The Chinese Circle of Life

From the discussion of Amy Chua's "Tiger Mother" book.

To many Chinese people of our generation and earlier, life is a string of obligations. Meeting them = success and pride. Abandoning them = failure and shame. There's not much said about the pursuit of happiness and personal fulfillment. We're supposed to do what we're supposed to do to make our family look good, and to prepare ourselves to do the same for the next generation. And so goes the Chinese circle of life.

Amy herself seems to reject the common interpretation of her book. She says that it is about how she was becoming an American mother. The best comment is Prof. Hsu's. I recommend his blog. I choose to illustrate this note with a pic of William Sidis, to remind us that over-pushing childen is not a Chinese invention (the Yiddische Mame has been doing it for gnerations) and that it tends to end tragically.