Introduction
Achieving success is a complex endeavor, which cannot be pursued in a linear manner. Sometimes it means failing multiple times before getting what one wants, and the stories written by Amy Tan and Cherokee Paul McDonald support this opinion by providing examples of such cases. In these pieces, the characters do not give up when being disappointed and keep following their dreams regardless of circumstances.
“A View from the Bridge”
The first story, “A View from the Bridge,” narrates about a blind boy fishing at the bank of the river. His encounter with the man who is jogging nearby seems to irritate the adult at first, but he changes his perspective when learning about the main character’s condition (McDonald 3). According to McDonald, the culmination is: “Someday I’m gonna catch a sailfish and a blue marlin and a giant tuna and all those sportfish!” Thus, the disability of the young fisherman does not affect his desire to catch a big fish in the future, and he keeps trying without paying attention to his failures.
“Fish Cheeks”
The second story, “Fish Cheeks,” presents the initial challenge of the author to blend in with society while maintaining her national identity. In this situation, the girl struggles to authentically express her preferences, such as in the case of foods for Christmas dinner. According to Tan (2), “I had gotten over my crush on Robert – that I was able to fully appreciate her lesson and the true purpose behind our particular menu. For Christmas Eve that year, she had chosen all my favorite foods. In the end, she manages to accept the differences between other people and herself, and it leads to self-acceptance (2021).” Therefore, the author underlines those numerous failures in this respect do not prevent the main character from achieving this goal.
“Squid Game” was rejected for ten years before becoming a hit
Nowadays, many people discuss the success of a new online series named “Squid Game” wrote and directed by Hwang Dong-Hyuk, creative director. To be more specific, this person is a genuine representative of today’s world successors. Even though his story recalls in some cases the J. K. Rowling with her “Harry Potter” book, this life story significantly differs from others due to its author’s resistance and “realistic” evaluation of the proper work.
In this case, Korean creative director invented a perspective and futuristic plot, which he offered to companies to rise the money for starring and distribution process. However, the plot was too “weird” for creative directors so they did not consider seriously the Dong-Hyuks’ offer. Consequently, creative director did not surrender though he realized that the plot will either bring him a world recognition either “kill” his career in creative content industry. Dong-Huyk paid a significant price for his success by loosing possibilities of career opportunities instead of promoting his series (Hsia, 2021). Finally, he reached the point when the whole world recognizes the importance of his work, so that his main objective achieved only after 10 years by implementing the “error-learning” method and enormous resistance of the other’s influence to personal opinion.
Conclusion
To summarize, the true measure of success is clearly related to the number of situations in which one does not give up before reaching objectives. For Tan, it was accepting her culture, while for McDonald, the indicator was the resilience of the boy who did not let circumstances ruin his dreams. On the contrary, for Hwang Dong-Hyuk, it was the realistic scenario that should occur to gain the possibility to verify the successfulness of his series plot. Thus, it can be concluded that a person’s continuous efforts are a guarantee of a better future.
Works Cited
Hsia, H. “‘Squid Game’ Was Rejected for Ten Years before Becoming a Hit.” Cinema Online, Yahoo! Life, 2021, Web.
McDonald, Cherokee Paul. “A View from the Bridge.” Bomedia, Web.
Tan, Amy. “Fish Cheeks.” New Canaan Public Schools, Web.