Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother

Coda

Tigers are passionate and rash, blinding themselves to danger. But they draw on experience, gaining new energies and great strength.

I started writing this book on June 29, 2009, the day after we got back from Russia. I didn’t know why I was doing it or how the book was going to end, but even though I usually have writer’s block, this time the words streamed out of me. The first two-thirds of the book took me just eight weeks to write. (The last third was agonizing.) I showed every page to Jed and the girls. “We’re writing this together,” I said to Sophia and Lulu.

“No, we’re not,” they both said. “It’s your book, Mommy, not ours.”

“I’m sure it’s all about you anyway,” added Lulu.

But as time went on, the more the girls read, the more they contributed.The truth is, it’s been therapeutic — a Western concept, the girls remind me.

I’d forgotten a lot of things over the years, good and bad, which the girls and Jed helped me remember. To try to piece things together, I dug up old e-mails, computer files, music programs, and photo albums. Often, Jed and I were overcome with nostalgia. Sophia was just a baby yesterday, it seemed, and now she was a year away from applying to college. Sophia and Lulu were mainly overcome with how cute they used to be.

Don’t get me wrong: Writing this book hasn’t been easy. Nothing in our family ever is. I had to produce multiple drafts, revising constantly to address the girls’ objections. I ended up leaving out big chunks about Jed, because that’s a whole other book, and it’s really his story to tell. Some parts I had to rewrite two dozen times before I could satisfy both Sophia and Lulu. On several occasions, one of them would be reading a draft chapter, then suddenly burst into tears and storm off. Or I’d get a curt, “This is great, Ma, very funny. I just don’t know who you’re writing about, that’s all. It’s definitely not our family.”

“Oh no!” Lulu cried out once. “Am I supposed to be Pushkin, the dumb one? And Sophia is Coco, who’s smart and learns everything?” I pointed out that Coco wasn’t smart and couldn’t learn anything either. I assured the girls that the dogs weren’t supposed to be metaphors for them.

“So what purpose are they serving?” Sophia asked, ever logical. “Why are they in the book?”

“I don’t know yet,” I admitted. “But I know they’re important. There’s something inherently unstable about a Chinese mother raising dogs.”

Another time, Lulu complained, “I think you’re exaggerating the difference between Sophia and me to try to make the book interesting. You make me sound like a typical rebellious American teenager, when I’m not even close.” Sophia, meanwhile, had just said, “I think you tone down Lulu too much. You make her sound like an angel.”

Naturally, both girls felt the book shortchanged them. “You should definitely dedicate this book to Lulu,” Sophia once said magnanimously. “She’s obviously the heroine. I’m the boring one readers will cheer against. She’s the one with verve and panache.” And from Lulu: “Maybe you should call your book The Perfect Child and the Flesh-Eating Devil. Or Why Oldest Children Are Better. That’s what it’s about, right?”

As the summer went on, the girls never stopped nagging me, “So how’s the book going to end, Mommy? Is it going to be a happy ending?”

I’d always say something like, “It depends on you guys. But I’m guessing it’ll be a tragedy.”

Months passed, but I just couldn’t figure out how to end the book. Once, I came running up to the girls. “I’ve got it! I’m about to finish the book.”

The girls were excited. “So how will it end?” Sophia asked. “What’s your point going to be?”

“I’ve decided to favor a hybrid approach,” I said. “The best of both worlds. The Chinese way until the child is eighteen, to develop confidence and the value of excellence, then the Western way after that. Every individual has to find their own path,” I added gallantly.

“Wait — until eighteen?” asked Sophia. “That’s not a hybrid approach. That’s just Chinese parenting all through childhood.”

“I think you’re being too technical, Sophia.”

Nevertheless, I went back to the drawing board. I spun more wheels, cranked out some more duds. Finally, one day — actually yesterday — I asked the girls how they thought the book should end.

“Well,” said Sophia, “are you trying to tell the truth in this book or just a good story?”

“The truth,” I replied.

“That’s going to be hard, because the truth keeps changing,” said Sophia.

“No it doesn’t,” I said. “I have a perfect memory.”

“Then why do you keep revising the ending all the time?” asked Sophia.

“Because she doesn’t know what she wants to say,” Lulu offered.

“It’s not possible for you to tell the complete truth,” said Sophia. “You’ve left out so many facts. But that means no one can really understand. For example, everyone’s going to think that I was subjected to Chinese parenting, but I wasn’t. I went along with it, by my own choice.”

“Not when you were little,” Lulu said. “Mommy never gave us a choice when we were little. Unless it was, ‘Do you want to practice six hours or five?’”

“Choice. . I wonder if that’s what it all comes down to,” I mused. “Westerners believe in choice; the Chinese don’t. I used to make fun of Popo for giving Daddy a choice about violin lessons. Of course he chose not to. But now, Lulu, I wonder what would have happened if I hadn’t forced you to audition for Juilliard or practice so many hours a day. Who knows? Maybe you’d still like violin. Or what if I’d let you choose your own instrument? Or no instrument? After all, Daddy turned out fine.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Lulu. “Of course I’m glad you forced me to play the violin.”

“Oh, right. Hello Dr. Jekyll! Where’s Mr. Hyde?”

“No — I mean it,” Lulu said. “I’m always going to love the violin. I’m even glad you made me drill exponents. And study Chinese for two hours every day.”

“Seriously?” I asked.

“Yeah,” nodded Lulu.

“Really!” I said. “Because come to think of it, I think those were great choices we made too, even though all those people worried that you and Sophia would be permanently damaged psychologically. And you know, the more I think about it, the madder I’m getting. All these Western parents with the same party line about what’s good for children and what’s not — I’m not sure they’re making choices at all. They just do what everyone else does. They’re not questioning anything either, which is what Westerners are supposed to be so good at doing. They just keep repeating things like ‘You have to give your children the freedom to pursue their passion’ when it’s obvious that the ‘passion’ is just going to turn out to be Facebook for ten hours which is a total waste of time and eating all that disgusting junk food — I’m telling you this country is going to go straight downhill! No wonder Western parents get thrown into nursing homes when they’re old! You guys better not put me in one of those. And I don’t want my plug pulled either.”

“Calm down, Mommy,” said Lulu.

“When their kids fail at something, instead of telling them to work harder, the first thing Western parents do is bring a lawsuit!”

“Who exactly are you talking about?” asked Sophia. “I don’t know any Western parents who have brought a lawsuit.”

“I refuse to buckle to politically correct Western social norms that are obviously stupid. And not even rooted historically. What are the origins of the Playdate anyway? Do you think our Founding Fathers had Sleepovers? I actually think America’s Founding Fathers had Chinese values.”

“I hate to break it to you, Mommy, but—”

“Ben Franklin said, ‘If thou loveth life, never ever EVER wasteth time.’ Thomas Jefferson said, ‘I’m a huge believer in luck, and the harder I work the more I have of it.’ And Alexander Hamilton said, ‘Don’t be a whiner.’ That’s a totally Chinese way of thinking.”

“Mommy, if the Founding Fathers thought that way, then it’s an American way of thinking,” said Sophia. “Besides, I think you may be misquoting.”

“Look it up,” I dared her.

My sister Katrin is doing better now. Life is definitely tough for her, and she’s not out of the woods yet, but she’s a hero and bears everything with grace, doing research around the clock, writing paper after paper, and spending as much time as she can with her kids.

I often wonder what the lesson of her illness is. Given that life is so short and so fragile, surely each of us should be trying to get the most out of every breath, every fleeting moment. But what does it mean to live life to its fullest?

We all have to die. But which way does that cut? In any case, I’ve just told Jed that I want to get another dog.