Lydia's Identity In Mulberry And Peach

Lydia’s family and the community contribute most in oppressing Lydia’s personality. Most of the conflicts can trace back to the Chinese American cultural conflicts. In Mulberry and Peach, the cultural environment leaves external influence on Mulberry, and Mulberry completes her individuality reformation passively. While the elements in Everything I never Told You mostly leave intrinsic influence on Lydia, and push her reform her individuality actively.

Through the observation of Lydia’s family environment, the dilemma between Lydia’s parents plays the major role in foreshadowing Lydia’s tragedy. Lydia’s father James’s identity as an American is rarely admitted (James is born in America, his parents are first generation of immigrants), thus

However, wherever he goes, his outlook marks him as an “alien” which is different from the surroundings; in his first class as Professor Lee, students leave when they discover him is an oriental, and shout “Yippee-ki-yay-ay!” (Ng 33). All those makes him isolate from the environment, “He never felt he belonged here (America)” (Ng 40). Therefore, Marilyn’s (a white American) admire for him seems a rare approval and an ideal start point of normal life. They get married and have three children. In bringing up Lydia, James keeps telling her to keep good relationship with friends; in another words, to get the approval from the majorities. On the other hand, Lydia’s mother Marilyn is a feminist who stands out from the crowd, her life goal is to chase her own dream. Since she was young, she refuses to take home economics course and shows great enthusiastic in maths and physics. When she grows up, she goes to Harvard with excellent grade. She is the only female of 15 students in the laboratory, and has the best performance. Thus, when she first comes across