“I hate the violin,” she screamed in a cafe on a family trip to Russia.
(She was seven.) At 13, Lulu seemed to have had enough. Chua threatened to deny Lulu lunch, dinner and birthday parties for “two, three, four years” when she couldn’t play a piece called The Little White Donkey. Then there were her emotional tactics, which seemed to push Lulu, in particular, to breaking point.Īt four, Chua gave Lulu back the birthday card she had made for her mother – “I reject this,” she wrote on the back of the card, accompanied by a scrawled unhappy face – because Chua wanted “a better one – one that you’ve put some thought and effort into”. Chua’s rules to achieve this famously included: no sleepovers, no play dates, no television, no grades lower than an A, no choosing their own extracurricular activities, and no playing any instrument other than the piano or violin, which they were expected to play for up to six hours a day. They were to perform at Manhattan’s Carnegie Hall. Amy Chua’s memoir tapped into universal anxieties around how parents should raise children who will cope with modern pressures.Ĭhua’s daughters Sophia and Lulu, aged 14 and 17 when the book came out, were expected to be the “number one” student in every class (except for drama and gym).
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