The Great Passage

by Shion Miura

  “I still have a lot to learn,” Majime said awkwardly and took a sip of the steaming tea that had just arrived.

  Professor Matsumoto was writing on a sample card. He added a question mark. On TV they were doing a special report on “Unexpected Sweating: Exploring the Mysteries of the Autonomic Nervous System.” Among the street interviews with men and women of all ages was an exchange between two high-school girls.

  “Sweating all of a sudden, like for no reason?” said one. “Yeah, yeah!”

  “It’s like, bamyuru!”

  “Yeah, bamyuda!”

  Catching this conversation, the professor had lost no time in making a note of the words. He added a question mark as if unsure of what he had heard.

  No, thought Majime, the girls weren’t talking about the autonomic nervous system. More likely they randomly made Bermuda into a verb, bamyuru, to express how hot they felt—and this was probably a word they’d made up, used only by them and their friends. No real reason to take note of it. He felt like telling the professor all this, but seeing the look of intense concentration on his face, he let it pass.

  “Are we on schedule?” the professor asked, turning to his noodles.

  “Yes. The Great Passage should come out right on time next spring.”

  “It’s been a long time coming.” The professor scooped up some grated yam with a wooden spoon and smiled. “But you know, the real work starts after a dictionary comes out. To improve its accuracy and precision, we have to keep collecting samples for the revised and expanded edition.”

  The biggest Japanese dictionary of all time was the Great Dictionary of Japanese. Twenty-four years after its first publication, a second edition had come out, increasing the number of entry words from 450,000 to half a million—testimony to the editors’ and contributors’ determination to respond to changes in a living language by ceaselessly collecting words and nurturing the growth of the dictionary.

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” Majime had just bitten off a piece of rice cake, but he nodded as he spoke. The hot, softened rice cake dangling from his lower lip swung like a white tongue and brushed against his chin, burning a little.

  Even while the professor was busy eating, his thoughts remained on dictionaries. With a far-off look in his eyes, he said, “Majime, just look at the Oxford English Dictionary or China’s Kangxi Dictionary. Overseas, a university founded by royal charter or some other ruling authority often takes the lead in compiling a dictionary of the national language. In other words, public funds go into the project.”

  “And here we are, perpetually underfunded. It’s enough to make you weep.”

  “Right. So why do you suppose they use public funds to make dictionaries?”

  Majime left off winding his noodles. “I suppose it’s because they see a dictionary as a way to enhance national prestige. Language helps form a sense of national identity, and, to a certain degree, unification and control of language are necessary to bring a nation together.”

  “Exactly. Yet look at Japan. We have zero dictionaries compiled under the patronage of any public institution.” The professor rested his chopsticks, leaving half of his soba noodles untouched. “Take the first modern Japanese dictionary, Fumihiko Otsuki’s Sea of Words. Not even that had financial support from the government. Otsuki worked on it his whole life and published it with funds from his own pocket. To this day, every publishing company puts out its own dictionary, and no official bodies are involved.”

  Majime wondered if this was the professor’s way of saying, “Apply for government funding. What have you got to lose?” Cautiously, he said, “Government agencies can be somewhat obtuse in their attitude to culture.”

  “When I was young, I used to wish we had more generous funding.” The professor folded his hands on the tabletop. “Now I think it was all for the best.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “If government money were involved, there’s a strong chance they would interfere with the content. And just because national prestige would be on the line, language could well be made a tool of domination, a way of bolstering state legitimacy.”

  Until now, caught up in the grind of dictionary compilation, Majime had never stopped to think about the political influence dictionaries might have. “I guess words, and dictionaries, must always exist in the narrow, perilous space between individual and authority, internal freedom and public governance.”

  “Yes,” said Professor Matsumoto. “Which is why even if we lack funding, we should take pride in the fact that dictionaries are compiled not by the government but by publishing companies. By private citizens like you and me, plugging away at our jobs. After devoting more than half my life to lexicography, that’s one thing I’m sure of.”

