Study Questions and Suggested Essay Topics
Study Questions
What is Helen's role in the novel?
What is the significance in Winnie having given Pearl a box in which to keep her secrets, for Pearl's tenth birthday?
How are the female characters in the novel different from the male characters?
Suggested Essay Topics
Discuss the significance of cleaning and sweeping in the novel. What does it mean that Winnie comes home to clean her house after Helen tells her she must release her secrets?
Discuss the novel as a feminist text? Is Winnie Louie a feminist? Is Amy Tan?
How did Winnie's mother disappear? Did she commit suicide? Did she simply abandon her marriage? Did she fall ill and die? Does the reader ever have an answer to this question and is the answer to this question important?
Discuss the differences and similarities between Helen's children and Winnie's children. What are their shared experiences? What separates them?
Discuss the role that Phil, Cleo, and Tessa play in the novel.
