Tan's first short story was "Endgame." It describes a precocious young chess champion who has a stormy relationship with her overprotective Chinese mother. In 1985, Tan used the story to gain admission to the Squaw Valley Community of Writers, a fiction writer's workshop run by the novelist Oakley Hall. Guided by another novelist and short story writer, Molly Giles, Tan rewrote "Endgame" at the workshop. It was then published in FM magazine and reprinted in Seventeen magazine. Giles sent the story to Sandra Dijkstra, a literary agent in San Francisco, who thought that it was very well written. When Tan learned that an Italian magazine had reprinted "Endgame" without her permission, she asked Dijkstra to be her agent. Dijkstra agreed. She urged Tan to submit other short stories and to turn the series into a book. That book became The Joy Luck Club.
On the surface, "Rules of the Game" applies to the rules of chess, which Waverly masters with astonishing skill. Her success is even more admirable when we realize that she is only eight years old and almost entirely self-taught. Aside from some sessions with old Lau Po in the park, Waverly has taught herself everything that she needs to know about chess in order to become a national champion. She understands the rules of chess. She knows how the game is played, and she knows how to psych-out her opponents.
Look, however, at the title from another perspective. In addition to the game of chess, the title alludes to the "game" of life — knowing the "rules" in order to get what you want. Mrs. Jong calls these rules "the art of invisible strength." Unlike the clear-cut rules of chess, however, the rules of the game of life are ever-changing and brutally difficult to learn.