  “Professor . . .” Majime was moved by this declaration.

  “Words and the human heart that creates them are absolutely free, with no connection to the powers that be. And that’s as it should be. A ship to enable all people to travel freely across the sea of words—we must continue our efforts to make sure The Great Passage is just that.”

  The professor spoke simply and quietly, but the passion in his words washed over Majime with the force of breaking waves.

  When they had finished their meal and gone back outside, Majime hailed a taxi and all but forced the professor and his briefcase inside. The professor had shown little appetite, and under the circumstances Majime couldn’t allow him to take the train home. He pressed a taxi voucher from the company into the professor’s reluctant hand.

  “Good night, sir. Till next time.”

  Inside the taxicab, the professor bowed his head apologetically.

  Majime watched the taxi speed off and then went back to the office, on fire with new determination.

  Three days later, the sky was a deep blue. Even inside the office, where bookshelves hid the windows, Majime felt somehow refreshed.

  As usual, he spent the day at his desk. Then all at once Araki came rushing in. “Majime, we’ve got trouble!” he cried. In his hand was a large sheet of paper, part of the fourth proofs they were currently going over.

  Despite himself, Majime started up, but before he could get to his feet Araki spread the sheet of paper on Majime’s desk.

  “Look at this.”

  The page contained words starting with chi.

  “Chishio is missing!” The word for “blood.”

  “What?” Majime’s glasses had slid down his nose. He pushed them back up and bent over the page, where the words were lined up in order.

  Chishi idenshi (lethal gene), chishio (repeated soaking in dye), chishiki (knowledge). But no sign of the compound written in different characters but also pronounced chishio.

  “Well, this is a bloodcurdling state of affairs.”

  “Majime, this is no time for levity!”

  Majime had spoken from the heart, but Araki scolded him. He felt the blood drain from his face but managed to get hold of himself and think about what needed to be done.

  “This is already the fourth proof,” he said, “but we’ll have to squeeze out enough space to insert ‘blood.’ We have no choice.”

  Araki nodded, grim-faced. “You’re right. The question is, how did a mistake of this magnitude get by until the fourth proof without anybody noticing?”

  “We’ll have to be especially meticulous checking the fourth proofs. We’ll start over from the beginning. Everyone will have to pitch in, including the students.” It made Majime’s head spin to think how far off schedule this would put them, but any delay was better than letting other possible omissions go unnoticed. “We also need to get to the bottom of this and find out how the word went missing.”

  The others had picked up on the tension in the air. Miss Kishibe, Mrs. Sasaki, and the few part-time workers still in the office began to drift toward his desk.

  “Mrs. Sasaki, you check the usage sample cards, will you please?”

  She nodded and promptly scurried to the reference room where the
cards were stored. After a bit she returned and reported that the card for blood was there. She held out all the materials relating to the word and gave them to Majime. “It’s marked as an entry word. You wrote the definition yourself.”

  Maybe so, but somehow or other the word and its definition hadn’t been properly inserted. The first, second, and third proofs which Mrs. Sasaki had brought showed that the entry was missing in all previous proofs.

  Majime stood up. “Everyone, I’m sorry, but this is an emergency. I need you to drop everything and help us check every last word in the fourth proof.”

  The air crackled. Silently they gathered around as Majime explained the procedure. “All we can do is go through and make sure that the data on every sample card marked ‘use’ is actually there. Recruit as many more people as you can. We’ll divvy up the pages. Everyone, check the pages you are assigned with utmost care. However long it takes, let’s dig in and get it done.” He looked around at the faces surrounding him and added, “We mustn’t let The Great Passage spring a leak!”

  Although now, in the final stage of making the dictionary, a major problem had arisen, no one appeared downcast. Araki, Mrs. Sasaki, and Miss Kishibe, as well as the students, all looked determined to weather this crisis.

