Plot Development in Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club

The Joy Luck Club is the first novel by Amy Tan, published in 1989. The Joy Luck Club is about a group of Chinese women that share family stories while they play Mahjong. When the founder of the club, Suyuan Woo, died, her daughter June replaced her place in the meetings. In her first meeting, she finds out that her lost twin sisters were alive in China. Before the death of Suyuan, the other members of the club located the address of June’s half-sisters. After that, they send June to tell her half-sisters about her mother’s life. In our lives there are events, and situations that mark our existence and somehow determine our life. In this novel, it shows how four mothers and their daughters were impacted by their tradition and beliefs. In the traditional Asian family, parents define the law and the children are expected to follow their requests and demands; respect for one’s parents and elders is critically important. Traditions are very important because they allow us to remember the beliefs that marked a whole culture.

   In Amy Tan's novel, Joy Luck Club, the mother of Jing-mei recognizes only two kinds of daughters: those that are obedient and those that follow their own mind. Perhaps the reader of this novel may recognize only two types of mothers: pushy mothers and patient mothers.  The two songs, "Pleading Child" and "Perfectly Contented," which the daughter plays, reinforce the underlying tension in the novel. These songs represent the feelings that the daughter, Jing-mei, has had throughout her life.

    Of the many stories involving the many characters of "The Joy Luck Club", I believe the central theme connecting them all is the inability of the mothers and their daughters to communicate effectively.

   Each person reaches a point in their life when they begin to search for their own, unique identity. In her novel, Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan follows Jing Mei on her search for her Chinese identity – an identity long neglected.

There is a common theme of hope throughout the stories of The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan. Even in the face of immeasurable danger and strife, the mothers and daughters in the book find themselves faithful in the future by looking to the past, which is only helped by the format of Tan’s writing. This is shown specifically in the stories of Suyuan and Jing-Mei Woo, Lena and Ying-Ying St. Clair, and Lindo and Waverly Jong. The vignette structure of The Joy Luck Club allows the stories to build on one another in a way that effortlessly displays both the happy and dark times in each mother’s life, which lets their experiences act as sources of background and guidance to their daughters in times when they need it most.

Traditions, heritage and culture are three of the most important aspects of Chinese culture. Passed down from mother to daughter, these traditions are expected to carry on for years to come. In Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club, daughters Waverly, Lena, Rose and June thoughts about their culture are congested by Americanization while on their quests towards self-actualization. Each daughter struggles to find balance between Chinese heritage and American values through marriage and professional careers.

 In the Joy Luck Club, the author Amy Tan, focuses on mother-daughter relationships. She examines the lives of four women who emigrated from China, and the lives of four of their American-born daughters. The mothers: Suyuan Woo, An-Mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, and Ying-Ying St. Clair had all experienced some life-changing horror before coming to America, and this has forever tainted their perspective on how they want their children raised. The four daughters: Waverly, Lena, Rose, and Jing-Mei are all Americans. Even though they absorb some of the traditions of Chinese culture they are raised in America and American ideals and values.  This inability to communicate and the clash

“Here is how I came to love my mother.  How I saw her my own true nature.  What was beneath my skin.  Inside my bones.” (Tan 40)

Stated by the Dictionary of Literary Terms, an exposition is, “Applied to the beginning of the portion of a *plot in which back ground information is set forth” (Shaw 150). The exposition is basically the first few paragraphs of a story. To me a healthy exposition is very detailed. Personally, when reading knowing the main characters and setting are the two main things I tend to look for; not knowing this information can be risky and cause readers to be unentertained and stop reading the story. In the short story “Grand Stand-In,” the character goes right into telling her background story. Within the first few paragraphs she states, “I never had a family of my own. I didn’t get married, couldn’t see the use of it. […] I

The illustrations should help readers anticipate the unfolding of a story’s action and its climax.

In the novel The Joy Luck Club written by Amy Tan, there are several stories that intertwine into one novel. Each of the stories takes place China where the roles and the actions of woman are vastly different compared to American tradition. In the different stories, they all are about different mothers and daughters. Throughout the book, the reader can see the development in each relationship between mother and daughter with their conflicting backgrounds from China to America.

All literature is created by themes, without themes, they would simply be stories, and within those themes are patterns; constantly repeating throughout the work. Throughout the novel, The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, the use of themes and repeating patterns are seen through four different families. Some of the most prominent themes or patterns are family, specifically mother-daughter relationships, women and femininity, and growth in characters.

Conflicts play a crucial role in novels. Without conflict, novels would be uninteresting and very dull. Conflicts are seen in many different forms, as internal conflicts, when a character must deal with private problems, and external conflicts, when a character must deal with problems originating from an external source, like another person or society in general. Some common conflicts seen in other novels are person versus society, as in The Scarlet Letter when Hester is forced to face her mistake of adultery due to the obsession of the unforgiving town. An example of an internal conflict is present within Animal Dreams, when Cody must decide where she belongs and

The exposition introduces the mood, characters and setting . An expositions purpose is to describe or explain the beginning of a story. In this story’s exposition, a man with the name Framton Nuttel is visiting the Sappletons out in the country around the month of October. Once he arrives he waits for Mrs. Sappleton. Her fifteen year old niece Vera, keeps him company while he waits. “‘My aunt will be down presently, Mr. Nuttel,’ said a very self-possessed young lady of fifteen; ‘in the meantime you must try to put up with me.’”(page) This is a great way for the reader to understand the beginning of the story and the characters.

Amy Tan, within her famous novel, The Joy Luck Club, describes the fictional story of four Chinese women, who each persevere through their own hardships by making both sentimental and materialistic sacrifices. All of these characters have committed controversial acts and have demonstrated their ability to survive and adapt to the Chinese social standards laid out for their gender. Although a number of these behaviors and decisions are generally frowned upon, the four should be given substantial respect, as they each loyally follow their obligations and carry out any task necessary for their aspirations to attain fulfillment. For instance, Lindo Jong, the mother described in “The Red Candle,” relinquishes a life of joy and excitement to fulfill a promise to her family as she says, “I once sacrificed my life to keep my parents’ promise.” (49) Despite being subjected to merciless treatment that even drives her to consider suicide, Jong does not abandon her vow and states, “...I started to think about how I would escape this marriage without breaking my promise to my family.” (63) Of course, this determination and ambition towards one purpose is not limited to only Linda Jong, but is resonant within the other three women, especially Suyuan Woo, who even goes as far as giving up on her hope and children to find a new, prosperous life. During the chapter, “The Joy Luck Club,” Woo talks about walking a path that was filled with belongings of people who could not afford to be