Shoujo isn't a genre but a demographic. Unlike shonen manga, written for junior-high-aged boys (like Onegai Sensei) or seinen manga, written for eighteen- to thirty-year-old men (like Saikano), shoujo anime and manga is written for young women. As such, it tends to focus on human relationships and emotions. Honestly, most shoujo anime and mange is pretty cheesy. But, occassionally, it can be uplifting and insightful.
Fruits Basket is one of the more thoughtful shoujo mangas I've read. The heroine, Tohru, moves into a tent on a large tract of land after her widowed mother dies, leaving her without a place to live. The owners of the land discover her and invite her to move into their home as a cook, cleaner, and surrogate sister. Of course there's a twist. The owners and certain members of the rest of their family are possessed by the animals of the Chinese zodiac. They lose their human form when they are especially weakened by exhaustion or illness, or by physical contact with members of the opposite sex. Needless to say, hillarity ensues.
The manga explores a number of themes relevant and interesting to fifteen-year-old girls and maybe more than its fair share of romance and pubescant sexual tension. These are well-developed, but nothing new. But the manga also dwells on the significance and importance of physical intimacy for all kinds of human relationships in a meaningful way.
For a family that can't even hug without being transformed into a rat or a cow, intimacy is rare and sporadic. Many of the young men in the series were raised by mothers who couldn't hold them, who can't even help care for their younger siblings. Many of their mothers break down under the pressure of being denied the simple but vital priveledge of holding their babies. Most of the characters cursed by the zodiac have been raised by parents who are distant or absent at best, physically and emotionally abusive at worst. Their inability to touch their parents only makes the distance between them more difficult to bridge.
Even worse, none of the members of the zodiac are--can be--in meaningful romantic relationships. They live in the fear of what will happen if their lover touches them. In the end, they run away from love to avoid that fear. These are people who love deeply and crave meaning in their relationships with others, but whose curse denies them the priveldge they so crave. It's only at the end of the manga, when they finally break the curse, that any of the relationships which have been growing for the 136-chapter manga blossom.
The manga forced me to think about my own attitude toward physical intimacy in romantic relationships. I was raised in a religious tradition that seemed to have a love-hate relatonship with sexuality. Abstinence before marriage was clearly pivotal, so sex was villanized to preteens and teens. But that attitude contrasted sharply with the beautiful connection my parents and others like them obviously had. I didn't know what to think. Was physicality important for relationships or not? Was sex evil?
Since becomming Catholic, and learning more about the theology of marriage, I've developed a much better understanding--in the academic sense, at least--of just how important physical intimacy in relationships is. A marriage isn't even a marriage until it is consummated. And a consummated marriage, a physical oneness between husband and wife, is a natural and beautiful state created by God at the very dawn of human history. Touch is a part of human existence. A lover who can't touch, a husband who can't become one--these are tragedic figures.
Fruits Basket is the story of young men and women overcoming their personal tragedies, fighting against their curse for the priveledge of physical contact. It is marvelously insightful for capturing just how important physical intimacy--or at least the promise of physical intimacy--is for a romantic relationship. A hug, a kiss can make all the difference during a courtship. And a total personal openess, a perfect gift of self, is a vital part of a working marriage.
This is the third part in an unintentional series on marriage in anime and manga. You can see my posts on Saikano and Onegai Sensei. You can also read Fruits Basket on-line here.
Unexpected advices at unexpected place usually work better, hehe.. You will likely to remember that as a memorable one.
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