World Lit. Paper - Thousand Cranes/Chronicle of a Death Foretold

Katie Weiskotten 03/22/10
English - World Lit. Paper Mod 5
A person becomes who they are because of the influences they encounter throughout their life. Whenever someone makes a decision, they are using past experiences to help them make up their mind. They then pass these beliefs down to younger generations, and this influence ends up spanning many decades. The way people are taught to behave has a profound impact on how they live their life. In Thousand Cranes by Yasunari Kawabata, the protagonist Kikuji is influenced by the older generation, specifically his father, and also by the characters and the tea ceremonies that take place in the novel. In Chronicles of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the main character and other characters in the novel are influenced greatly by their elders, and what their society expects from them, from protecting their own honor and their family’s honor to what rituals they are advised to do. Because the older generations were raised in very traditional, controlling societies, the common theme in the books Thousand Cranes by Yasunari Kawabata and Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez focuses on the rigid restraints they put on the characters Chikako and Santiago .
In Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the idea that honor prevailed over everyone and everything was one of the main themes of the book. Families felt that they had an obligation to protect the honor of their family, and this caused many misunderstandings and a lot of miscommunication in their society. This was how past generations acted, and it became an accepted way of life. When Santiago Nasar was thought to have taken Angela Vicario’s virginity before she was married, it was almost expected by all the men and women in their society for him to be killed to protect her family’s honor. But even though she consented to this with Santiago , he was still blamed and killed. The older generation restrained the younger generation, forcing the Vicario brothers to believe they had to protect their family’s honor by killing Santiago without second-guessing themselves. Her brothers were protective of her and knew that her honor was not allowed to be taken from her, especially from a man they did not know or trust. They thought it was necessary and justifiable to kill Santiago . On the day the Vicario brothers planned on killing Santiago , they even went to a festival where they danced and drank with Santiago . When they found out, only a few hours later, what Santiago did, they killed him. In their society, it was an unspoken obligation. They walked around town for a while before they committed the murder, and even went to the butcher shop to sharpen their knives for the killing. The actions of the Vicario brothers telling everyone how they were going to kill Santiago showed that they didn’t want to have to murder him, but they were trained to go through with the murder without a second thought. Even aware of the murder about to take place, no one did anything to try to warn Santiago’s family or actually stop the murder itself. The reader sits there, on the edge of their seat, waiting for someone to hint to someone else in the story what is about to happen, but no one ever does. The most logical reason for their lack of action is that this is just what is accepted in their society, and always has been. People who read this book, and don’t live in a society similar to that of Santiago and the Vicario brothers can’t seem to comprehend how a murder is overlooked and not paid much attention to. But, in their society, everyone is accustomed to not reacting to something that seems like such a big deal to others.
The citizens of this town keep quiet out of fear that they might meet the same fate as Santiago. They have been taught to keep quiet by the older people in the town. It is a learned action. No one seems to have ever stood up to another person when it concerned a controversy over morals. The society needed a brave person to stand up and defy that normality, but it never had happened. Another example of how the older generation effects the younger generation was how the older woman in Angela's life told her how to cover up her not being a virgin on her wedding night. "The only thing they believe is what they see on the sheet," they told her (Marquez, 38). It was a tradition and a man's expectation in their society to show the blood on their bed sheet the morning after their wedding as proof that they had consummated their marriage. Since Angela was not a virgin, she was told "old wives' tales" on how to cover up what she had done. Angela went into her marriage thinking that all the tips and tricks the old women had told her would save her and her marriage. She didn't even second guess what these women had told her, and if it would work or not. The old womens' perceived "wisdom" and "proof of what would work" led Angela to believe everything they had said immediately. When their advice did not work for Angela, she was completely surprised. She had never given a second thought to what they had told her, and what happened was completely unexpected. Angela had put her complete trust in these women, and their words had betrayed her. Everyone in this society was too afraid to rise above the accepted old "wisdom" they all lived by, so none of the seemingly unfair and unreasonable parts of their society were ever changed.
