The Joy Luck Club (Masterplots II: Women’s Literature Series)
At a glance:
- Author: Amy Tan
- First Published: 1989
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Psychological realism
- Time of Work: The 1910’s, the 1940’s, the 1960’s, and the 1980’s
- Setting: San Francisco and China
- Principal Characters: Suyuan Woo, Jing-mei (June) Woo, Lindo Jong, Waverly Jong, An-mei Hsu, Rose Hsu Jordan, Ying-ying St. Clair, Lena St. Clair
- Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction, Social realism, Domestic realism, Family literature
- Subjects: North America or North Americans, Self-discovery, United States or Americans, Mothers, Parents and children, Twentieth century, Authors or writers, Marriage, California, West, U.S., Asia or Asians, Immigration or emigration, Multiculturalism, Women, Divorce, Lifestyles, Bilingualism, Asian Americans, China or Chinese people, Chinese Americans, Career women, Luck or misfortune
- Locales: San Francisco, CA, China
Form and Content
Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club is a narrative mosaic made up of the lives of four Chinese women and their Chinese American daughters. Because of its structure, the book can only loosely be called a novel. It is composed of sixteen stories and four vignettes, but like many novels, it has central characters who develop through the course of the plot. The daughters struggle with the complexities of modern life, including identity crises and troubled relationships, while the mothers reflect on past actions that were dictated by culture and circumstance. The...
[The entire page is 2234 words long]
Navigate
- The Joy Luck Club (Cyclopedia of Literary Characters)
- The Joy Luck Club (Magill’s Choice: American Ethnic Writers)
- The Joy Luck Club (Magill’s Literary Annual 1991-2005)
- The Joy Luck Club (Masterplots, Revised Second Edition)
- The Joy Luck Club (Masterplots II: Women’s Literature Series)
- The Joy Luck Club (Cyclopedia of Literary Places)
- The Joy Luck Club (Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition)
See Also:
Amy Tan (Short Fiction)Amy Tan (Long Fiction)Amy Tan (Cyclopedia of World Authors)Amy Tan (Identities and Issues)
See Also:
- - For teachers, the The Joy Luck Club Lesson Plan.
- - The Joy Luck Club summary and study guide in the eNotes.
- Add The Joy Luck Club to your favorites