Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Crazy Rich Asians, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Wealth and Absurdity
Marriage and Money
Family vs. Individuality
Chinese vs. Western Culture
Summary
Analysis
As Rachel is packing for their trip, Nick nonchalantly shares that he’s only just told his parents that she exists and is coming to Singapore with him. Rachel is shocked and doesn’t understand Nick’s explanation: he tries to keep “clear boundaries between [his] personal life and [his] family life.” He notes that Rachel and Kerry have a special relationship; he and his parents don’t talk about feelings at all.
Rachel is already struggling with the differences between her family culture and Nick’s, and she hasn’t left for Singapore yet. This suggests she’ll continue to struggle with this going forward. Having gotten a look into Eleanor’s mind, readers may understand why Nick doesn’t have a close relationship with his mom. His “family life” isn’t welcoming or supportive, aside from Astrid—rather, it’s controlling.
Themes
Nick knows he messed up with Eleanor. When he called her to tell her about Rachel, she asked where he was staying and where Rachel was staying after an ominous silence. This resulted in Nick consulting with his great-aunt Rosemary, who advised him to introduce Rachel to his parents on the first day over lunch, then ask Ah Ma to invite Rachel to the customary Friday-night family dinner, after which Ah Ma will invite Rachel and Nick to stay with her. But if she doesn’t, Rosemary told Nick they can stay with her. Nick doesn’t want to tell Rachel any of this and scare her, but she clearly needs a primer on his family. Astrid was right.
Eleanor makes it clear to Nick that Rachel isn’t welcome to stay with her and Nick’s dad. This is a clear indicator that she feels entitled to insert herself into Nick’s romantic relationships. However, Nick does have some allies in his family, such as Rosemary. This offers some hope that Eleanor and her cruel scheming is an outlier, rather than exemplifying what the entire family is like. Nick is gradually realizing that Rachel is walking into a situation where people in his family are going to be unfriendly and perhaps cruel and rude, and it seems like he’s realizing how unwelcoming his family can be for the first time.
Themes
Nick has been trained from birth not to speak about his family, and he struggles to explain them to Rachel. He says his family is big and can be overwhelming “to outsiders,” but it’s your usual bunch of obnoxious relatives. Everyone will love her, Nick assures her. Rachel has never heard Nick speak so much about his family, but she still doesn’t get it. She and her mom are close, as Rachel spent her childhood doing homework in the back of whatever Chinese restaurant her mom got a job in. When Rachel called her mom recently to worry about this situation with Nick, Kerry told her that Overseas Chinese families are really traditional, and his family might be poor. Rachel also remembers telling her rich Singaporean college friend, Peik Lin, about Nick. Peik Lin hadn’t heard of the Youngs, and she knows all the wealthy families.
In a few important ways, Nick makes the case that his family really isn’t that different from anyone else’s—obnoxious relatives exist everywhere and aren’t unique to a certain income bracket. However, notable here is that Nick suggests his family is overwhelming “to outsiders,” implying that Rachel is an outsider. This may be factually true; Rachel is a girlfriend, not a fiancée or a wife yet, and so she isn’t officially part of the family. But it also suggests that other people will see her as lesser and perhaps won’t treat her as kindly due to that outsider status. Kerry also notes again that Rachel isn’t fully aware of traditional Chinese culture and so might be at a disadvantage in that regard, too.
Themes
