Texts in Conversation

When I read through Ralph Waldo Emerson's piece from his "Self-Reliance" essay about trusting thyself, it was as if it fit perfectly with "American Born Chinese." The whole story wraps around the idea that we are who we are and we were made that way for a reason. The quote "Accept the place the divine has providence has found for you" is the exact concept the characters in the book struggle to come to an understanding of. The monkey wants to be a king even though he was brought into the world as a monkey. He eventually learns that this is what he is and to accept it. Jin wants so badly to just fit in with everyone else in his school. He stands out and is made fun of because he is Chinese. When he wakes up and finds that he has transformed in to the typical blonde, blue-eyed boy next door he is pleased and tries to deny who he truly is. His cousin Chin-kee is a constant reminder to him that he wants to escape from. I believe what Emerson meant by writing that great men "predominate in all their being" was the fact that if one embraces who he truly is he will go farther and truly dominate the position of being himself and reach his greatest potentil.