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The William E. Massey Sr. Lectures in American Studies
Tiger Writing: Art, Culture, and the Interdependent Self
For author Gish Jen, the daughter of Chinese immigrant parents, books were once an Outsiders Guide to the Universe. But they were something more, too. Through her eclectic childhood reading, Jen stumbled onto a cultural phenomenon that would fuel her writing for decades to come: the profound difference in self-narration that underlies the gap often perceived between East and West.
Drawing on a rich array of sources, from paintings to behavioral studies to her father s striking account of his childhood in China, this accessible book not only illuminates Jen s own development and celebrated work but also explores the aesthetic and psychic roots of the independent and interdependent self each mode of selfhood yielding a distinct way of observing, remembering, and narrating the world. The novel, Jen writes, is fundamentally a Western form that values originality, authenticity, and the truth of individual experience. By contrast, Eastern narrative emphasizes morality, cultural continuity, the everyday, the recurrent. In its progress from a moving evocation of one writer s life to a convincing delineation of the forces that have shaped our experience for millennia, "Tiger Writing" radically shifts the way we understand ourselves and our art-making.
Drawing on a rich array of sources, from paintings to behavioral studies to her father s striking account of his childhood in China, this accessible book not only illuminates Jen s own development and celebrated work but also explores the aesthetic and psychic roots of the independent and interdependent self each mode of selfhood yielding a distinct way of observing, remembering, and narrating the world. The novel, Jen writes, is fundamentally a Western form that values originality, authenticity, and the truth of individual experience. By contrast, Eastern narrative emphasizes morality, cultural continuity, the everyday, the recurrent. In its progress from a moving evocation of one writer s life to a convincing delineation of the forces that have shaped our experience for millennia, "Tiger Writing" radically shifts the way we understand ourselves and our art-making.
224 pages, Hardcover
First published March 21, 2013
20 people are currently reading
563 people want to read
About the author
Gish Jen
40 books421 followersGish Jen grew up in New York, where she spoke more Yiddish than Chinese. She has been featured in a PBS American Masters program on the American novel. Her distinctions also include a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, a Guggenheim fellowship, a Fulbright fellowship, and a Radcliffe Institute fellowship. She was awarded a Lannan Literary Prize in 1999 and received a Harold and Mildred Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2003. Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2009, she has published in the New Yorker and other magazines.
John Updike selected a story of Jen's for The Best American Short Stories of The Century. Her newest book, Tiger Writing, is based on the Massey Lectures in the History of American Civilization, which she delivered at Harvard University in 2012.
John Updike selected a story of Jen's for The Best American Short Stories of The Century. Her newest book, Tiger Writing, is based on the Massey Lectures in the History of American Civilization, which she delivered at Harvard University in 2012.
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews
March 30, 2015
I read this for part of my Johns Hopkins University masters in writing program. I enjoyed our class discussion more than I enjoyed the book. Jen is an amazing writer and her indepedent vs. interdependent dichotomy provides writers with a lot to think about.
This is how Jen sets up her premise:
Independent: “individualistic self – stresses uniqueness, defines itself via inherent attributes such as its traits, abilities, values, and preferences, and tends to see things in isolation."
Interdependent “collectivist self – stresses communality, definites itself via its place, roles, loyalties, and duties, and tends to see things in context.”
This is helpful in terms of thinking about how one approaches a story, and for that aspect, I really liked the book. I also appreciated the way she demonstrates interdependent storytelling by digging into her family history.
However, I feel like Jen frequently gets lost in the weeds of her own creation. She makes very broad statements but also tacks on disclaimers. I don’t want to generalize, but… then she goes on to generalize. I don’t want to say writers are defined by their culture, but… writers are defined by their culture. I don’t want to say only Asians are interdependent… but, well, maybe Milan Kundera is the only Western interdependent writer. Each one of these disclaimer-proclamation cycles further distances me as a reader. It’s like zooming out on a map each time, until you reach a point when we’re not really looking at anything. I'm left with a vague grasp of a rather nebulous concept.
