Botchan

I believe that an important them throughout this story is keeping your morals.  Botchans morals are constantly being challenged throughout the entire story.  He does not like people who are two faced and believes them not to be men.  He even has no sympathy for the children's behavior because he believes it is not right to act this way even for children, so much so that he request for harsh punishment including expulsion.  Along with morals comes and honesty and integrity.  Botchan thinks it is highly unacceptable for anyone to be dishonest.  This is shown many times such as when he meets the principle and he feels compelled to tell him that he cannot live up to the expectations that the Badger has for him. Also, when Redshirt tells him that the Hota is someone to watch out for, he get very upset because he trusted Hota as an honest person and accepted food from him.  He then made a point to tell him how dishonest he thought Hota was and to give him back the money, simply because hated people who were dishonest and it made him feel terrible. He also constantly makes remarks about the hypocrisy of Redshirt.  Redshirt is always preaching about having spiritual experiences and being a role model, yet he sneaks around with an engaged woman and a geisha. Botchan doesn't understand why this is OK behavior in Redshirts eyes, but eating at a dumpling or noodle restaurant is not. He even brings it up in the meeting when Redshirt is making these rules up, and at the end when they catch Redshirt at the inn.  Botchan is painted as this very impatient and impulsive person, but no matter what, he never loses his morals.

If I had to choose a character that I felt sympathy for it would be 'Hanger'.  I feel sorry for 'Hanger' because he is the complete opposite of Botchan.  He is constantly trying to be accepted. I think that's why Botchan decides to call him Hanger, because he hangs on to everyone, acting whatever way he thinks he needs is best to be accepted.  He always acts over the top to gain attention and acceptance from his peers. To me this is sad.  I would never want to live like this, never being able to be yourself and just be happy.  Even when he first meets Botchan, he changes and tries to relate to him because he is also from Tokyo.



Discussion Question:
Everyone is given a nickname in this story, and most are only ever referred to by there nicknames with the exception of Kiyo and Mr. Koga.  Botchans real name is also never revealed. Do you think there is any significance in the nicknames?