Student Question

What are three events that occur in "Two Kinds"?

Quick answer:

Three key events in "Two Kinds" include Jing-Mei's mother deciding she should become a piano prodigy after seeing a young Chinese girl on TV, Jing-Mei's disastrous recital that reveals her lack of piano skills to her parents, and Jing-Mei's later realization that the recital piece "Pleading Child" is paired with "Perfectly Contented," symbolizing her personal growth and life stages.

Expert Answers

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Well, there are plenty of "events" that happen in any story, so you might want to think about narrowing down your question or making it more specific. For me, the three main events that occur in this tale are as follows. Firstly, I would select when Jing-Mei's mother sees the young Chinese girl on TV and comes up with the idea of Jing-Mei showing that she is a prodigy through her talent on the piano. Secondly, I would select the diastrous recital that Jing-Mei gives in front of an audience including her parents when it becomes very clear how little Jing-Mei actually knows. Lastly, I would select the final part of the story, when Jing-Mei realises that the piece of music she played at the concert, entitled "Pleading Child," was one of two pieces of music, being paired with "Perfectly Contented." The way the final paragraph seems to describe the two pieces indicate the different stages of Jing-Mei's life and the way that now she has managed to become perfectly contented:

"Pleading Child" was shorter but slower; "Perfectly Contented" was longer but faster. And after I played them both a few times, I realised they were two halves of the same song.

Thus the music becomes a kind of metaphor for Jing-Mei's life and the way that she has passed through two distinct stages.

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