This is how Jen sets up her premise:
Independent: “individualistic self – stresses uniqueness, defines itself via inherent attributes such as its traits, abilities, values, and preferences, and tends to see things in isolation."
Interdependent “collectivist self – stresses communality, definites itself via its place, roles, loyalties, and duties, and tends to see things in context.”
This is helpful in terms of thinking about how one approaches a story, and for that aspect, I really liked the book. I also appreciated the way she demonstrates interdependent storytelling by digging into her family history.
However, I feel like Jen frequently gets lost in the weeds of her own creation. She makes very broad statements but also tacks on disclaimers. I don’t want to generalize, but… then she goes on to generalize. I don’t want to say writers are defined by their culture, but… writers are defined by their culture. I don’t want to say only Asians are interdependent… but, well, maybe Milan Kundera is the only Western interdependent writer. Each one of these disclaimer-proclamation cycles further distances me as a reader. It’s like zooming out on a map each time, until you reach a point when we’re not really looking at anything. I'm left with a vague grasp of a rather nebulous concept.
April 22, 2017
A deep meditation on the extent to which the individual self can be separated from its context (environment, culture, surrounding people). The focus is not so much on finding a factual answer to that question, but exploring how Easterners and Westerners have different assumptions about what the truth of the matter is (evidenced by cognition, behavior and the types of literature produced by writers in each culture), and how people of mixed cultural background -- for example, Asian American immigrants -- may have special insight into these differences.
June 30, 2022
“Culture is not fate; it only offers templates, which individuals can finally accept, reject, or modify, and do.”
Gish Jen's discussions about the intersections of art, culture, and how one views one's self made for a beautiful introspective work in which she dissects her father, her own literature, and her place as an author who straddles two very different cultures. I've been intrigued for a long time in the idea of identity as self and what that means, and I found that Jen's book has made for solid landing ground.
This book is almost half-memoir, half-academic nonfiction, filled with countless artifacts, including her own father's memoir. Combined, it creates both a thoroughly engaging read that had me chewing on my thoughts as I read it on the subway.
Gish Jen's discussions about the intersections of art, culture, and how one views one's self made for a beautiful introspective work in which she dissects her father, her own literature, and her place as an author who straddles two very different cultures. I've been intrigued for a long time in the idea of identity as self and what that means, and I found that Jen's book has made for solid landing ground.
This book is almost half-memoir, half-academic nonfiction, filled with countless artifacts, including her own father's memoir. Combined, it creates both a thoroughly engaging read that had me chewing on my thoughts as I read it on the subway.
July 16, 2015
Very interesting book. It compares Western literature with that of Asian and Asian American writing. It discusses the cultural differences which impact writing -- the interdependent vs the independent self. I didn't completely "get" the analysis she lays out or perhaps don't completely agree. I hope to reread this at some point. C, I hope, that you will at least scan this so we can discuss. I very much like Jen's novels. And here's a ink to the NYT review, which I found helpful.
Hmmmm .... can't seem to add link. It's easy to find in a Google search and worth looking up.
Hmmmm .... can't seem to add link. It's easy to find in a Google search and worth looking up.
January 28, 2019
On one level, I loved the subject of this book -- the way art reflects culture, context, and the artist, and how all that changes between "East" and "West" -- but on another level, I couldn't make heads or [tiger] tails of some of the author's examples or explanations of social scientific studies that were meant to substantiate her point. I understand her argument about inter- vs. independent cultures; in fact, my next (very, very nascent) project is on more-or-less that exact topic. But either I'm very thick or she thinks she's explaining herself better than she is (or maybe both) because there were several places where I thought, "Wait - how is that proving her point? I don't get it." It's how I feel sometimes when my students just shoehorn in a quote from their reading that's meant to shore up their thesis, but the poor quote is just hanging there all by itself, being forced to do the writer's job of making an argument, instead of being integrated in a way that makes the quote a valuable piece of information in the context of the paper.
So, I'll say about this book what I say about student papers: A for the writing (she writes very beautifully and I'm going to track down some of her fiction immediately) but C for organization and substantiation.
