Rhapsody In The Sun Chapter Summaries

1.The two main characters: the pregnant girl, Jig, and the American man are two different people. The first clue about the exact nature of their conflict is when the woman compares the hills to “white elephants”. The American says that he has “never seen one” and Jig reacts to his answer saying: “No, you wouldn’t have.”
Jig seems not to be convinced that the decision she made is the right one. The man says the abortion is “perfectly simple” and that he thinks “it’s the best thing to do.” Even though he then continues “But I don’t want you to do it if you don’t really want to”, he has already stated that according to him abortion is the best solution. Even if Jig is of a different opinion, she knows what the man’s view is.

2.At first I thought
She doesn’t have an extensive and impressive vocabulary. The mother doesn’t build proper sentences when speaking “because you not trying” and makes grammar mistakes “Our problem worser than yours.“ She cleans houses and doesn’t go to school to work on her education. The woman doesn’t speak English fluently and seems to give orders to her daughter “You watch.” The mother wants her daughter to become a prodigy, to achieve something in life. She has a lot of expectations for her daughter and puts a lot of pressure on her. Jing-mei doesn’t want to live her mother’s dreams. The unrealistic expectations of her mother make Jing-mei angry and frustrated. Jing-mei lacked encouragement and understanding from her mother. As a result, the daughter was not great at school and she later dropped out of
The first line in the story says: “My mother believed you could be anything you wanted to be in America.” The mother believes that anyone can success in America: “You could open a restaurant. You could work for the government and get good retirement. You could buy a house with almost no money down. You could become rich. You could become instantly famous.”The mother regards America as a place full of opportunities “America was where all my mother's hopes lay.” She is convinced that her daughter has what it takes to be successful. At the beginning, the mother wants Jing-mei to become a child actress. She even takes her to a beauty training school to have her hair cut like Shirley Temple. Then she has her daughter take many tests to make sure she can be great at school and eventually succeed. At the end the mother makes Jung-mei take piano lessons, which the daughter despises.
I think that Amy Tan believes in American Dream however she shows in her story that the dream can’t be forced on somebody. A person can achieve anything if she/she wants it. Jung-mei says “Unlike my mother, I did not believe I could be anything I wanted to be, I could only be