  “Before we begin I’d like you all to go home and bring back a change of clothes and whatever else you may need,” said Majime. “Starting tonight, we camp here.”

  No shoulders slumped at this announcement. Miss Kishibe returned to her computer and started typing an e-mail. Probably letting Miyamoto know she wouldn’t be available for a while, Majime thought. The students varied in their reactions, some firing themselves up—“Okay, let’s go! Let’s do this!”—and others deciding to return to campus and see who else they could recruit. All were cheerful and positive. A state of emergency could induce temporary euphoria, he had heard. This might be something similar.

  As he looked around at the eager, determined faces of his reliable crew, Majime couldn’t help but bow his head in gratitude and humility. From the time Nishioka had left until Miss Kishibe arrived, he had toiled alone for years in the Dictionary Editorial Department, the lone full-time employee, working on The Great Passage whenever he could. He had often grown discouraged and wondered if the dictionary would ever see the light of day. His labors had not been misplaced, he thought now, looking at the crowd of people willing to roll up their sleeves and pitch in to save The Great Passage from foundering.

  As people started coming and going, the phone rang. Miss Kishibe swiftly picked up the receiver. Thinking it was probably Mr. Particle yet again, Majime paid scant attention. After a few words, however, her face grew solemn.

  “Mr. Majime.” Having finished her conversation, Miss Kishibe drew near with a note in hand. “That was Mrs. Matsumoto. The professor is in the hospital.”

  The note she handed him bore the name of one of the larger hospitals in Tokyo. The symptoms weren’t clear, but Majime felt a sense of foreboding. For a moment he couldn’t move.

  The subsequent verification process would long be remembered by dictionary editors at other companies as “Gembu Books Hell Camp.”

  Of course, in the midst of the turmoil Majime had no way of knowing this. All he could do was try his best to deal with events as they arose.

  First, he and Araki went to see Professor Matsumoto in the hospital. The professor had just finished a round of morning tests. When they walked in, he was sitting up in bed watching television, scribbling on a file card.

  What a man. Even in the hospital, he still gave the dictionary top priority. The professor’s color was better than Majime had expected, and this cheered him as well.

  “Thanks for coming,” said the professor. He seemed embarrassed by the situation. “I’m sorry to drag you all the way here. My wife blew things out of proportion, I’m afraid. I’ll be here a week or so for routine tests, that’s all. Age has a way of catching up with you. I’ve started falling apart, and that’s just how it is.”

  His wife bowed over and over to them. Majime had always assumed that the professor’s total commitment to the dictionary must have meant he was a failure as a family man, but no, the couple seemed devoted to each other. At the moment she was carefully arranging a cardigan over her husband’s shoulders.

  “Sir, you mustn’t overdo it,” said Araki in a tone of concern. “This is a good chance for you to get some rest.”

  “I’m so disappointed in myself for creating a distraction at such a busy time.” The professor seemed unable to reconcile himself to the exigencies of old age. “How is The Great Passage coming along?”

  Exchanging glances, Majime and Araki said simultaneously, “Fine.” It wouldn’t do to cause the professor any worry. Wild horses couldn’t have dragged the word blood from them.

  After the visit, Majime said good-bye to Araki and went home to pick up a change of clothes. Ten or so years before, his landlady Také had died, ushering in a new chapter in the history of the two-story wooden structure. Ownership had passed to Kaguya, Také’s granddaughter. She and Majime were already married by then, and they had continued to live there, carrying out occasional repairs as needed.

  Také had always treated Majime like one of the family. As his library grew, gradually taking over the entire downstairs, she never uttered a word of complaint. He was clumsy at work and romance alike, but she always watched over and supported him. When he and Kaguya got married, she’d been overjoyed. Recalling the early days of their marriage, spent in that house with Také, always filled him with pleasant warmth.