All that said, I'm sure I'll keep gnawing away at this in my head for quite a while, and go back and revisit some of her points. Also, her dad sounds like a nightmare of a professor and a genuinely wonderful guy -- I loved reading the parts of his autobiography she shared. Anyway, a very valuable and interesting reflection...just confusing as all hell in certain spots.
So, I'll say about this book what I say about student papers: A for the writing (she writes very beautifully and I'm going to track down some of her fiction immediately) but C for organization and substantiation.
All that said, I'm sure I'll keep gnawing away at this in my head for quite a while, and go back and revisit some of her points. Also, her dad sounds like a nightmare of a professor and a genuinely wonderful guy -- I loved reading the parts of his autobiography she shared. Anyway, a very valuable and interesting reflection...just confusing as all hell in certain spots.
December 22, 2020
Lots of things to chew. As a Chinese American woman, there were so many observations that ring true to me both about my motherland and the country I grew up in, especially the comment that my American generation recognizes in independence a flipside that is loneliness and a lack of community, while I see my relatives in China determined to cultivate more Western values like independent thinking and individuality in their children. I've always felt that both orientations, independence and interdependence, are important for societies to thrive even if their average temperatures for comfort falls more on one side of the spectrum or the other - it's not that one is better or worse than the other, that yin is better than yang, that the mountain is better than the sea; they have their own strengths and weaknesses and nurture their own ecosystems, ones that invariably have some species more or less suited to it than others but a great variety nonetheless.
November 2, 2025
Tiger Writing: Art, Culture, and the Interdependent Self is a thoughtful and illuminating exploration of identity, storytelling, and cultural perspective. Gish Jen bridges East and West through art and narrative, revealing how our sense of self shapes the way we write, read, and see the world.
Her reflections rooted in personal history and enriched by philosophy, psychology, and art offer readers an intimate yet universal dialogue on creativity and belonging. The contrast she draws between the independent and interdependent self is as enlightening as it is poetic, challenging us to rethink what it means to tell a story.
A beautifully written meditation on culture, consciousness, and creativity.
Her reflections rooted in personal history and enriched by philosophy, psychology, and art offer readers an intimate yet universal dialogue on creativity and belonging. The contrast she draws between the independent and interdependent self is as enlightening as it is poetic, challenging us to rethink what it means to tell a story.
A beautifully written meditation on culture, consciousness, and creativity.
September 12, 2020
I took this book to expand my horizon on West vs East. The Book is dry, with personal anecdotes.
The Core idea of the book:
Independent: “individualistic self – stresses uniqueness, defines itself via inherent attributes such as its traits, abilities, values, and preferences, and tends to see things in isolation."
Interdependent “collectivist self – stresses communality, definites itself via its place, roles, loyalties, and duties, and tends to see things in context.”
Imagine having narratives, communication between these two?
If you are interested in Cross-Cultural context, Immigrants, East-West differences.
Deus Vult,
Gottfried
The Core idea of the book:
Independent: “individualistic self – stresses uniqueness, defines itself via inherent attributes such as its traits, abilities, values, and preferences, and tends to see things in isolation."
Interdependent “collectivist self – stresses communality, definites itself via its place, roles, loyalties, and duties, and tends to see things in context.”
Imagine having narratives, communication between these two?
If you are interested in Cross-Cultural context, Immigrants, East-West differences.
Deus Vult,
Gottfried
September 1, 2024
If you are a person who would enjoy attending an academic lecture, this is an attractively designed book version of three lectures delivered by Jen, an author whose books I’ve read in the past. The overarching theme is mainly the Eastern vs. the Western mind, and the differences between how they remember and write memoir and, by extension, fiction. Or maybe that isn’t the theme, and someone will come here and tell me I missed the entire point. I blasted through this in a day, after a heavy pour of wine.
My reaction to all of it was more of a Marie in When Harry Met Sally, when told that Harry is also from New Jersey: https://youtu.be/zGw4fC_Dxo4?si=zCjhm...
