Multi-voice Symphony— A Dialogic Interpretation Of The Joy Luck Club

Amy Tan is one of the most influential writers in the contemporary Chinese American literary history. The publication of The Joy Luck Club in 1989 has established Amy Tan’s important position in American literature and made her a famous Chinese American writer. This novel explores the cultural differences and communication between Chinese and Americans through mother-daughter conflicts in different cultural backgrounds, and conveys the identity confusion and anxiety of the Chinese Americans with a global view of cultural collision and reconciliation. Critics at home and abroad have analyzed the novel from different aspects. In recent yeas, Bakhtin’s theory of dialogism is applied to analyze literary works. By searching in CNKI, the present author finds that few articles apply Bakhtin’s dialogism to interpret Amy Tan’s works. Based on Bakhtin’s theory of dialogism,this thesis explores the novel The Joy Luck Club from the aspects of “great dialogue” and “microdialogue”, with the expectation to have a better understanding of the novel and show the charm of the novel from a different viewpoint. The whole work is like a multi-voice symphony, in which a variety of different consciousnesses contradicts and communicates with each other, and finally, the Chinese American women successfully find their own cultural identity through dialogue.This thesis consists of three chapters, along with the introduction and conclusion.The introduction introduces Amy Tan’s life, discusses some research background and literary reviews of The Joy Luck Club, and states methodology and the significance of this thesis.Chapter One is theoretical foundation of the whole paper, which briefly states the framework of the paper—Bakhtin’s theory of dialogism. According to Bakhtin, dialogue is the essence of life, and one can come to know oneself only through communication with others. In his Problem of Dostoevsky’s Poetics, Bakhtin divides dialogue into two forms: great dialogue and microdialogue. The so-called great dialogue is constructed by the equal dialogue among various consciousnesses between the novelist and the character and between characters; with the dialogue penetrating inward into every word of the novel, double voice emerges, in which two voices contradict and communicate. This is called microdialogue.Chapter Two elaborates the great dialogue in The Joy Luck Club. It mainly talks about the dialogic relationship between characters though the dialogue between mothers and daughters, and between the Chinese culture and American culture. As the theme, mother-daughter dialogue runs throughout the novel, linking the whole work together like a hub. In the meantime, it reflects the main great dialogue—the dialogue between two cultures in the novel. All conflict and dialogue between mothers and daughters are closely around it. Through dialogue, mothers and daughters go from estrangement to harmony. The mothers understand and accept daughters’ Americanness, and the daughters admit their Chinese blood. On this basis, it conveys a wish for the harmonious cultural coexistence by the embrace of Chinese and American sisters.Chapter Three discusses the “microdialogue” in The Joy Luck Club. It mainly analyses the double-voiced discourses based on the speech and the inner conflicts. Facing the cultural conflicts, double voice emerges in the speech and inner world of the characters. By means of dialogue between two inner voices on behalf of Chinese and American consciousnesses respectively, they finally find their cultural identity: Chinese American.The conclusion summarizes the foregoing discussion and indicates the innovation and the significance of this study. Bakhtin’s dialogism sheds a new light on the study of The Joy Luck Club. The Joy Luck Club looks like a net composed of dialogues, in which many characters are in the equal position and period of time. Thus they could not only express their views freely but also exchange and interact with each other at the same time. Only by dialoguing and communicating, can the Chinese Americans break through the mainstream American hegemony. Only by encouraging contradiction and diversity, can they get rid of identity crisis and find their cultural identity. Representing different voices, they form a multi-voice symphony. It not only reflects the conflicts, communication and fusion of Chinese and Western cultures, but also indicates that a new attitude should be taken in the period of globalization for the harmoniousness of different countries, ethnics and cultures, that is, understanding, communication and trust.