Battle Royal

she had to endure being raised by an overbearing mother as well as dealing with psychological struggles within herself. She had to learn how to become a woman on her own terms. Throughout the story, her mother repeatedly pressures Jing-mei to be something that she is not. For instant Jing-mei, resists her overbearing mother's desire to make her into a musical prodigy in order to compete with one of her friend's daughters. She wants Jing-mei to somehow become a prodigy child. Jing-mei's mother wants her daughter to be the best, and to have the kind of life, full of hopes and dreams that she did not have when she was a girl at a time of communist in China. Like all good mothers, she only wants the best for her child. Since immigrating to America, she believes that anything is possible and she uses her daughter to prove it. She has such high hopes for her daughter that she doesn't realize the amount of distress she causes Jing-mei. In the beginning of the story Jing-mei liked the idea of becoming a prodigy however, the prodigy in her became impatient. Jing-mei would try various dance and musical forms but would do her best to become the worst so that her mother would give up this obsession of her being a prodigy. By giving up her will to her mother, the mother took control as if she were her daughter herself. In Nathanial Hawthorne's story "Young Goodman Brown" I felt Goodman Brown is an everyman character, meaning anyone of us, is in struggling situation with his or her heritage or more specifically having spiritual faith. In the beginning, Goodman and his wife "Faith" are standing in the doorway of his own home, he hated to leave her but his commitment is to the devil and wouldn't want anything to happen to her.