Two Kinds by Amy Tan - Essay Example

Two Kinds by Amy Tan The Joy Luck Club is a popular book by Amy Tan and which critics have again and again referred to it as a novel. The author had intended for it to be a short-story collection with four interconnected segments. Each segment contains a group of stories that can stand alone and ‘Two Kinds’ is the last in the second segment of this group of stories. However, these segments contain interrelated narrations thus the critics feel justified to refer to it as a novel. Most of the stories in this series show the twists in how mothers relate with their daughters in San Francisco’s China-town. The author lets the reader extract meaning behind the story through the narration. She states her experience and feelings all through without deciding what is right or wrong based on her opinion. She writes a diary of events in her childhood and states her true feelings towards them. This offers a clear description of events and gives more insight to the frustrations that the narrator had since she always seemed not to meet the expectations of her mother. From these accounts, we can tell the root of the conflict between her and her mother. Before the communist revolution, the mothers born in China were deep into their culture. However, after this revolution, they get disconnected from their native culture. Apparently, their daughters born in America have not much knowledge about their native culture and thus seem so disconnected from their mothers. Their parents place on them a high expectation since they are in America and are supposed to meet the American dream. According to their mothers, they can be whatever they want to be in America. They are therefore made to keep juggling between the not experiences of their Chinese ancestry which were not so good and the America expectation for success that has been placed on them. Jing-Mei, the narrator of this story is so consistent with crashing the American dreams of her mother of making her a music prodigy. She comes to comprehend really what her mother’s motives were even as she pushed her to succeed in America. The author explores the aspects of a multicultural nation which is a sensitive issue and in so doing, he uses some very highly regarded literary tools such that she does not compromise on the quality of the work she delivers to the readers. The narrator by showing the interaction of other people allows for readers to decide for themselves the root for any conflict that exists in the story. It is also through the interactions of people in the story that the self-righteous opinions which are actually ironic to readers are revealed. The aggressive attitude the author’s mother has in showing off her daughter and the self-praise of her piano teacher are such cases. Also, some conversations show the different characteristic between other people and the narrator. For example, the narrator and her mother converse over a girl on TV and this reveals a varying understanding of each of them to each other’s behaviour. The daughter speaks for the girl and questions her mother; “why picking on her […] she’s pretty good. Maybe she’s not the best, but she’s trying hard.” She uses that opportunity to express how her mother’s disregard for her hard work make her feel annoyed. It is clear that the author yearns for her mother’s compliments and not her critics but yet still the mother responds with “just like you,” and, “not the best. Because you not trying.” Her mother never seems to appreciate her previous hard work and it is like she perceives her like someone who has never tried enough and should actually put in more effort always. The author uses these conversations which she encountered to help readers deduce for themselves the cause for conflict that occurs in the subsequent encounters between her and her mother. From the narrator’s point of view, the readers are able to comprehend the stress and frustration that she goes through. She at first tries to meet the mother’s expectation after which she decides not to consider whatever her mother attempts to do in the attempts of making her a prodigy. This was after she saw her “mother’s disappointed face once again,” and felt, “something inside” her “began to die.” The “thing” is her confidence of one day becoming a prodigy and also the responsibility of putting effort to meet her mother’s expectations. One of the conversations with her mother when she was sent for piano lessons revealed how she did not think that her mother liked her. She asks, “Why don’t you like me the way I am? […],”. This gives the readers a revelation of one of the narrator’s major fears of what would happen if her mother does not like ordinary children like her who have no special talents to showcase to the world. She therefore stops being an obedient girl to her mother as a means of protest to her endless expectations. She however cares about what her mother thinks of her. This is revealed by the piano recital that did not go well. […] what “devastated her” The readers are also able to infer the root for her decision to be a “lazy kid,” As it seems, the only thing the author did wrong was deciding to have an immature attempt