How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
[…] for they were English now, more English than the English by virtue of their disappointments. All in all, then, the headmaster was wrong: Glenard could not be said to have passed on any great edifying beacon to future generations. A legacy is not something you can give or take by choice, and there are no certainties in the sticky business of inheritance. (11.384)
One's legacy is not something people get to choose in White Teeth. And the process of inheriting legacy is deeply muddied. In this way, tradition and legacy are very similar; they get forced upon often unwilling recipients, and those recipients are then burdened by the task of living up to the previous generations.
Quote #5
It was a tradition, in both Mickey's wider and nuclear family, to name all sons Abdul to teach them the vanity of assuming higher status than any other man, which was all very well and good but tended to cause confusion in the formative years. However, children are creative, and all the many Abduls added an English name as a kind of buffer to the first. (8.26)
Here's proof that tradition does not necessarily make any sense. And also proof that tradition is not necessarily fixed—it's subject to change.
Quote #6
Samad blew his top. "Whose tradition?" he bellowed, as a tearful Magid began to scribble frantically once more. "Dammit, you are a Muslim, not a wood sprite! I told you, Magid, I told you the condition upon which you would be allowed. You come with me on hajj. If I am to touch that black stone before I die I will do it with my eldest son by my side." (6.286)
Must father and sons follow the same traditions? Why might Magid and Samad have very different ideas about the traditions that belong to them? This quote asks us to think about where traditions come from and how we come to possess them.