“Two Kinds” by Amy Tan is a well written short story about the conflicts of a Chinese immigrant mother and child, who clash due to their different definitions of living a fulfilled life. In the short story, a theme that has played out from paragraph to paragraph is the suppression of a person 's identity based on the expectations of society. In the story, the author states that “We didn 't immediately pick the right kind of prodigy. At first, my mother thought I could be a Chinese Shirley Temple” (Tan paragraph 4). The word prodigy is defined as a young person who is endowed with exceptional qualities or abilities. Amy 's mother wanted her child from the moment she was born to be a prodigy or what the story defines as a Chinese version