Conflicts In Amy Tan's Year Of The Elephant And The Joy Luck Club

In the books Year of the Elephant by Leila Abouzeid and The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan the protagonists, Zahra and Ying-ying St. Clair, share a similar struggle. They both suffer from a loss brought about by their husbands that causes them emotional distress, and due to male superiority in patriarchal societies the men are able to alter the lives of their wives without any consequences or feelings of guilt for their wrong doing. However, having experienced the same struggle the women cope with it differently. While Ying-ying decides to tell her daughter Lena about her first marriage in order to give Lena her Tiger spirit, Zahra begins to piece together the life that is now her reality. Similarly, Zahra and Ying-ying St. Clair struggle with

Ying-ying gradually lost herself over the years during her two marriages, and her loss causes her much anguish because she watches her daughter’s unhappiness knowing she has passed on her tiger ghost. Being born in the year of the tiger Ying-ying’s spirit possesses the strength and fierceness of a tiger. Ying-ying’s loss of herself is due to absence of her tiger spirit. This loss began during her first marriage. Ying-ying was not fond of her first husband, but she grew to love him because of the “part of [her] mind that swims to join [him] against [her] will” (Tan 247). She, essentially, domesticated herself for her first husband by focusing on pleasing him and not herself, she was taught that “it is wrong to think of [her] own needs” (Tan 70) and in doing this she silenced her voice. Her passivity tamed the “wild and stubborn” (Tan 243) aspects of herself. And the pain she felt when her husband committed adultery caused her tiger’s fire to finally go out, resulting in Ying-ying no longer being the “heartstrong” (Tan 248) girl that she remembered. “[Ying-ying] became a stranger to [herself]” (Tan

Clair. In patriarchal societies men are the superior beings, and struggles the two characters face show the amount of power men have over women. For Ying-ying, her first marriage is arranged, so she did not have a say in who she married. Much like Mohammed, Ying-ying’s first husband committed adultery with no consequences to his actions. They both also left their wives as if they had become worthless, and even in his absence in Ying-ying’s life her first husband maintained had power over her. She is unable to marry until her first husband died and even after his death he still has hold on her because their marriage left a lasting affect on her. She carried her passivity into her second marriage and passed it n to her daughter. Zahra’s husband’s ability to divorce her also made him capable of having lasting affect on her life. She now has to struggle to find her place in a society fit for men, which is difficult because she does not have the education necessary to get a job that would allow her to make “an honorable living” (Abouzeid 77). The lack of education of women living in Moroccan society makes them dependable and inferior to men, socially and economically. With these disadvantages, the two women do find a way to cope with their loss in their patriarchal societies. Ying-ying decides that it is time to tell her Lena about her first marriage and her life mistakes so