Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in A Hundred Flowers, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Redemption
Journeys and Growth
Suffering, Strength, and Resilience
Home and Family
The Promises and Failures of Communism
Summary
Analysis
At school, Tao finds that much more has changed than he expected. He’s ranked below nearly half the class. He struggles to pay attention as his leg grows achy and tired from trying to keep up with the other children. But when Wei asks about the day on their walk home, Tao refuses to complain, or even to answer the questions, afraid that he will burst into tears. He won’t admit aloud that nothing has been the same since Sheng left. Auntie Song and Kai Ying welcome Tao with coconut tarts. He answers their questions, hoping to hide his unhappiness. But each day that week is worse than the last.
Tao knows that things haven’t returned to their pre-fall normal but he’s too proud (or too upset) to admit it to Wei. Consciously or not, he mirrors his grandfather’s choice to avoid looking directly at the sources of his difficulty and pain. But rather than making the problems go away, Tao begins to see that this just makes them worse. The pain remains and he won’t allow anyone else to help him carry his painful load.
Themes
Tao also resents Suyin and the baby, as they take up Kai Ying’s time and attention. One morning, as he stands in the kitchen with his mother, Tao can no longer contain his angst. He bursts into tears. Kai Ying asks what’s wrong, and he cannot answer. There is so much wrong in his life: he hates school, he hates Suyin, he hates his limp. He hates his classmate, Lai Hing, most of all. Lai Hing has been bullying Tao over his limp. Yesterday, he told everyone that Sheng was sent away as a traitor to the Communist Party. Then, when he and Tao got into a fight, Little Shan intervened—on Lai Hing’s side. Tao asks Kai Ying why the police took his father away.
Avoiding the things that are bothering him, from school to Suyin and the baby, doesn’t make Tao feel better; in fact, he feels worse and worse until he cannot stand it anymore. With all this going on, Tao finally asks explicitly what happened to Sheng, adding more credence to the novel’s insistence that people can only grow when they face difficult things head-on. Now, he has the opportunity to learn the truth and move forward.
Themes
