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Takichiro’s shop is having financial difficulties and Ryusuke, Shin’ichi’s brother, helps him. Chieko and Ryusuke fall in love. Initially Ryusuke’s father
plans to marry his son to Chieko. However, after he knows that Chieko is a foundling, the marriage is canceled.
One night, Naeko comes to Chieko’s house. That is the first and the last time she comes to Chieko’s house. Naeko does not want to stay with Chieko. She
wants to live alone without disrupting Chieko’s life.
B. Approach of the Study
This study focuses on the old traditions that cause tragedy in the life of Chieko, one of the major characters of Yasunari Kawabata’s The Old Capital.
This study uses the sociocultural-historical approach for its analysis because it takes some sociocultural aspects of reference as its basis. These approaches are
then combined with an interest of the biography as well as knowledge of and interest in literary history. The writer needs to know the sociocultural aspects at
that time, especially the old traditions in Japan. The sociocultural-historical approach help the writer to analyze Yasunari Kawabata’s The Old Tradition and
understand the historical-cultural background related to the novel.
C. Method of the Study
The method used in this thesis is library research. In order to complete the study, the writer needed many sources that are divided into two kinds, namely
primary main sources and secondary sources. Its main source is the novel The
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Old Capital by Yasunari Kawabata. Other sources are taken from related books,
journals, articles, and the internet. There were some steps taken in order to find out the answer to the research
problems, as follows below. First, the writer read the novel as the primary source several times. The first reading was used to gain a better understanding about the
story, and subsequent readings were more in-depth, to ensure complete comprehension of the novel. While reading, notes were taken and important
quotes underlined to support the analysis. Second, as much as information and data as possible was gathered by the
writer. The information and data were found in books about literary theory and other sources related to the study, such as journals, articles, and internet.
Third, the formulized problems were analyzed through the theories obtained in the previous step. This includes the characteristics of the major
characters, which provided a better understanding of the reason why Chieko has to go through her tragic life. Finally, the novel was analyzed using the chosen
approach, then compared to the original theory. From that, a conclusion was drawn.
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CHAPTER IV ANALYSIS