My reaction to all of it was more of a Marie in When Harry Met Sally, when told that Harry is also from New Jersey: https://youtu.be/zGw4fC_Dxo4?si=zCjhm...
January 15, 2020
I love Gish Jen's writing, but ironically, I just couldn't finish this book. I probably marked up enough of the first half of it to make it completely illegible for anyone else, but for some reason, I just could not plow through the rest of this brief little book. It's a shame, but I've finally given up hope on making myself return to it after SO long since I started it. It's just not worth my time to try to force my way through some reads anymore. I still give her mad props for being such a great writer, but this book just was not for me.
May 21, 2017
It started off amazing, I had thought this would be a great book. The first lecture was fantastic. Moving to the second lecture it was okay, the last one was boring turning annoying at some points. So far from the book I hoped for at the start.
December 2, 2017
Lovely writing style, although it became a bit too theory intensive towards the end.
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April 2, 2021Terrific insight into another mindset/worldview. Enlightening. Hoping the ideas will infuse my own creative work.
May 12, 2013
In Tiger Writing, a memoir of art, culture, and interdependent self, author Gish Jen said, “Culture is not fate; it only offers templates, which individuals can finally accept, reject, or modify, and do.” Jen was born in the United States of immigrant parents who migrated from Yixing in Jiangsu province, west of Shanghai. The memoir is divided into three sections, which were presented as lectures at Massey Lectures in the History of American Civilization program at Harvard. It is a cultural memoir filled with beautiful passages of Chinese-American diaspora.
In narrative format, the author showed the readers how American culture glorifies “independent,” while Chinese culture is “interdependent.”
In the first section, her father’s memoir was the primary focus. Unlike American memoirs, which are filled with details of personal affairs and private thoughts, Mr. Jen’s focuses on things he saw and experienced, such as intriguing architectural and interior designs and where generations of family members received the character for their middle name. In the second section, Gish discussed the differences between European-Americans and Asian-Americans in terms of self portrayals. Individuals in the first group are more self-focused than those in the second group. In the third section, the author included critical analyses of the two cultures and how scientific studies and anecdotes from literary works made sense in the life of the author’s –a novelist’s.
It’s a memoir of diaspora unlike others, for it is also a vivid comparison of two cultures and the collision of two philosophies of self --independence and interdependence. In this memoir, readers can clearly sense Gish Jen’s joy and anguish caught in the diaspora. Beautiful and clever.[]
This review was originally published on BookReviewClub.com.
In narrative format, the author showed the readers how American culture glorifies “independent,” while Chinese culture is “interdependent.”
In the first section, her father’s memoir was the primary focus. Unlike American memoirs, which are filled with details of personal affairs and private thoughts, Mr. Jen’s focuses on things he saw and experienced, such as intriguing architectural and interior designs and where generations of family members received the character for their middle name. In the second section, Gish discussed the differences between European-Americans and Asian-Americans in terms of self portrayals. Individuals in the first group are more self-focused than those in the second group. In the third section, the author included critical analyses of the two cultures and how scientific studies and anecdotes from literary works made sense in the life of the author’s –a novelist’s.
It’s a memoir of diaspora unlike others, for it is also a vivid comparison of two cultures and the collision of two philosophies of self --independence and interdependence. In this memoir, readers can clearly sense Gish Jen’s joy and anguish caught in the diaspora. Beautiful and clever.[]
This review was originally published on BookReviewClub.com.
Read
June 3, 2017A remarkably cogent and important exploration of the supposed dichotomy between the independent and the interdependent selves, their respective roots in Western and Eastern cultures, their psychological traits and social consequences. The book itself (which is based on three lectures author Gish Jen delivered at Harvard, her alma mater) unfolds in mostly interdependent style, with Jen skating from independence to interdependence, criticizing the stereotyped notion of a disembodied voice and yet upholding the social and personal value of that Whitmanesque "I." Thoroughly engaging, particularly relevant today in this age of globalization and increasing cross-cultural dialectic, "Tiger Writing" is as illuminating as it is unsure of its own orientation, which, by its own standards, is not a bad thing at all.
