Chinese Cinderella

Chinese Cinderella

by

Adeline Yen Mah

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on Chinese Cinderella makes teaching easy.
PLT Symbol Icon

PLT, an acronym for Precious Little Treasure, is Adeline’s pet duckling given to her by a family friend. PLT is a symbolic parallel to Adeline herself, particularly showing her emotions and her need for love. Adeline cherishes her pet, giving it all the love she has to offer and exulting in the feeling of being needed by another. This partially echoes the love that Aunt Baba and Ye Ye have for her—particularly in the designation, “precious,” which they often use for her—but even more so demonstrates the love that Adeline should have received from Father and Niang. Adeline exhibits courage when she digs in the garden for worms to feed PLT even though Father’s dog is threatening her—just as Father should have had the courage to protect his original children from his new wife. In contrast to Niang, Adeline feels guilty when she tries to feed PLT a worm but has not brought such a treat for all the other ducklings, intuiting that such favoritism is unhealthy and unjust. The way in which Father brings about PLT’s death highlights his abject cruelty and parallels his utter disregard for Adeline’s emotional well-being and need for love: One evening, Father decides that he want to watch his dog kill one of the children’s ducklings for his own amusement, even though the family knows that Adeline loves PLT more than anything in the world. This highlights Father’s near-psychopathic level of cruelty and apathy towards his daughter. Like Adeline’s wellbeing, PLT does not die immediately, but slowly succumbs to its wounds overnight as Adeline grieves it and wishes the world could be a different place.

PLT Quotes in Chinese Cinderella

The Chinese Cinderella quotes below all refer to the symbol of PLT. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Physical and Emotional Abuse Theme Icon
).
Chapter 11: PLT Quotes

I felt quite guilty about my favoritism and couldn’t help blaming myself for not having gotten more worms that each duckling could have its own.

Related Characters: Adeline Yen (Jun-Ling / Wu-Mei)Niang (speaker), Niang (Jeanne Prosperi)
Related Symbols: PLT
Page Number: 76
Explanation and Analysis:

“Since it’s so hot tonight,” Father suggested, “why don’t we all cool off in the garden after dinner? It will also give us a a chance to test Jackie’s obedience.” He turned to Big Brother. “Go fetch one of those ducklings…We’ll have some fun tonight!”

Related Characters: Father (Joseph Yen) (speaker), Adeline Yen (Jun-Ling / Wu-Mei)Niang, Big Brother (Gregory)
Related Symbols: PLT
Page Number: 81
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Chinese Cinderella LitChart as a printable PDF.
Chinese Cinderella PDF

PLT Symbol Timeline in Chinese Cinderella

The timeline below shows where the symbol PLT appears in Chinese Cinderella. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 11: PLT
Physical and Emotional Abuse Theme Icon
Toxic Family Theme Icon
...last, gets the smallest, weakest bird, but she cherishes her new pet and names it PLT, short for Precious Little Treasure. (full context)
Physical and Emotional Abuse Theme Icon
Toxic Family Theme Icon
Adeline speaks to PLT as if she were a baby sister and loves having another creature be dependent on... (full context)
Physical and Emotional Abuse Theme Icon
Toxic Family Theme Icon
...of the pet ducklings. The stepchildren are horrified, but Big Brother obeys and returns carrying PLT. Father brings the duckling to the garden and releases it, ordering Jackie to hold still... (full context)
Physical and Emotional Abuse Theme Icon
Toxic Family Theme Icon
Adeline wraps PLT in scarf and lays next to her for the entire night, hoping and wishing that,... (full context)