56 pages • 1 hour read
Banana YoshimotoKitchen
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1988A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Themes
Death
Death is a prevalent theme throughout each section of the narrative. Though it is a heavy theme, Yoshimoto manages to instill humor and life lessons into the narrative so that the weightiness of death does not crush the reader in doom and gloom. In many ways, death is what connects the characters and what brings them closer together, thus adding life to the narrative. Each character deals with tragedy on an individual level, but death as a social connector causes the characters to also express their grief with others, often while grieving over the same person or people.
The first two sections deal with Mikage and Yuichi. Both experience death at a young age. Mikage’s parents died during her childhood. Her grandmother took her in, and the narrative opens with the death of that grandmother, which leaves Mikage with no blood relative in the world. She feels orphaned. The death of all her loved ones throws Mikage into a depressive cycle where she questions even her own reason for living. Against the onslaught of death, Mikage finds that kitchens are a perfect representation of life. Kitchens are often the life force of the household, and Mikage is always drawn to these communal spaces. Mikage fights the negative effects of death by spending time in kitchens, fighting destruction through the act of creation.
Yuichi’s mother died when he was young. His father, Yuji, had a gender affirmation operation and is now Eriko, a beautiful woman who raises him on her own. Though this might be viewed by some readers as another death in that it is a “loss” of a father via gender reassignment, Yuichi does not view it as such. For Yuichi, he has gained a mother. This instance shows how Eriko’s existence is a mechanism for fighting against the loss and death of his mother. In time, however, Eriko is murdered violently, thus bringing about the death of Yuichi’s “last” family member (he has relatives, but Eriko tells him to never seek these cruel people out). He jokes that he and Mikage are essentially orphans. He even says they should be “destruction workers” because their lives are characterized by the deaths of those around them. Yuichi was also close to Mikage’s grandmother, and so her death was like losing a relative. In this sense, death works as a social connector. Mikage and Yuichi have much in common in that they both loved Mikage’s grandmother and both loved Eriko. Death brings them together, for better or worse. By their narrative’s end, the two address death head on and try and make a life from death. It is suggested that they will move on and cherish life.
The last portion of the novel, “Moonlight Shadow,” deals entirely with death. Satsuki has lost her lover, Hitoshi, in an accident. The accident also claimed the life of Yumiko, who was Hiiragi’s (Hitoshi’s younger brother) girlfriend. Hitoshi was taking Yumiko to the train station when the crash occurred. Both Hiiragi and Satsuki are left to deal with the deaths of their closest loved ones. Death brings them together, though they were already friends before the accident, but also works as a social connector with the arrival of Urara. Urara is in town to say goodbye to someone as well. She brings about an event called “the Weaver Festival Phenomenon,” where Satsuki sees Hitoshi again and says goodbye, while Hiiragi is visited by his girlfriend, who also says goodbye. The two manage to work through their despair at the death of their loved ones and to find meaning in living.
Friendship
Friendship is a vital component in the lives of every character. The characters all endure tragedies, and it is because of their friends that they make it through these ordeals. When Mikage’s grandmother passes, Yuichi befriends her and invites her to live with him and his mother, Eriko. Even though Yuichi’s own girlfriend is taken aback by the gesture, Yuichi notices a kindred spirit in Mikage, and the two do indeed bond in their grief. Mikage does not know much about Yuichi, though she does know that he cared deeply for her grandmother. When Yuichi’s mother is murdered, he and Mikage grow closer. They both feel as though they are orphans, and their bond of being lonely people with so much in common preserves their friendship even when life conspires to separate them. Though they separate due to the intensity of their grief, their bond brings them back together and they realize that they want to be there for one another. By the end of the narrative, it is suggested that they might become romantically involved.
