Symbolism Joy Luck Essay, Research Paper

Symbolism of The Joy Luck Club and The Zoo Story

There are numerous conditions in human life that mold people into who they presently are. A person’s identity and way of thinking are influenced greatly due to their surroundings, and relationships they are involved in. Amy Tan, author of the Joy Luck Club, uses this theme in her book. Four mothers have emigrated to America from China because of their own struggles. They all want their daughters to grow up successful and without any of the hardships they went through.

The “Joy Luck Club,” by Amy Tan, is a collection of short stories about the relationships between Chinese born mothers and their American born daughters. The story is set here in America and in China and is set in the 1940’s and also takes place now. It illustrates the hardships both the mother and daughters go through in order to please the other. In the novel, the characters are generic, in the sense that, although they are from different families, the problems and emotions experienced are similar. The daughters are in an on-going search to discover themselves, who they are and what they represent. The women go through many obstacles in life and must overcome them in order to survive. In the end, these women demonstrate tenacity and confidence in themselves. This book shows that now days the traditions of the older generations are slowly being filtered out by the younger generations. An example in the book is when one of the mothers had her marriage pre-arranged by her parents and a friend of the family and the fact that she accepted the marriage. The difference between the mother and daughter was that the daughter was married multiple times against what her mother believed in and to people who her mother wouldn’t have approved of. This shows that the children had lost some of their heritage because of where they were raised and the influence that the different cultures would have on them.