1. The Rules of the Game
Study Notes

2. 1. “The Art of Invisible Strength”
an annoying person who begs and cries for what he wants will, ultimately, not achieve his goal. The person who is subtle and seems to along with others is more likely to get what he or she wants. As a child, this was true for me. If I asked for something, the answer would automatically be “no” from my frugal parents. If, however, I let my parents know in subtle ways what I liked and then silently hoped to have it, I often was gifted the item or treat. This silent hoping didn’t always work, but it worked far more often that outright asking for what I wanted. Weird, right? In the business world, this idea is also true, as the person who is most adept at working behind the scenes is often the one promoted by the boss. When you are noisy and trying to seek attention/glory, people often don’t want to see you succeed.

3. 2. Personification
One day, as she struggled to weave a hard-toothed comb through my disobedient hair, I had a sly thought.
I remember his sweaty brow seemed to weep at my every move.

4. 3. Sensory Details
I was playing in a large high school auditorium that echoed with phlegmy coughs and the squeaky rubber knobs of chair legs sliding across freshly waxed wooden floors.
My mother’s eyes turned into dangerous black slits.

5. 4. Simile
The alley was quiet and I could see the yellow lights shining from our flat like two tiger’s eyes in the night.

6. 5. A parent’s love is a double-edged sword.
Waverly’s mother is, ultimately, acting out of love for her daughter. She wants Waverly to excel.
However, the mother also wants to control her daughter’s actions, as seen in small details like teaching Waverly how to pose for the magazine photographer and hassling her about losing fewer pieces in the next chess match.
A mother’s love is very powerful. It can protect and help a child, but the removal of that love can be devastating, as we see with Waverly, who talks about the “sharp silence” she feels from her mother whose eyes are compared to “dangerous” black slits.

7. 6. Waverly family = fish dinner
The fish is described as a “fleshy head still connected to bones swimming upstream in vain escape.” So, too, is Waverly caught in a trap.
Three short paragraphs above this line, Waverly is described as being trapped in the alleys of Chinatown with “no escape routes.” She must live with and learn to navigate her mother’s ways. There can be no escaping this relationship.
Interesting, the family is picking clean the flesh from the bone of the fish’s body for dinner. Waverly’s mother has also been picking apart her daughter, nourishing herself with compliments about her daughter’s accomplishments.

8. 7. The Joy Luck Club
In the actual novel, Waverly tells her mother that she will no longer play chess. She later changes her mind, but the damage has been done and her confidence shaken. She never returns to the same level of success.