In Thousand Cranes by Yasunari Kawabata, traditional aspects of Kikuji's society in Japan played a large part in the way the novel played out. Kikuji was born to a man who had affairs with the women Mrs. Ota and Chikako. This affected Kikuji's life ever since he was a child. He was accustomed to other women in his father's life, and this came back to affect him the same way it affected his father. When Kikuji became an adult, Chikako tried to control every aspect of Kikuji's life, attempting to play the role of Kikuji's mother. She feels obligated to do so because his mother and father had both passed away, and she wanted to take care of him. Chikako also invites Kikuji over to participate in one of her tea ceremonies, trying to get him to marry the Inamura girl. Mrs. Ota also tries to get her daughter, Fumiko, to marry him. These women take on this responsibility of mother because they are drawn to it - they want some way to remember and feel close to Kikuji's father, and they also want to fit into the stereotype of women in Japanese society. The tea ceremony in Japanese culture is a way to introduce a man to different possible wives, and this is exactly what Chikako was aiming for for Kikuji. Kikuji is exposed to many traditions and rituals that have been in Japanese culture for hundreds of years by Chikako. He and Fumiko, and sometimes Chikako, spend time with one another and use tea cups and bowls that are of significant meaning. Towards the beginning of the book, during one of the tea ceremonies, Chikako used the black and white Oribe that had been passed down many generations between Mrs. Ota's family, Kikuji's family and Chikako. It held significance, and was supposed to be used in the ceremony because it had always been. At one point after the first few tea ceremonies, Chikako says to Kikuji, "If she comes it will be a sign that as far as she's concerned everything is settled." Kikuji responded, "I don't like anything about the idea. And I won't be coming home anyway." Chikako then said, "We'll talk about it later. Well, that's how things are. Come right home, now" (Kawabata, 43). Chikako thinks she has settled the marriage between Kikuji and the Inamura girl, but Kikuji doesn't understand how something could be settled so easily and quickly without his consent. Chikako has learned that this is the way marriages are set up in their society: not out of love, but out of obligation to one another and their families. Chikako saying "Come right home, now" has a stern, motherly tone to it, and this causes Kikuji some stress and grief as to why she is talking this way to him. She feels she needs to take over as his mother, since his father is now dead, but Kikuji and the reader are aware that she just wants to have control over him, because she didn't have any control over his father. She feels that since she is an outcast because of her "ugly" birthmark, she can fit into society by obtaining the role of mother. Towards the end of the novel, Kikuji and Fumiko have another tea ceremony, this time just as friends. There is no pressure to seek out a marriage partner, and this is because someone older, like Chikako or Mrs. Ota is not there to force them together to consider marriage. They are free as a more open-minded generation to just sit and talk, and not feel like they have to talk about a serious matter, such as marriage. Kikuji and Fumiko used the tea bowls for non-traditional purposes towards the end of the book, showing this by throwing the bowls and breaking them. They were finally resisting the traditions from their society that they had been forced to follow all their lives until that point. The incorporation of traditional tea glassware by Kawabata showed how the older generation still left a lasting impact on how the younger people of Japan conducted themselves, though. The many bright, traditional colors of red and white and the Shino bowl support the idea that young people used traditional objects in their daily lives because they were conditioned by the older generation to do so, even when the older people were not around.
It is very clear to the reader that the older generations left a lasting impact on the young people in the books. In Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Angela listened to the older women in the town, and took their advice even though it didn't work. She used it for the sole purpose that they were older and wiser, and she needed to listen to them, yet that was not always the case. In Thousand Cranes, Kikuji was forced to listen to Chikako just because she was older and had more power than him, even though she was portrayed as a "venomous" character who inflicted pain upon everyone she interacted with. He also continued to practice the art of the tea ceremonies with young people, like Fumiko, because he had grown up experiencing them, and was conditioned to continue to participate in them. Both novels had an underlying theme of the older people in both novel's societies having power over all the characters in the books. They continued to bring the influence of what they grew up with into the lives of the young people that existed in the novels. Even though the younger characters tried to resist the older generation's power, they continued to be influenced by the "traditional, controlling " rules and regulations that the older generation brought down upon them from their own upbringings.