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Amy Tan

Amy Tan Quotes

Film writer

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Famous Amy Tan Quotes

“My mother imparted her daily truths so she could help my older brothers and me rise above our circumstances. We lived in San Francisco's Chinatown. Like most of the other Chinese children who played in the back alleys of restaurants and curio shops, I didn't think we were poor. My bowl was always full, three five-course meals every day, beginning with a soup full of mysterious things I didn't want to know the names of.”

ThinkingKnowsWantChildrenHelpingMotherThreeCoursesNamesPoorFamilyFiveBrotherCircumstancesMysteriousChineseMealsRestaurantsShopsBowlsSoupSan FranciscoRise AboveAlleysOlder BrotherMysterious ThingsChinatownBack Alleys
Book:The Joy Luck Club
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“I was raised the Chinese way: I was taught to desire nothing, to swallow other people's misery, to eat my own bitterness. And even though I taught my daughter the opposite, still she came out the same way! Maybe it is because she was born to me and she was born a girl. And I was born to my mother and I was born a girl. All of us are like stairs, one step after another, going up and down, but all going the same way.”

PeopleWayStillsMotherDesireGirlBornMy OwnStepsGenerationsTaughtDaughterOppositesMiseryRaisedChineseMy DaughterBitternessUp And DownStairs
Author:Amy Tan
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“And then it occurs to me. They are frightened. In me, they see their own daughters, just as ignorant, just as unmindful of all the truths and hopes they have brought to America. They see daughters who grow impatient when their mothers talk in Chinese, who think they are stupid when they explain things in fractured English. They see that joy and luck do not mean the same to their daughters, that to these closed American-born minds "joy luck" is not a word, it does not exist. They see daughters who will bear grandchildren born without any connecting hope passed from generation to generation.”

ThinkingMindMeanDoeAmericaJoyMotherGrowsFearBornGenerationsStupidBearsDaughterLuckIgnorantChineseFrightenedGrandchildrenConnectingImpatient
Book:The Joy Luck Club
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“Yet some of my friends tell me they understand 50 percent of what my mother says. Some say they understand 80 to 90 percent. Some say they understand none of it, as if she were speaking pure Chinese. But to me, my mother's English is perfectly clear, perfectly natural. It's my mother tongue. Her language, as I hear it, is vivid, direct, full of observation and imagery. That was the language that helped shape the way I saw things, expressed things, made sense of the world”

IfsWorldWayMadeMotherLanguageNaturalClearSawsPureShapesPercentMy FriendsDirectTongueObservationChineseVividImageryMother TonguePerfectly Natural
Author:Amy Tan
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