In Marilyn Chin’s “How I Got That Name”, Amy Tan’s “Two Kinds and “Fences” by August Wilson the theme of family arises. Due to the theme of family the notion of unsympathetic parents is presented. In Marilyn Chin’s poem the speaker's father is unsympathetic due to how he named his daughter after Marilyn Monroe, a figure known for her questionable behavior. In addition to the unsympathetic nature of the father in “how I got my name”, an unsympathetic mother also appears in the short story “two kinds” by Amy Tan. throughout this short story the mother sets unrealistic expectations for her daughter, which results in her daughter rebelling against her authority. Another unsympathetic parent is presented in the drama “Fences.” During this drama…show more content… The mother would be unsympathetic because she never takes into account what her daughter truly wants. In one portion of the story the mother makes her daughter do certain tasks she believes will improve her intellectual abilities. A quote from the story that expresses the extent of these exercises is, “The tests got harder - multiplying numbers in my head, finding the queen of hearts in a deck of cards, trying to stand on my head without using my hands, predicting the daily temperatures in Los Angeles, New York, and London. One night I had to look at a page from the Bible for three minutes and then report everything I could remember”(Amy Tan, pdf. 1-2). This quote expresses the mother’s unsympathetic nature because it shows the mother pushing the daughter to extremes by having her do difficult tasks that are near impossible. The narrator later states “I hated the tests, the raised hopes and failed expectations”(Amy Tan, pdf. 2). This is an indication that the narrator wasn’t enjoying the tests her mother put her through, but her mother continued to put her through them and did not take into account what she truly wanted or how the failed expectations effects her daughter’s…show more content… The father in this poem is unsympathetic because he named his daughter after Marilyn Monroe, who is a women he has an immense attraction to. This poem provides an allusion in the form of Marilyn Monroe. The father naming his daughter after her displays him as an unsympathetic parent because it makes the daughter feel as if he compares her to Marilyn Monroe a woman known for her infidelity and wild behavior. The daughter feels that due to her father comparing her to marilyn monroe he has low expectations of her. This comparison is best expressed when the speaker states “And there I was, a wayward pink baby, named after some tragic white woman swollen with gin and Nembutal.”(17-19). The speaker of this story states that she was a wayward pink baby meaning that she believes she was difficult to take care of. This perception was influenced by her father’s belief that she will adopt similar behaviors to
