Chinese Cinderella

Imagine being forgotten by your father, bullied by your step-mother, and tormented by your siblings. Adeline Yen Mah endured these things every day, with her only escape as school and her roommate, Aunt Baba, and her grandfather, Ye Ye. In the memoir, Chinese Cinderella by Adeline Yen Mah, Adeline has a troubled youth. The people that she looks towards for support are Ye Ye and Aunt Baba, and they help her to overcome her abusive childhood. Adeline’s grandfather Ye Ye cares for Adeline in a loving way throughout her youth. When Adeline stays at her parents house after her incident with Pneumonia, Ye Ye has many words of advice for her, ”You have your whole life ahead of you. Everything is possible! I’ve tried to tell you over and over that…

The book A Chinese Cinderella begins in the fall of 1941. The main character is a young girl named Adeline and she is in kindergarten. Adeline has 4 birth siblings, Lydia, Gregory, Edgar, and James and 2 step siblings, Franklin and Susan. Adeline's meanest sibling is Edgar. Edgar goes out of his way to make Adeline's life miserable. He enjoys hurting her and making her feel like she is less than him. James, the youngest of the boys, is sometimes compassionate towards Adeline; however, he is in…

Chinese Cinderella is the perfect title for this touching and emotional novel. Chinese Cinderella is a true story of Adeline Yen Mah's childhood where she was hated and despised by her family because she is believed to be the cause of her mother's death. Despite this, she is an extremely intelligent girl trying exceedingly hard at school, desperate to prove her worth. Some of the themes evident in this novel are perseverance, isolation, Tragedy, Acceptance and self-worth. One of the themes of…

Composers have the power to create different worlds and new messages. The autobiographical novel Chinese Cinderella by Adeline Yen Mah and the drama Across the Barricades by Joan Lingard demonstrate the hardships faced by individuals in difficult circumstances and their ability to escape to new places. In these texts the composers have developed the concept of new messages having the power to change an individual’s lack of acceptance in their world. _In Chinese Cinderella, the protagonist…

Having grown up with a supporting family, I have become ignorant to the hardships experienced in other households. However, after having read the novel Chinese Cinderella written by Adeline Yen Mah and interviewed Sarah Marcello, my outlook on this subject has been influenced. Chinese Cinderella follows the life of a young Adeline as she struggles through life as the unwanted child of the Yen Mah family. Sarah Marcello was sent to live with her grandparents in Italy following the discovery of…

Depressing means causing someone to feel sad or without hope. In the book Chinese Cinderella the main character Adeline, a young girl, is put down, persecuted, wipped, assaulted, and made fun of. Reading about all of the things that happened to Adeline throughout her childhood made me feel bad for her, and made me feel sad that this was a real story. Chinese Cinderella was a page turning book because it made you want to read more, and see what happens to Adeline in the end. Its sad that a…

“Chinese Cinderella is dedicated to you (unwanted children) with the fervent wish that you will persist in trying to do your best in the face of hopelessness; to have faith in the end your spirit will prevail; to transcend your abuse and transform it into a source of courage, creativity and compassion.” (Yen Mah xii) Adeline Yen Mah’s memoir of her childhood was influential as she overcame hardships and burdens; finding hope in difficult situations. The story was inspirational because Adeline…

This novel was written by Adeline Yen Mah. Chinese Cinderella is a true story about an unwanted daughter. The author Adeline Yen Mah is telling us about her life between the ages of four through her early teens. At the beginning of the story she comes home with a medal the very first week of school. She received the medal for being the best student of the week. Aunt Baba was so proud of her little niece, so she put the certificate and the medal, the same place she kept her valuables. Aunt Baba…

Adeline Yen Mah’s autobiography, Chinese Cinderella, tells the tale of a young girl in 20th century China who was severely abused and neglected throughout her childhood. Her story also resembles the Chinese Cinderella story Yeh-Shen. Throughout her novel, many themes and issues are addressed including Adeline’s perseverance, her broken family relationships and realising her own self worth and importance. Through multiple positioning techniques and Yen Mah’s vivid vignettes, readers gain personal…

The book Chinese Cinderella by Adeline Yen Mah tells a story of a girl who has many ways in which she needs to show courage throughout her life, such as when she walked home from school by herself, when she stood up for Youngest sister when Niang was unfairly scolding her and when she was alone in the school in Tianjin. Explained at the beginning of the book, after Adeline was born her mother died, which caused her to be a symbol of bad luck to her family and therefore caused this maltreatment.…