May 15, 2013
There are days when I have been fortunate beyond what I deserve. The day that I was invited by faculty members at my University to have lunch with Gish Jen was one of them. Sharing conversation with her over a lobster sandwich paid for by the English Department was one of the highlights of my college experience.
Her lecture on interdependence opened my eyes to a fundamental truth about Western and Eastern cultures. (Hint: Look at the cover. The object of the painting is a tiger, but the focus is on the context or environment surrounding the tiger.)
I hope to finish this book soon, but not as much as I hope to once again cross paths with the brilliant and wonderful person who wrote it.
Her lecture on interdependence opened my eyes to a fundamental truth about Western and Eastern cultures. (Hint: Look at the cover. The object of the painting is a tiger, but the focus is on the context or environment surrounding the tiger.)
I hope to finish this book soon, but not as much as I hope to once again cross paths with the brilliant and wonderful person who wrote it.
Read
July 5, 2014This book is kind of ground zero for my own writing and thinking, situated as I am on the eastern edge of the Pacific, and coming from a Norwegian Lutheran culture which I would define as interdependent (Gish Jen's term). At least at the time and in the place in the family I was born into. I need to read this again!
Gish Jen describes her father's writing as not narrating "a modern, linear world of conflict and rising action, but rather one of harmony and eternal, cyclical action, in which order, ritual and peace are beauty, and events spell, not excitement or progress, but disruption."
Gish Jen describes her father's writing as not narrating "a modern, linear world of conflict and rising action, but rather one of harmony and eternal, cyclical action, in which order, ritual and peace are beauty, and events spell, not excitement or progress, but disruption."
April 1, 2013
Jen covers many topics in these three lectures: art, literature, food, morality and growing up the child of Chinese immigrants. Contrasting Eastern and Western cultures, always in the background are her parents view of life. She examines being interdependent and independent and creates many fresh insights and contrasts of the Western and Eastern view of living. Stimulating and fresh thinking from a fine mind.
May 9, 2013
Really enjoyed these reflections on Eastern / Western differences in engaging the world from an interdependent / independent understanding of self. Using sociological studies, visual art, her father's "autobiography", her own novels and stories, as well as other literary references (Kafka, Woolf, Proust, Kundera, etc.), she offers examples of the differing worldviews. The book includes three lectures; I found it engaging and enlightening. Makes me want to read her novels.
Read
July 23, 2013I was disappointed because it wasn't what a I expected, which was a sort-of writing memoir, as in this is why/how I became a writer, etc. Instead it is a scholarly, rather dry lecture ... indeed the book IS a William E. Massey Sr. lecture from Harvard's Program in the History of American Civilization. I would have liked more reflection and more personal anecdotes, and less pontification.
May 29, 2014
At times quite fascinating but I found the tone problematic - too pandering to an audience that readers aren't really a part of in terms of cute colloquialisms that seemed forced - if she said "feh" one more time, I'd have tossed the book across the room - didn't hold to0gether for me so a disappointment
May 31, 2013
Interesting premise, but after the first 2 chapters it starts to get exceedingly repetitive and boring. Seems to try to address what Amy Chu does in her book but in a format (content of a lecture series) that is just too boring to follow
June 19, 2013
Independent vs. Interdependent self. Of the three sections, the first was most interesting when the author analyzed her father's autobiography to illustrate the difference in eastern vs. western viewpoints.
August 12, 2013
Amazing book. It took me in a variety of wonderful directions. Who else, at least in my world, would read sociological studies as meditation?! Ms. Jen, thank you for your intellect, range, and humor.
May 30, 2016
I love Gish Jen's book but for some reason I just wasn't able to get in this book. It was well written but I think it was just not a subject I could get into right now. I'm going to get a copy (my copy is from the library) and keep it around to read more throughly later
May 24, 2013
thought provoking
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September 16, 2013Interesting ruminations on inter/independence culturally and what that means for how one reads, appreciates, or dislikes narrative.
Read
February 14, 2014Biog J512t 2013
February 24, 2015
Fascinating book, one I will come back to again.
Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews