Let's see you try and get away from it

Characters attempt to abandon the traditions within their cultures.  In So Long a Letter, the character Mawdo comes from a privileged bloodline.  To follow tradition, it was expected that he marry a woman of the same status as he.  Within the novel, polygamy exists as a common practice, and even his mother has many co-wives.  Marriage seems to be more of a means to an end, rather than a union.  Nabou sets a standard for what tradition is in this culture because “She lived in the past, unaware of the changing world.  She clung to old beliefs.  Being strongly attached to her privileged origins, she believed firmly that blood carried with it virtues” (Bȃ 26).  The characterization of Nabou demonstrates the traditional values of marriage, where a man takes multiple wives that can provide a monetary benefit.  Contrary to this, Mawdo and Aissatou marry out of love, which proves to be, “a controversial marriage,” and Ramatoulaye describes how she, “can still hear the angry rumors in the town: ‘What, a Toucouleur marrying a goldsmith’s daughter?...Mawdo’s mother is a Diofene, a Guelewar from the Sine.  What an insult to her” (Bȃ 17).  Mawdo and Aissatou attempt to abandon the tradition of marriage because Aissatou’s family exists on a much lower status than Mawdo’s, as is revealed through the characterization of their families.  Her father is a goldsmith, while Mawdo’s mother is a sort of princess.  Similarly, in Thousand Cranes, the character Fumiko represents modernization within a tradition-bound culture.  It is first portrayed when she visits Kikuji to ask him to forgive her mother.  Instead of wearing a kimono to the meeting, “She was in a European dress, and a necklace set off the beauty of the throat” (Kawabata 37).  Characterization of her dress represents a passive change into a modern state of mind.  Further, as Kikuji attempts to get closer to Fumiko, and it demonstrates that he is also attempting to abandon traditional ways, as he moves closer to the modernization that she stands for.  Together, they decide to give up tea, and at one point Fumiko is so desperate to rid herself of things that bind her to her past that she, “had flung the Shino against the basin before he could stop her” (Kawabata 143).  The Shino had been her mother’s, and by breaking it she actively tries to rid herself of things that tie her to the affairs in her parent’s, and Kikuji’s, past.  The tea ceremony, an extremely traditional practice, connected all of the characters whom participated in the affairs.  By letting go of tradition they would be able to free themselves of the affairs of the past.  Characters within the novels are connected to tradition by their parents: Mawdo through his mother’s privileged bloodline, and Kikuji and Fumiko through their parents affairs, and the tea ceremony.  They all attempt to break away from tradition by rebelling against the ways of life which their parents expect them to follow.