Like Water For Chocolate Character Analysis

In “Like Water for Chocolate” by Laura Esquivel, tells a story of a girl who lives in a household where filial piety is expected from her mother. What is filial piety? Good question. It is an institution where the child must respect, obey and care the parents, until death. Historically, this traditional came from a Confusion philosophy in China, which the child must take care of their parents until death, and utter most, respect them.

The main character in this book, is Tita. She has two older sisters named, Gertrudis and Rosaura. Their mother is Mama Elena, who is strict and cold hearted, with some signs for care of the family. But, in general, the author portrays Mama Elena as a conservative and cruel mother who treats her as not a human

The older generation, who lived through the Mao-Deng years were brought up through respect to the old, which the ideals of Confucian philosophy was heavily supported by the Communist party of China. According to an article form the Global Post, those who survived the oppressive years under strict communist rule survived by stealing, etc. Now the current younger generation have plenty of food and don’t care much of the old. They ignore the old, when they are in need for a seat on the bus, even having a lecture in a hall and sleeping through it. The young also see the old doing tae-chi is weird and calls them “dancing grannies”. In addition, the young armed themselves with water balloons and threw at them at the old.

In the end there is good things and bad things with tradition. The good things about tradition is that, members of that family can be proud and understand how their family is connected. Sometimes the family has secrets recipes. For example in “Like Water for Chocolate”, Nacha knew the recipes from the back of her head, when and how to cook a dish, if something goes wrong. Also in the book, it stated that if Tita died, it meant that the family legacy and secrets also died with