to make her mother accept her the way she was as an ordinary person. The author reveals her mother’s character through the conversations between them. The mother’s dogmatic belief that anyone can be anything in America, and that “there were so many ways for things to get better” shows her optimistic attitude in light of people attaining individual dreams. It is this attitude that caused her to put high expectation on the daughter with an attempt to help her daughter have a successful. She explicitly shares this belief with her daughter and actually pushes her to “try” new stuff. According to the mother, she is doing this out of love. The narrator helps the readers see the true expectation of the mother through several arguments. She asks the narrator, “Who ask you be genius?” She goes ahead to shout that, “only ask you be your best. For you sake […]” Her mother reveals that her real reason of pushing the narrator to try harder is for own sake. Also, when she shouts that “only two kinds of daughters, those who are obedient and those who follow their own mind,” it shows that she only yearned for her daughter to listen to her and take in her advice as good advice. Looking at the narrators dream of being a famous prodigy and the frustration she has as she fails to meet her mother’s expectation, then the resistance she has of not wanting to be changed, the reader is caused to sympathise with her. We try to understand her yearning for love which actually leads to her misbehaviour. The story suggests that both mother and daughter have a stand and thus both behave based on their beliefs. It is left for the reader to judge who is right and who is wrong and more so come up with suggestions and propose solutions to the conflict. Mrs Woo’s has some unattainable aspirations since she believes that America is the land for opportunities. She believes that if one is born in America, they are destined for success. These are the unreasonable expectations that she places on her young daughter. Although she has not made any effort to discover her daughter’s talents, she adamantly imposes different talents she comes across in a child who seems ‘successful’ on her daughter. Of course she fails in making her daughter a famous actress. She puts her through general knowledge tests such as memorizing capital cities for many countries, memorizing a page in the Bible and remembering songs just because she had seen these in some children who were in the spotlight. Jing-mei however does not show promise in that area. The mother finally decides that Jing-mei will be a piano virtuoso and she is so serious in this that she is compelled to buy her a second hand piano together with enlisting her for lessons at her neighbours place. She is very determined to make her famous to the extent of trading her cleaning services for the piano lessons. All this she does in pursuit of making her daughter famous, which sadly she fails. Generational tensions alongside the American dream are some of the themes that are brought out strongly in this narrative. Waverly Jong finds her mother displaying an appropriating pride as she displays her chess achievements. On the other hand, the competition between Jing-mei’s mother and Waverly’s mother compels her to put unrealistic demands on her daughter. She also feels that her mother has a misplaced assumption that in America anyone can achieve anything. No wonder she pushes her beyond her abilities and of course beyond her wishes. This is revealed by her lament; “You want me to be someone that I’m not!” [...] “I wish I wasn’t your daughter. I wish you weren’t my mother.” She finishes with, “I wish I’d never been born! . . . I wish I were dead...” After these outbursts, the generational tension is heightened and we can sense a silence between the mother and her daughter that is uncertain for so long until the mother brings it up many years later. The author never shows her opinion of exactly how she perceives the whole conflict between her and the mother. She however implies what she believes now as a grown woman. In a way, she admits that, “so maybe I never really gave myself a fair chance. I did pick up the basics pretty quickly, and I might have become a good pianist at that young age.” She somehow regrets not putting enough effort to learn the piano. She actually notices towards the end of the story that song she used to play was not complete. This clearly shows that she never concentrated when learning. It could be that she let the prodigy in her go unutilized and that maybe her mother was right. She however puts forth that the hardship that her mother had gone through in China which made her mother “lay all of the hope” in America, and more so on her and so maybe she was not entirely to blame for wanting so bad to make her succeed. Her mother also cared a lot for not only herself but for her daughter too. This was shown by her not blaming her after the disastrous piano recitation but she still had hope in her to succeed in life. She cared for her daughter’s future. Therefore, this narrative not only shows the author’s blame on her mother but also her realization of the motive behind everything years later. Read More