1. In telling story, would you say the first-person narration is more effective than the third-person narration?

回答：

Yes. The whole story is narrated by the daughter. Though the narrator remains the same, the point of view may change. Most of the story is narrated from the point of view of the daughter as a little girl and the last part is from the point of view of the same daughter when she has grown up.

2. Do you find Amy Tan a skillful story-teller? If you think so, give examples to illustrate her narrative skills.

回答：

Amy Tan certainly deserves the name of a skillful story-teller. She knows how to tell a compelling story by building up tension around conflict. From this story, you can find a complete plot of a short story. The author starts with exposition, providing the readers with some background information. It tells about the mother and her high hopes for her daughter, which paves the way for the development of the conflicts between the mother and daughter namely, the mother’s effort to change her daughter into a prodigy and her daughter’ s resistance against it. The climax came when the daughter bad- mouthed her mother after the talent-show frustration then the mother’s offer of the piano signals the end of the conflicts, and their peace-ranking and the daughter, later as resolution.

3. Can you illustrate where the language used in this story is simple but vivid?

回答：

Para 21 is one of the fine examples to show how the author uses simple but vivid expressive language in her depiction. When the sound of the TV set kept shorting out, the mother had to try to get up time and again from the sofa to adjust it. She uses simple words like 44up and down, back and forth to describe the mother’s movement between the sofa and the TV set. This action was repeated so many times that in the eyes of the little girl it was like a stiff embrace less dance between her and the TV set”

4. Could identify a few places where irony, sarcasm or a touch of humor occur?

回答：

You are lucky you don’t have this problem. The tone is ironic as problem actually means honor, implying that Jing-mei could not bring home any trophy.

“That was something’ else,” There is a touch of humor in it，implying his amazement.

5. How does the story end?

回答：

The story ends with the daughter’s epiphany. In the end when the narrator played the two pieces of music» she was able to see they were two halves of the same song.