on the other hand, is very forward and harsh, and acts as more of a guardian and mentor than a mother figure. While Kogawa’s Obasan and Choy’s Poh-Poh may seem very similar, they are in fact quite different.
The rapist that Aunt Tam “fought… off alone” symbolizes the male oppression that Aunt Tam has resisted her entire life, this coupled with the loss of her brother to Chinh’s “land reform”, causes Aunt Tam to resent and despise male influences in her life. Although Aunt Tam upholds ancestral values and practices, her “obsession: to get rich [pg78]” causes her to revolt against the traditional role of a Vietnamese female, never marrying and instead seeking to be “even richer”. The traditions she does uphold are her support of Hang in order to continue her family bloodline, and proper maintenance of ancestral ritual and the ancestral home. Aunt Tam’s neglect of her traditional responsibilities to marry and maintain a housewife’s lifestyle is the product of the suffering she has faced at the hands of Chinh in her past. Aunt Tam’s “past had poisoned life for her taking with it … all maternal feeling” driving her to a life of hard work which causes Aunt Tam to never foster a family. Although she raises Hang as her heir, she never starts a family in her ancestral home in order to continue the bloodline through her own
Chinese Cinderella is about I girl named Adeline Yen Mah growing up in an unloving family. Adeline's mother died from an illness caused by her birth. After her mother died, her whole family blamed Adeline for her mothers death and claimed she had "bad blood." The only people who truly loved her was her grandfather, Ye Ye, her grandmother, Nai Nai, and her aunt, Baba. Everyone else would tease her, steal from her, and call her names. Since Adeline and her aunt shared the same room, they became very close. They would talk to each other about when Adeline grew up, her and her aunt would live happily together. After her friends from school secretly fallowed Adeline home to celebrate her winning class president in fifth grade, her parents sent her to a boarding school claiming that her aunt was a bad influence on her. At that time, China was in war and, for safety, everyone was leaving the city where Adeline was going to boarding school. All the students left the school for safety but Adeline's parents didn't care about her enough to take her out of the city. After months of being the only person at school, another aunt of hers found out where Adeline was and took her out of the city and brought her back to her parents house. Immediately afterwards, Adeline was sent to another boarding school right as the war ended. Adeline stayed there for a few years until she had to go home for Ye Ye's funeral. While at home, Adeline talked to her father and convinced him to let her go to collage in England. Even though she had a very sad childhood, she overcame it all to go to medical school.
The story is set in the 1920ies in what has been termed The Jazz Age in which individualism was on the rise. The time period was also characterised by a post-war emptiness and cynicism. As such, the story deals with loss of meaningful life, with the sterility and vacuity of the modern world and with the crucial necessity of taking responsibility for the quality of one's own life (Yanling, p 108). The nature of the story’s dialogue tangibly represents the above mentioned time period emptiness and
Bettelheim, Bruno. ""Cinderella" A Story of Sibling Rivalry and Oedipial Conflicts." Bettelheim, Bruno. The Uses of Enchantment. 1976. 279-282.
The only sound I heard was that of Ye Ye chomping on his apple. Surely he was going to say something to put Niang in her place!"Chinese Cinderella, p.39.The balance of power within the Yen household has shifted dramatically by this point of the novel. What was originally a house run by Father under the supervision of Nai Nai and Ye Ye has become the empire of Niang, with Ye Ye only preserved as a mouthpiece. The importance of this scene is that the shift of power strongly hampers the future of Adeline within the household, especially after the fiasco with Little Sister and Aunt Baba. Without Ye Ye's protective and sympathetic presence holding any sway, Adeline's life is surely going to go from bad to
Based on Deconstruction theory, Lan Cao’s novel Monkey Bridge depicts the mother-daughter relationship before and after living in exile in terms of language, familial roles and deception.
The Soong sisters were very close to each other at the start of their lives, but always had distinctions between each other. In childhood, “…lively little Mei-ling wishe[d] she had been born a boy so she could ‘do things’. Sweet, shy Ching-ling astonishe[d] them all by the ardor of her determination to serve the revolution which [was] prophesied by her father and his friend, Dr. Sun Yat-sen. Clever, capable Ai-ling [was] looking forward to college”(Spencer 92).