Brilliance and Beauty in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club

Amy Tan’s 1989 debut novel, The Joy Luck Club, explores the experiences of first-generation immigrants, focusing on the relationship between mothers and daughters. I have a complicated relationship with my mother, and when I read this excellent book, I start to understand that parents are also people. Each mother tells their story of growing up in China during the 1920s, in contrast to their daughter's experiences in the United States during the 1940s. The chapters highlight the difference in values and expectations between generations. 

Tan writes genuinely, from a place of understanding rather than judgment. What these mothers experience in their lives influences the way they treat their daughters. The reader is expected to acknowledge the values and frustrations both generations feel. My favorite segment is An-Mei Hsu’s “Scar.” A warning to readers who might feel disturbed by this graphic scene from the book, as it does contain self-harm:

Here is how I came to love my mother. How I saw her in my own true nature. What was beneath my skin. Inside my bones…I saw my mother on the other side of the room. Quiet and sad. She was cooking a soup, pouring herbs and medicines into the steaming pot. And then I saw her pull up her sleeve and pull out a sharp knife. She put this knife on the softest part of her arm. I tried to close my eyes, but I could not. And then, my mother cut a piece of meat from her arm. Tears poured from her face and blood spilled to the floor. My mother took her flesh and put it in the soup. She cooked magic in the ancient tradition to try to cure her mother one last time.

The macabre interests me, as does good storytelling. Reading a story should be enjoyable, no matter the genre. I want to be sucked into this person's life and live the gut-wrenching trauma myself. GOOD BOOKS GET MY HEART PUMPING. An-Mei Hsu grew up without her mother and was taken care of by her Grandmother, Popo. (Popo means grandmother in Chinese). An-mei’s father died when she was young. Her mother was raped and forced to become a concubine to a wealthy man – transformed from a widow into a prostitute. Seen as disgracing her late husband’s memory and her family, Popo chased her away. 

When reading this book, Tan plants the scenes into your brain. And the emotion in your veins. She doesn’t ask the reader to imagine whatever they wish with vague uncertainty. NO, she writes the memories of this little girl vividly. She grips you. Think about how the scene above starts: “Here is how I came to love my mother. How I saw her in my own true nature.” Her mother is inside of her, her kindness and strength. Can you see her wide eyes watching a woman she has never seen before trying to cure her Popo with everything she has? Do you see how slowly she describes this scene? Tan repeats the word knife twice, each sentence short. Slowly she watches her mother: “And then I saw her pull up her sleeve and pull out a sharp knife. She put this knife on the softest part of her arm.” Simple and yet spine-chilling. Why is she doing this? We don’t understand this tradition: “And then, my mother cut a piece of meat from her arm. Tears poured from her face and blood spilled to the floor.” (Tan). I can hear the drops hitting the floor, this soup boiling, and the quiet sad night. Mother puts a bit of herself into Popo, stopping at nothing to heal her. An-Mei’s trauma is vivid in her mind. The book doesn’t cut tragedy; it leans into it without unnecessary, cushion-y, description. 

All An-Mei learns of her mother from others is that she is rotten – and to never follow her mother’s path. Popo continues to tell her stories even when deathly ill. This scene is the first time An-Mei meets her mother truly. Everything she has been told washes away with this sacrificial act. An-Mei learns what love is at this moment. She learns that sacrifice is what creates love – and that it may bring unhappiness. 

An-Mei unknowingly learns another lesson of love from her mother: persistence. The persistence to live her life as a concubine, to swallow her tears and keep moving.

Tan writes these lessons realistically through the experiences of An-Mei’s daughter, Rose. In the chapter “Half and Half,” Rose tells the reader how her mother lost her faith in God. There is a saying her parents have called “nengkan”—the ability to do anything they can put their mind to. Rose watches her mother do anything she can to make life better. If her father wants something to eat but she has never made it before, she will cook it anyway. When Rose watches her brother fall off a cliff into the ocean, her mother swims after him without thought. Rose knows her mother is a terrible swimmer, but An-Mei won't let that stop her from trying.

Americans often dismiss people who speak imperfect English, even though learning another language is incredibly difficult. Tan writes about language with brilliant authenticity. The “broken” English the mothers speak in this book is written beautifully. This element, which only those who speak two languages can create, is another reason why I’m in love with this book. 

In “Magpies,” An-Mei is thinking about her daughter's failing marriage: “Yesterday my daughter said to me, ‘My marriage is falling apart.’ And now all she can do is watch it falling.” The way I would have said that sentence is “and now all she can do is watch it fail.” Why does Tan’s version sound better? Because of the visualization. In my sentence, we are focusing on the fact that Rose’s marriage is terrible. In Tan’s, we focus on the breaking down and the action of falling. When I think of something falling, it is usually rapid and without control. Like dropping a precious vase, only quickly enough to watch it shatter into tiny little pieces. Limited vocabulary helps elevate the text and enhances accuracy in how these women talk. It is like painting with a limited color pallet, forcing yourself to work out a way to show your vision. An-Mei is expressing, with the terms that Rose used, that her daughter is doing nothing but watching her life fall.

Simple is brilliant.