Seventeen Syllables

Seventeen Syllables is a coming of age story about Rosie, a teen who struggles with the generational and cultural separation between herself and her mother. I chose Rosie, the protagonist, as my focus because she is more relatable to me. This is because she goes through many of the same experiences and struggles that other young adults go through. Also, as the protagonist of the story, Rosie is central to the plot and is the character that experiences the most change throughout the narrative. Yamamoto wrote Rosie in order to make the story compelling; she offers a lens to the audience about the struggles of coming of age, loss of innocence, and love, that no other character in the story could offer.

In the beginning, Rosie is characterized

In this scene, she once again displays her childhood innocence by being unable to recognize the situation she is in and unable to predict what will happen. When Jesus tells her he has a secret that he needs to tell her when they are alone, the reader can very quickly come to the conclusion that this secret will be a confession of his feelings. However, Rosie, up until the moment Jesus grabs her hands, seems unaware of his feelings. For a short moment, Rosie experiences adulthood, but hastily retreats to her innocence. “But the terrible, beautiful sensation lasted no more than a second, and the reality of Jesus’ lips and tongue and teeth and hands made her pull away with such strength that she nearly tumbled” (155). Rosie struggles with this loss of innocence and she literally, and figuratively, runs away from

Her mother’s confession is the catalyst that finally shatters Rosie’s innocence and pushes her into adulthood. When Mrs. Hayashi begs her daughter, “Promise me you will never marry!” (160) Rosie is shocked. Not only had her image of her parent’s marriage been broken, but she was also conflicted about her feelings for Jesus. Her parents’ love, the love she knew as a child, was a lie, so how could she love Jesus? What was it that she was feeling?

Yamamoto alternates the scenes of Rosie’s blossoming love and her parent’s tumultuous marriage to show the struggle Rosie has with becoming an adult. The stark differences and juxtaposition of these experiences reveal how complex adulthood is; it is not always terrible, there is also hope. Jesus represents this hope for Rosie; as she realizes the pain and unhappiness with her parents’ marriage, she is shown that not all love is the same. Without Jesus’ addition, the story would reveal adulthood as a depressing and painful