First+Draft+-+Steven+Noh

Pick at least one mother-daughter pair, and examine to what degree each has fulfilled the American Dream. How does the importance and/or definition of the American Dream change between generations?

Every people in this world can only live once. It’s a simple fact, no argument needed. But here’s the difficult part: how can those people succeed and make their one and only lives a worthy experience? When it comes down to the idea of success, people may bring up the American Dream. American Dream has been a national ethos for United States for centuries. It is a term to describe people’s success in United States. However, the idea of how one can achieve that success has been constantly changing over generations after generations. Such evidence can be found between Suyuan and Jing-mei, one of the main mother and daughter pairs from the book, Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan. For Suyuan she envisions American Dream with a dream of opportunities, where one should take every opportunity possible in order to be successful. On the other hand, Jing-mei envisions American Dream with a dream of freedom, where one should express his/her individuality and become successful by doing what one likes to do the best. Throughout the book, however, it depicts how both these mother and daughter fail to completely achieve their own American Dreams, as the two numerously collide due to different beliefs of success.

Suyuan believed she had already lost her opportunity of success, for she lost just about everything in China: “her mother and father, her family home, her first husband, and two daughters, twin baby girls” (Tan 141). Thus, her hopes now shifted towards her daughter, Jing-mei. Suyuan wanted Jing-mei to not lose anything, but to gain everything. She wanted Jing-mei to succeed by following her belief of American Dream, the dream of opportunities. However, Jing-mei failed to fulfill Suyuan’s desire, as Jing-mei decided to not take those opportunities. When Jing-mei was young, Suyuan gave an opportunity to Jing-mei to master in piano. She wanted her daughter to try her best; yet, Jing-mei “was so determined not to try” (148). She would take the easy way out by only keeping up with the rhythm and not playing the right keys, for she knew her piano teacher, Old chong, was deaf and too old to follow up with the notes. Such lazy effort proved to show how Jing-mei failed to fulfill Suyuan’s dream. Despite the given opportunity, Jing-mei never took it for granted to make her successful. Thus, it could be concluded that Suyuan’s American Dream was never fully achieved.

Another example of Suyuan’s failure of American Dream can be found during the crab dinner that she had hosted for the Chinese New Year celebration. Everyone that were invited to Suyuan’s dinner party tried to grab the crabs with the best qualities. After all the guests have chosen their satisfying crabs, there were only two left on the dish: one normal crab and one legless crab. Jing-mei, trying to show respect towards her mother, wanted to take the deformed crab, so her mother can eat the fine one. However, such thinking was what disappointed Suyuan. She could not fully understand why the Jing-mei wanted the deformed crab, for “everybody else want best quality” (234). Although, Jing-mei offered the good crab to her mother to show respect, Suyuan still believed Jing-mei should’ve took the better one. The primary reason why Suyuan was disappointed was because Jing-mei did not take the opportunity that was lying upon her. She had the opportunity to choose the better one, but decided to take the worse one. Because Jing-mei did not take the advantage of her opportunity, Suyuan believed her desired American Dream towards Jing-mei has failed.

As previously stated, Jing-mei’s definition of American Dream was completely different from that of her mother. Jing-mei believed success could be achieved by expressing one’s freedom and individuality. For Jing-mei, she wanted to live a life where she could pave her own roads step by step. However, she was not able to obtain such desire due to constant divergences between the people around her. Suyuan wanted to give Jing-mei an opportunity to succeed in piano; but for Jing-mei, the opportunity was more like a mandatory order. She felt like she was forced to become a prodigy in piano, so her mother could finally have something to boast about. If Jing-mei was to start playing the piano on her own will, she might’ve really became an expert, for she really did had a natural talent. But because she was playing the instrument under the atmosphere of “raised hopes and failed expectations” (144), her penchant for piano quickly waned and turned into hatred. Jing-mei simply wanted live a life where she could control her do‘s and don’ts. However, her imagined life was hindered by her mother, as she persistently authorized her life and tried to predetermine her future. Jing-mei was not able to find her own neither individuality nor freedom. In another words, this shows how Jing-mei was unsuccessful in achieving her American Dream.

To add on, Jing-mei’s desire towards her independent American Dream became further difficult to achieve as numerous people around her criticized and belittled her for her actions. She was incessantly compared with other daughters, such as Waverly, and often mocked for her failure to lead a successful life like the others. For example, people downgraded Jing-mei because she was a “college drop-off” (27). People compared her and Waverly, praising “how smart Waverly was at playing chess, how many trophies she had won last month, how many newspapers had printed her name, how many cities she had visited”, and expressed how Waverly was much better off (27). Living under such circumstances, Jing-mei found it hard to fully express herself as an individual. Whenever Jing-mei tried to follow her own path, she would face countless obstacles of criticisms, making her difficult to continue her desired future. Instead, she felt as if she was living under an artificial life, solely trying to live a life in order to please her mother as well as others around her. This clearly shows how Jing-mei was not able to achieve her American Dream.

All in all, the constant emphasizes of the failure of American Dream may doubt one minds whether there really is such thing as an American Dream. Suyuan failed meet her American Dream, as Jing-mei failed to use her opportunities of success. Jing-mei failed hers, as the people around her interfered with her individual ideas and took up her space of freedom. These failures, however, may have been due to the mother and daughter’s different perspective of American Dream. Both Suyuan and Jing-mei solely tried to achieve their own American Dream, which obviously only created additional conflicts. Perhaps, if they have understood better and helped each other, both of their desired futures may have came true.