Satsuki’s friendship with Hitoshi leads to their falling in love. When he dies in a car accident, she is overcome with loneliness. She then meets Urara, a strange woman who is also lonely. The two women share a friendship that allows Satsuki to be comforted in her grieving. Urara also helps Satsuki find closure with Hitoshi. Hitoshi’s younger brother, Hiiragi, also loses his girlfriend Yumiko in the accident. He and Satsuki remain friends, and their friendship helps them both get through the tragedy by having each other to talk to and depend on. Despite their individual grief, they want to be there for each other and to help in whatever ways they can.
Gender Roles
Gender roles play an important part in the narrative. Eriko’s life story stands out as a prominent example of gender’s importance for the novel’s characters. Raised as Yuji, Eriko has had gender affirmation surgery and is a woman when Mikage meets her. Yuichi sees nothing wrong with having a family structure that some might find surprising. Mikage mentions how “normal” the family acts despite having an “abnormal” story. Mikage takes an instant liking to Eriko, and is overwhelmed by her beauty and charm. She is devastated when Eriko is murdered by a client at the nightclub Eriko owned. It is suggested that the client might have become angry out of transphobia, after becoming obsessed with Eriko and then finding out that she had once been a man.
Yuichi’s attitude toward gender highlights how the definitions of normality and abnormality that society places upon people are predicated upon fear, misinformation, and a sense of “otherness.” Once Mikage gets to know Eriko, and even before that, she sees that this supposedly “abnormal” person is the most “normal” person she knows. Eriko herself tells Mikage that her life is not perfect, especially now that she is a woman. She still has a hard life, but she has learned to take the good with the bad. This philosophy is ultimately what the narrative is about, thus highlighting how the one character who might seem marginalized or eccentric by some, and who may be the least understood by society, is the character with the most understanding for others and the most to offer society.
Hiiragi deals with the death of his girlfriend, Yumiko, by wearing her sailor-style school uniform. Though Satsuki is terrified to be seen with him in public initially, and though she imagines that he is bullied at school for it (the waitress even looks at him in shock while taking their order), she comes to understand that wearing the uniform is a coping mechanism. For Hiiragi, however, dressing like a girl is just something that makes him happy and brings him closer to his lost girlfriend. Despite his society’s views on gender and how one must dress, Hiiragi wears the outfit until he feels that he does not need to wear it anymore. It is then “taken” by his girlfriend, or disappears, and he no longer has reason to wear it. The narrative suggests that whatever one finds to dull the pain of death might be questionable by society’s standards, but that if it hurts no one and allows one to cope, then perhaps society’s view is what is flawed and “abnormal.”
Finding One’s Place in Life/Moving On
For the characters in Kitchen, moving on (passing on) and finding one’s place in an altered world is the most important—and daunting—task in the narrative. When Mikage’s grandmother dies, she has no remaining blood relatives and feels that she has no place in life. She even questions her own life and wonders why she should continue. Her grandmother’s death forces her to analyze her life and discover what it is that causes her to be grounded. For a while, she is unable to find a place where she can ground herself. She works, cooks, and exists but has no idea why. She eventually finds a place with the Tanabes, and though Eriko’s death upends her world yet again, she finds contentment is being around Yuichi and existing because there are beautiful moments in life along with the truly ugly ones, like the death of loved ones. By the novel’s end, it seems that Mikage and Yuichi are both ready to move on in life and to find a foothold, probably with one another.
Satsuki must also find her place in life. After Hitoshi’s death, she realizes that Hitoshi was her life. She begins to jog to try and fill the void, but is unable to move on. Likewise, Hitoshi’s younger brother, Hiiragi, has lost his girlfriend Yumiko in the same horrible accident. Hiiragi cannot move on either, and wears his dead girlfriend’s school uniform in public to feel closer to her. Neither of these individuals can find a place in life, as their lives are tied inextricably to the dead. It is with the help of Urara that they move on by allowing their loved ones to pass on. Both get the chance to say goodbye and, in doing so, find they can move on as well. Satsuki and Hiiragi also find that they want to be encouraging and positive influences for one another. This desire to help gives them both a purpose as well.
