Rebellion in Two Kinds by Amy Tan

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Two Kinds

In this story “Two kinds” by Amy Tan it shows the great expectations of a mother, who wishes for her child to be famous and a genius. The mother coming from a society that is very hard working and obedient trying to instill the upbringing she had I her life. The child Jing-mei is a typical example of a child rebelling against their mothers wishes no matter how hard the parental figure tries, the child wishes to perform things in their own way and use their own freewill and to do things in there own timely fashion.

The mother moves to America after much heartache in China. She has lost everything as quoted “she had come here in 1949 after losing everything in China: her mother and father, her family home, her first husband, and two daughters, twin baby girls.” (pg 1218). She begins a new life in America raising Jing-mei how every parent raises their own child to become the best they can. She believes that moving to America that anything can be accomplished and uses Jing-mei to live that life through by making her watch certain television show. Shows that portray how famous people act and to see how child prodigies perform in front of audiences. Always testing her child with quizzes that became very hard as quoted “ The tests got harder-multiplying numbers in my head, finding the queen of hearts in a deck of cards, trying to stand on my head without using my hands, predicting the daily

Temperatures in Los Angelas, New York, and London.” (pg 1219). Afterwards the mother trades maid services for piano lessons and puts more pressure on Jing-mei to be this great child prodigy that will be very famous. Like any parent they have high expectations of their child or children to live a great life that is equally t...

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...uld. They have been the one to comfort us when the world seemed to turn evil. They have been the one to love us when we needed it the most, by the end of the story the outlook on the pressures take a different turn. Jing-mei has matured from a girl into a woman and as a peace of offering, her mother offers to give her the piano the main object of adversity between the two of them. This offers her the realization that she has become herself on her own terms, even with all of this hardship. She also learns that with everything her mother pushed on her or made her do it was out of love to make Jing-mei have a better and more satisfying life than the one her mother had to go through.

Works Cited

Tan, Amy “Two Kinds” In The Harbrace Anthology of Literature. Fourth Edition. Edited by Jon C. Stott et al. Canada: Thomson Nelson, 2006 pg 1015-22

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