  One winter morning, Také had failed to wake up. They found her on her futon, dead of what the doctor called heart failure. Plainly speaking, it was old age. In her later years she ate little and spent almost all her time in her room on the second floor; going up and down stairs was hard labor, she used to say. The night before she died, she said she thought she might be coming down with a cold. She had seemed so full of life that the sudden farewell had been most upsetting. She hadn’t suffered; that was their only comfort.

  They held the funeral in a daze and returned to a house empty of Také. Only then did they realize that they hadn’t seen any sign of their cat, Tora. They searched the neighborhood and even contacted the public health center. They waited for days and days, but never did find out what had become of Tora. Perhaps, sensing his owner’s death, he had set out on a journey of his own. When they accepted that Tora wasn’t ever coming back, then and only then were Majime and Kaguya able to cry over Také’s death. They held hands and wept aloud with rasping sobs, as if trying to force air into lungs crushed by grief.

  Now Majime slid open the lattice front door and called, “I’m home.”

  In response, out came their current pet cat, Torao, who had been with them for a number of years. He was a splendid tabby, very similar in appearance to his predecessor. Majime liked to think he was Tora’s son or grandson.

  He started up the creaking stairs, with Torao winding around his legs. The entire downstairs—except for the kitchen, bath, and toilet—was still taken up by his books, so he and Kaguya lived upstairs.

  “Oh, you’re back!” Still half-asleep, Kaguya poked her head out of the room at the end of the hall. “What are you doing back so early? Feeling okay?”

  “That’s not it.”

  He went into the middle room, the one that was his, and started to pull clean clothes out of the dresser. “A little glitch came up. I’ll be sleeping at the office for a while.”

  Kaguya looked worried, but she didn’t press him for details. She understood his passion for dictionaries and always tried to keep out of his way. Majime, too, tried to avoid being a burden on Kaguya, who was equally committed to her career.

  She seemed about to get up and join him, so he hastily said, “It’s okay. Go back to bed.”

  Having finished stocking food and making her preparations for the evening, Kaguya was undoubtedly trying to get a bit of needed sleep.

  “Mitsu, di
d you have lunch?”

  No, he realized, he hadn’t eaten anything. Unable to come up with an excuse off the top of his head, he stammered. She slipped a cardigan over her pajamas.

  “Let me make you something.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “You have time to eat, don’t you? I’m hungry, too.”

  Torao followed her expectantly down the stairs.

  The room at the top of the stairs, their living room, looked exactly as it had when Také was alive. They still hadn’t gotten out the kotatsu table heater for the cold weather. Instead, there was a small, low table. Against the wall was an old wooden dresser. The window looked out on the clothes-drying platform and the autumn sky.

  The one thing different from before was a small Buddhist shrine containing the memorial tablets and photographs of Také and her husband, Kaguya’s grandfather, who had died years earlier. Kaguya had never met him. The photograph showed him as a fine-looking man. Majime was of the opinion that Kaguya had his eyes.

  He stuffed some clothes and his shaver in a travel bag and, after a short breather, offered incense at the shrine, placing his palms together in respect. Kaguya came in carrying a tray, with Torao right behind her.

  “Here you are.”

  “Thanks. It looks good.”

  “Let’s eat.”

  They sat down at the small table and picked up their chopsticks. She had made grilled fish, an omelet, boiled spinach with soy sauce, and miso soup with onion, fried tofu, and silken tofu.

  “This is more like breakfast than lunch, I’m afraid,” she said.

  “It tastes wonderful. As usual.”

  He said this with such feeling that she lowered her head, embarrassed, and ate a little more quickly. Torao mewed softly, his eyes fixed on the salmon.

  “Torao, you have food in your dish and you know it!”

  Reprimanded by Kaguya, Torao turned away reluctantly and put his face in the dish of cat food in the corner.

  “I went to the hospital just now to look in on Professor Matsumoto.”

  “You what?” Kaguya set down her chopsticks and swallowed. “What happened?”