The Complexity of Mother and Daughter Relationships in Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club
Since the beginning of time the mother and daughter relationship has been complex. The book The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan is a great example of the mother and daughter relationship. In the book Amy Tan writes about four women who migrate to America from China. All of the women were in search of a better life since the lives they had in China were not what they wanted for themselves. Even though all of the women did not know each other until they met in America, they all share the same horrible memories of their past. The book mainly focuses on the expectations, hopes, and dreams that the women and their daughters have for themselves. Even though at the beginning the mothers and the daughters do not always see eye to eye at the end the daughters start to realize that their mothers just wanted the best for them and not the worst, "The mothers see themselves in the daughters."(Matthews).
The relationship between Suyuan and Jing-mei is somewhat difficult because they are both coming from two different cultures that are completely opposite of one another. Suyuan is trying to teach Jing-mei the Chinese culture when all Jing-mei sees is the American culture, that is on television and all around her. Jing-mei's friends do not even think that she is a true Chinese person. Suyuan wants her daughter to obey her and make her proud even if it means making Jing-mei do something that she does not want to do. As a Chinese women Suyuan knew her role to be a good wife and mother and to always stand by her husband's side. On the other hand Jing-mei does not want this, she wants to be independent, and to be able to make her own decisions because...
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... to teach her about her culture and where she was from, "And now I see"(Tan 331). Jing-mei finally learns the answers to all of the questions that her mother left unanswered when she passed away.
Although Jing-mei fought so hard to not do anything Suyuan said, it was not because she did not like her mother. It was because she did not understand where she was coming from. It is always hard to understand someone when you do not understand any of the hardships that one has been through.
WORK CITED
Matthews, Amanda. Structural Analysis...Thanks to Amanda Matthews. <http:www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~sbowen/314fall/novels/lit.html>.
Tan, Amy. The Joy Luck Club. New York, 1989.
Tavernise, Peter. Fasting of the Heart: Mother-Tradition and Sacred Systems in Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club. <http://www.mindspring.com/~petert/tan.htm>. 12 March 1992
Our mothers have played very valuable roles in making us who we are and what we have become of ourselves. They have been the shoulder we can lean on when there is no one else to turn to. They have been the ones we can count on when there is no one else. They have been the ones who love us for who we are and forgive us when no one else wouldn’t. In Amy Tan’s “Two Kinds,” the character Jing-mei experiences being raised by a mother who has overwhelming expectations for her daughter, which causes Jing-mei to struggle with who she wants to be.
Amy Tan’s novel, The Joy Luck Club uses much characterization. Each character is portrayed in different yet similar ways. When she was raised, she would do whatever she could to please other people. She even “gave up her life for her parents promise” (49), I the story The Red Candle we get to see how Tan portrays Lindo Jong and how she is brought to life.
It is very interesting the difference between Jing-mei’s mother and Sophie’s Grandmother. You see her show the difference between China and America , how in China the word ‘supportive’ does not exist basically that everyone is on their own and has to fend for themselves. Is as if shes an outsider looking in from the outside into the daily life of her daughter Nattie and her husband John and see what they
The mother wanted the daughter to be obedient because of the daughter becoming upset. Jing Mei mother was disappointed in her for all of mistakes she had done in her past life because of her awful piano recital and disobeying her mother. “You want me to be somebody that I’m not, by that she wanted her life to be the same. Jing Mei stopped playing for a few years on her piano during the past years during their fights but in the later years. “Only two kinds of daughters, she wants her daughter to be obedient to her mother and have a perfect life to accomplish when she grows
Jing-Mei’s story really starts before she was born because Jing-Mei’s mother came to America after she lost her parents, her first husband, and her two twin baby girls. Her mother set really high exceptions for Jing-Mei before she was ever born because she mother wanted a prodigy child. Jing-Mei starts at a young age to defy her mother on the quizzes her mother gave her because she does not want to be a prodigy child. Jing-Mei would daydream and not answer the questions right if she even knew them at all. For example her mother asks Jing-Mei “what is the capital of Finland?” Jing-Mei said “Nairobi” because she did not know any foreign cities. The only capital city she knows was the capital of California and that is because it was the name of the street Jing-Mei lived on (Page 227).
