Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club And Saving Fish From Drowning

Amy Tan is an Chinese-American novelist who is known for writing the daughter-mother relationship and the life of an Chinese-American. The themes in her novels shows a bond between mothers and daughters, love, forgiveness, and the differences between generation. Family, mother-daughter relationships, and divorce are her main topics. All of her novels also have a huge aspect of Chinese history and culture. This appears in many of her successful books like “The Kitchen God’s Wife”, “The Joy Luck Club”, and “Saving Fish from Drowning”. In Amy Tan’s short story, “Two Kinds”, Tan uses the literary devices of characterization, symbolism and theme, to show the readers the relationship between an Chinese-American mother and an American daughter. “Two Kinds”, a short story by Amy Tan, is about the relationship between a Chinese-American mother and an American daughter. Jing-Mei mother, Suyuan, comes to America after

Another one is when Suyuan had given Mei the piano. “Through the process, Jing-Mei’s mother demands that she “try on” a variety of identities: from “Chinese Shirley Temple, to child genius and now to a piano virtuoso” (Stein). Now, Suyuan wants Mei to become a young successful pianist. “Three days after watching the Ed Sullivan Show my mother told me what my schedule would be for piano lessons and piano practice” (Tan 2). Because her mother watched the Ed Sullivan Show, she was so inspired that she thought Mei could do it. So, when the piano was given to Mei, it symbolized a sign of regret because Mei mother is pushing her to do something that she wishes not to do. “A few years ago, she offered to give me the piano, for my thirtieth birthday. I had not played in all those years, I saw the offer as a sign of forgiveness, a tremendous burden removed” (5). But in the end, it showed the sign of forgiveness, love, and support her mother has for