She says she does not know why she adopted the approach she did– it is just what Chinese families do. She sets the goals and goes for them: she even believed Coco, the family dog, had hidden talents and should be pushed to excel as a show dog – even if she eventually concluded that it was 'perfectly fine for most dogs not to have a profession'.Ĭhua's book would have benefited from more reflection. But then, as Chua admits herself, she rarely reflects. She simply cannot understand what was wrong.

That was how Chua was brought up, and she was a great success – getting into Yale Law School and becoming a professor there, with a clever and loving husband and two equally clever children. Still, her defeat made her pause and take a step back.ĭoes she have regrets? She admits that she had moments of self-doubt, as when she suddenly felt a pang for Sophia, running home from school with an armful of books to have time for piano practice. I hate you, and I hate this family!' Chua did not mind her daughters hating her as she constantly reminds them, her job is 'to prepare you for the future – not to make you like me'. Why can't you get that through your head? I hate the violin. Worse, she openly challenged her mother in public, screaming: 'I don't want to be Chinese. She simply refused to obey, a huge crime for Chinese kids. It paid off: I came high enough in the National Exam to get a place at Beijing University, the best in China.īut Chua's Chinese parenting backfired when her younger daughter Lulu cracked under her mother's non-stop pressure. Apart from seven hours' sleep, all my waking moments were consumed by study – I did not even come to the table until my food was lukewarm, so I could gulp it down quickly and get back to work. I remember my own upbringing in the city of Handan, in central China.

Battle hymn of the tiger mother