"I have already experienced the worst. After this, there is no worst possible thing" (Amy Tan 121). Throughout The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan tells stories of how mothers use the misfortunes in their lives, to try to teach their daughters about life. Many of the mothers had bad experiences in their pasts and do not want to see their daughters live through the same types of problems. They try to make their daughters' lives as easy and problem free as possible. However, the daughters do not see this as an act of love, but rather as an act of control. In the end, the daughters realize that their mothers tried to use their experiences to teach them not to give up hope, and to look at the good of an experience rather than the bad.
The theme of, mother daughter relationships can be hard but are always worth it in the end, is portrayed by Amy Tan in this novel. This theme is universal, still relevant today, and will be relevant for forever. Relationships are really important, especially with your mom. “ A mother is best. A mother knows what is inside you”
Mother-Daughter Relationships in Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club In the Joy Luck Club, the author Amy Tan, focuses on mother-daughter relationships. She examines the lives of four women who emigrated from China, and the lives of four of their American-born daughters. The mothers: Suyuan Woo, An-Mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, and Ying-Ying St. Clair had all experienced some life-changing horror before coming to America, and this has forever tainted their perspective on how they want their children raised.
America was not everything the mothers had expected for their daughters. The mothers always wanted to give their daughters the feather to tell of their hardships, but they never could. They wanted to wait until the day that they could speak perfect American English. However, they never learned to speak their language, which prevented them from communicating with their daughters. All the mothers in The Joy Luck Club had so much hope for their daughters in America, but instead their lives ended up mirroring their mother’s life in China. All the relationships had many hardships because of miscommunication from their different cultures. As they grew older the children realized that their ...
In the short story, “The Minister’s Black Veil,” Nathaniel Hawthorne tells the Mr. Hooper’s black veil and the words that can describe between him and the veil. Hawthorne demonstrates how a black veil can describe as many words. Through the story, Hawthorne introduces the reader to Mr. Hooper, a parson in Milford meeting-house and a gentlemanly person, who wears a black veil. Therefore, Mr. Hooper rejects from his finance and his people, because they ask him to move the veil, but he does not want to do it. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Minister’s Black Veil”, Mr. Hooper’s black veil symbolizes sins, darkness, and secrecy in order to determine sins that he cannot tell to anyone, darkness around his face and neighbors, and secrecy about the black veil.
Amy Tan’s novel, The Joy Luck Club describes the lives of first and second generation Chinese families, particularly mothers and daughters. Surprisingly The Joy Luck Club and, The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts are very similar. They both talk of mothers and daughters in these books and try to find themselves culturally. Among the barriers that must be overcome are those of language, beliefs and customs.
... her own person and wanting only to be accepted for who she is and not who she could be. Even though the argument was never discussed it still haunted Jing-mei. That is why Jing-mei was surprised when her mother offered her the piano for her thirtieth birthday, she took it as a sign of forgiveness.
* Tavernise, Peter. “Fasting of the Heart: Mother-Tradition and Sacred Systems in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club.” 23 March 2000. <http://www.mindspring.com/~petert/tan.htm>
Jing-Mei was forced to take piano lessons; this only further upset her as she felt that she was a constant disappointment. Her mother was mad at her on a regular basis because Jing-Mei stood up for herself and explained to her that she didn’t want to be a child prodigy.
...ith Jing Mei and her mother, it is compounded by the fact that there are dual nationalities involved as well. Not only did the mother’s good intentions bring about failure and disappointment from Jing Mei, but rooted in her mother’s culture was the belief that children are to be obedient and give respect to their elders. "Only two kinds of daughters.....those who are obedient and those who follow their own mind!" (Tan1) is the comment made by her mother when Jing Mei refuses to continue with piano lessons. In the end, this story shows that not only is the mother-daughter relationship intricately complex but is made even more so with cultural and generational differences added to the mix.