the joy luck club

the joy luck club is a book of solidarity for the daughters who have a complicated relationship with their mothers, the american children of immigrant parents, and the people who wish to be seen.

as a daughter to a chinese immigrant mother, this book resonated with me in a way that i’ve never resonated with anything before. there is something about the dynamic between asian mothers and their daughters that’s so difficult to put into words, and yet tan has done it. in reading the joy luck club i felt validated in my experience, but was also able to see my mother in a different light as well. she has her own history, a whole story before me, and before reading this book that was something i never thought about. 

the joy luck club beautifully details the struggles of being apart of the asian diaspora while also acknowledging the hardships that can stem from being an asian american. both are hard, but in their own ways. the daughters of the story are ethnically chinese and nationally american, and as readers we follow them throughout the book as they attempt to mediate their polarizing identities through the relationships that they hold with their diasporic mothers. but how is anyone supposed to find common ground between two cultures that could not be more different? how is a leopard supposed to reconcile with an eagle? 

it's an difficult question to answer, and a very big part of me thinks that it's almost impossible. the distance is too broad, too vast. the bridge would have to be constructed on both sides and in my experience, projects like that are often too one-sided. but i want to place emphasis on the word almost. 

while speaking about chinese culture and the asian diaspora, the joy luck club really focuses in on intergenerational trauma. each of the mothers in the book has lived through trauma that will eventually influences the lives of their daughters. yet, such an impactful history goes unnoticed, tucked and buried away. as a reader who shares a similar background to the daughters in the story, it forces you to think about your own mother and your grandmother and her mother before her. it was difficult to not see myself and my mother in the characters. 

“Because sometimes that is the only way to remember what is in your bones. You must peel off your skin, and that of your mother, and her mother. Until there is nothing. No scar, no skin, no flesh.