Themes essays

Themes essays The novel, The Joy Luck Club, written by Amy Tan is divided into many vignettes that each treat a different topic and theme. Every flash back or story of each character has s a different theme, however, there are three themes that appear constantly in the story. Most of these themes are shown by most of the characters in the novel. Sometimes for some it was really obvious, while on the other hand for others it was not. The first theme that appeared constantly throughout the novel was sacrifice. Sacrifice was mainly shown by An-Meis mother whose name was Nuyer. The way she sacrificed herself was that she killed herself to give her daughter a stronger spirit. When the poison broke into her body, she whispered to me that she would rather kill her own weak spirit so she could give me a stronger one. (Tan, pg.271) In this example it shows the great sacrifice her mother did for her daughter. Another sacrifice shown is when Nuyer cuts her own flesh to save her mother popo from dying. An example of this is, My mother took her flesh and put in the soup. She cooked . . . to try to cure her mother this one last time. (Tan, pg.41) In the example given it is shown how a daughter is willing to do anything for their mother just as in the last example where the mother is willing to anything for her daughter. These types of sacrifices were seen along through the novel in between the mothers and daughters. Howeve r, sacrifice was not the only theme seen throughout the novel. The second most important theme is lack of communication. This theme can be seen two times in one single vignette. One way it is seen is the mother has no-good communication with her husband for the reason that they do not understand each others languages well as seen in the following example, My father who spoke only a few canned Chinese expressions, insisted my mother learn English. So with him, she spoke in moods and ...