“Typical American”, by Gish Jen, has many themes, ranging from the paradox of freedom and limits to the assimilation of a race of immigrants. One of the major themes in the book is the pursuit of the American Dream. All immigrants who come to the USA have this pursuit in mind when they first set foot in New York or San Francisco. They have dreams of what America will be to them and what they will become in this land of opportunity. The American dream allows someone to make themselves into whoever they want to be and to live the life they’ve always wanted. “[Ralph] lay waiting to see what happened. Anything could happen, this was America. He gave himself up to the country and dreamt.” (Pg. 42) What they don’t realize is that the pursuit doesn’t always go the way they want and it can end in disappointment and tragedy. This was sadly more often than not the case for East Asian immigrants at the time “Typical American” takes place. Their pursuit of the American dream was hampered by the general populace who despised them and tried to drive them back to where they came from. For most East Asian immigrants the American dream was hard to achieve, and the story of the immigrants in “Typical American” is no exception. Through the book, two characters, Grover Ding and Ralph Chang, each achieve only certain facets of the American dream and thereby create a sense of disappointment in the novel.
Ralph Chang and Grover Ding are opposites in many ways. Grover is rich, has skills with women, a huge house with servants, and he’s a wild and crazy bachelor. Ralph is a quieter, mildly successful husband with a wife and two kids and a house in the suburbs. They have one thing in common, and that’s the pursuit of the American dream. The pursuit has a lot to do with money and material possessions, but it also has to do with having someone to come home to that cares for you and also the chance to propagate your lineage so you can keep your seed in the country that you decided to adopt as your home. Each has pursued the American dream and each has succeeded, but each has also failed. Ralph has the family life and Grover has the material wealth, but neither man has both, and each is somewhat disappointed.
Ralph may have a nice family with his wife Helen, and his girls Mona and Callie, but he also wants to have lots of money. Money, he thinks, will let him do whatever he wants instead of working for the rest of his life, and it will make his family life more secure, since he won’t have to worry about monetary problems. When he first came to the USA he had no trouble with money, but when he had to flee the university, it became a struggle to survive. He had to take a horrible job as a chicken plucker to make ends meet and he moved into a shoddy apartment to save money. He slowly lost the acquaintances he had made in college and finally ended up in the park sitting on a bench waiting for fate to deal him his next hand. Fortunately his sister showed up and she saved him from probable death by taking him in and getting him back into the university legally. From his stint as a poor wretch, Ralph learned the importance of money with regards to security and he began a lifelong pursuit of wealth. “…he would have said that he yearned for a larger tenure than any department could grant; to go with his professional tenure, a sort of life tenure. He wanted simply to stay put. No more scrambling! He wanted to laze away the afternoon at a dumpling house, sip plum juice by a green pond flickering with orange-and-white carp. Or, well, he would have settled for iced tea, anyway, by a crabgrass-free lawn with a sprinkler leaning one direction, then the other, charmingly indecisive. Hadn’t he once wished, achingly, ardently, only that no revolution should ever take his wife from him.” (Pg. 179)
Ralph thought his hard work in the university and his efforts to get tenure would be enough to make lots of money, “Marriage, as he’d thought of it, was the end of a story, much like a Ph. D., except that the marriage story was shorter, and less work.” (Pg. 69). But all his efforts did was allow him to move from a run down apartment in the city to a house in the suburbs. Ralph was disappointed and he wanted more, so he waited and hoped for the day when he would receive tenure at the university. The big day came and went and he got stuck teaching in a musty, hot room in a remote tower on campus, where he certainly did not want to spend the rest of his career. The disappointment of his tenure job was ended when he got the chance to get into a new business selling fried chicken, which his friend, Grover, had just bought, but needed someone else to run. Ralph quit teaching and the chicken shop started out fine, with Ralph working to buy the place and to eventually own a profitable business. Ralph was feeling very happy about his business venture paying off so well and he became a shrewd businessman, looking for ways to make it more profitable. One way was to add a level on top as a place for people to eat in, but it was risky and cost a lot of money. Fortunately, Grover bought the mortgage on Ralph’s house so Ralph could pay for it. It worked and the chicken palace became even more profitable, but there were cracks appearing in the walls. The cracks became worse and worse until they were forced to close down the shop. Later Ralph learned he had been sold a building that was on unstable ground from his supposed friend Grover. He was once again disappointed in what his life in America had brought him. He kept having successes, but they were always ruined by something corrupt hidden beneath the sheen of their opportunity.
Grover may have been the opposite of Ralph in many ways, and may have seemed to have everything going his way, but he had his own failures in the pursuit of the American dream. He had achieved great material gain through his many investments and shady dealings, such as tax evasion. His outside appearance was one of contentment, but he had no family and no one to share his wealth with on a long-term basis. Sure he had fun one night flings with waitresses, but they soon forgot each other. He had no way of passing on his success or his knowledge of how to succeed to his offspring, and when he died, he would be forgotten. He also had failures in his attempts to wreck Ralph, whose family he envied. While he was dealing with Ralph as a business partner, he invaded his home and began seducing his wife, Helen. He started out slowly, hiding behind the disguise of friend and partner, and occupying Ralph with a cash register and the chicken shop’s accounting. He was pleased that he was giving Ralph a raw deal on the shop while buying his house and secretly tearing his family apart. Feeling full of himself, he tried to finally have an affair with Helen, but surprisingly she “stiffed” him and he failed to wreck Ralph’s home life. He had tried to take Ralph’s family from him, but he only succeeded in stealing what he already had, material possessions.
Grover and Ralph each had their own successes and failures and neither achieved the perfect American dream. They did both learn something from their pursuit – that family is stronger than money. Grover tried to use his power to draw Helen away from Ralph and he failed because of his family’s close ties. “What kind of love was theirs, that it brought strife instead of peace? They fought again a few days later, and then again the next week, and then again and again, until they were practiced at it – until it had become the kernel of their married life, the form of intimacy they knew best. Sad refinements: Ralph knocked at Helen’s skull. “Nothing to say? Anybody in there? Come on, open up.” Knocking made Ralph fell fierce, but it made Helen go blank – which make him knock more, and command her to breathe, and accuse her of holding her breath on purpose (which she wasn’t really, she wasn’t, she wasn’t) until she ran away into another room. Sometimes she would blockade the door; he would band and bang, unable to stop himself. He had never dreamed a person could be so powerless in his power. But there he’d be, yelling, “I’m the father of this family! Do you hear me? The father, not the son!” She would start crying. Then usually he would back off, apologetic and tender. These were some of the most passionate moments of their lives together, the most searingly entwined. How central Helen felt then, how naturally indispensable!” (Pg. 73 - 74). Ralph tried a few attempts to move into the upper class but he failed in each try and when he hit his sister with the car at the end of the book, he saw how strong his family really was. He had just heard about Helen’s almost-affair and he was steamed, but when his sister was in trouble, the family came together to aid her and watch over her recovery. At the end of the book, where Ralph may seem disappointed with his predicament and the bleak setting in the snow, he actually realizes something. While it may seem that the American dream is all about money, it’s truly about family and that you’ll only be disappointed with money, while family will bring you joy.
All quotes from “Typical American” by Gish Jen, © 1991, published by Penguin Books USA, New York, New York
