Literary Devices Found In Two Kinds
By: Demetrius Kaisharis
Setting
The Story Takes Place In Chinatown, San Fransico. In a highly Chinese Populated area.
Characters
Jing-mei and her mother are the main characters in this story. Jing-mei is a chinese, 8 year old girl who is not very talented and has smart wits. Her mother is a self-centered perosn who believes her daughter is a prodigy. The Piano TeacherMr. Chong is a deaf, old looking man who teacher Jing-mei piano lessons.
Plot
This story is about Jing-mei ' s Mother who always dreamed of Jing-mei to be a prodigy, just like Shirley Temple. But the Daughter does not agree with her mother. She Just wants to be different, but not a prodigy. So her mother puts Jing-mei in Piano lessons. But the Piano teacher isn't what she expected. He is Old, weird and... DEAF!!! While Piano lessons Jing-mei wasn ' t trying hard and was messing up to much. So when it came time for her performance Jing-mei ' s mother bragged a little to much. The performance was bad and the mother didn ' t say a thing. But when she finally gets mad Jing-mei Tells the mother how she Really feels. Years past and they haven't spoken to each other for a while. But Jing-mei talks to her mom one lest time before she passed away. She wanted Jing-mei to have the Piano she got when she was little.
Internal Conflict
Jing-mei is fighting with emotions with her mom and frustrations with her mother making her play piano, which breeds anger. Her mother is fighting internal emotions with frustration and anger with her daughter not wanting to be a prodigy.
External Conflict
The mother and Jing-mei are having a lot of external conflicts. one is when the daughter does not want to play piano and does not want to be a prodigy and her mother is very mad with her and makes her practice more. The other is when Jing-mei plays bad and her mother is so upset/embarresed that she does not say anything to Jing-mei.
Theme
The Theme of this story is knowing that people can't always get what they want. Patience.
Symbolism
The Two Songs represent the mother and daughter and the two personality ' s the mother wanted out of her daughter.
In the first part of the story there is a scene in which the daughter sees herself in the mirror. What does she see? What thematic significance could this scene have? How does it relate to the title?
She sees the two characters that she had. It meant she changed because she is lazy. The two story ' s are the mother and daughter and the two personality ' s she had.
Two strong-willed characters are pitted against each other in this story. What went wrong in the relationship between mother and daughter?
They did not agree with most things that they were doing. the mother was very forceful and the daughter was very laid back. Two Different Kinds.
Read carefully the parts dealing with the mother’s earlier life in China. How have her earlier experiences shaped her ambitions for her daughter?
The experience in China for the mother was not very good and she moved to America for better life and she wanted her child(ren) to be the best.