Modern Japanese Literature

by Donald Keene

  GISUKE: If you talk like that you’ll fall, just as you did once before. You’re already crippled and insane—what will you do next to worry your parents? Come down, you fool!

  KICHIJI: Master, don’t get so angry. The young master will not obey you. You should get some fried bean cake; when he sees it he will come down, because he likes it.

  GISUKE: No, you had better get the stick after him. Don’t be afraid to give him a good shaking-up.

  KICHIJI: That’s too cruel. The young master doesn’t understand anything. He’s under the influence of evil spirits.

  GISUKE: We may have to put bamboo guards on the roof to keep him down from there.

  KICHIJI: Whatever you do won’t keep him down. Why, he climbed the roof of the Honzen Temple without even a ladder; a low roof like this one is the easiest thing in the world for him. I tell you, it’s the evil spirits that make him climb. Nothing can stop him.

  GISUKE: You may be right, but he worries me to death. If we could only keep him in the house it wouldn’t be so bad, even though he is crazy; but he’s always climbing up to high places. Suejiro says that everybody as far as Takamatsu knows about Yoshitaro the Madman.

  KICHIJI: People on the island all say he’s under the influence of a fox-spirit, but I don’t believe that. I never heard of a fox climbing trees.

  GISUKE: You’re right. I think I know the real reason. About the time Yoshitaro was born, I bought a very expensive imported rifle, and I shot every monkey on the island. I believe a monkey-spirit is now working in him.

  KICHIJI: That’s just what I think. Otherwise, how could he climb trees so well? He can climb anything without a ladder. Even Saku, who’s a professional climber, admits that he’s no match for Yoshitaro.

  GISUKE (with a bitter laugh): Don’t joke about it! It’s no laughing matter, having a son who is always climbing on the roof. (Calling again.) Yoshitaro, come down! Yoshitaro!—When he’s up there on the roof, he doesn’t hear me at all—he’s so engrossed. I cut down all the trees around the house so he couldn’t climb them, but there’s nothing I can do about the roof.

  KICHIJI: When I was a boy I remember there was a gingko tree in front of the gate.

  GISUKE: Yes, that was one of the biggest trees on the island. One day Yoshitaro climbed clear to the top. He sat out on a branch, at least ninety feet above the ground, dreaming away as usual. My wife and I never expected him to get down alive, but after a while, down he slid. We were all too astonished to speak.

  KICHIJI: That was certainly a miracle.

  GISUKE: That’s why I say it’s a monkey-spirit that’s working in him. (He calls again.) Yoshi! Come down! (Dropping his voice.) Kichiji, you’d better go up and fetch him.

  KICHIJI: But when anyone else climbs up there, the young master gets angry.

  GISUKE: Never mind his getting angry. Pull him down.

  KICHIJI: Yes, master. (Kichiji goes out after the ladder. Tosaku, the neighbor, enters.)

  TOSAKU: Good day, sir.

  GISUKE: Good day. Fine weather. Catch anything with the nets you put out yesterday?

  TOSAKU: No, not much. The season’s over.

  GISUKE: Maybe it is too late now.

  TOSAKU (looking up at Yoshitaro): Your son’s on the roof again.

  GISUKE: Yes, as usual. I don’t like it, but when I keep him locked in a room he’s like a fish out of water. Then, when I take pity on him and let him out, back he goes up on the roof.

  TOSAKU: But after all, he doesn’t bother anybody.

  GISUKE: He bothers us. We feel so ashamed when he climbs up there and shouts.

  TOSAKU: But your younger son, Suejiro, has a fine record at school. That must be some consolation for you.

  GISUKE: Yes, he’s a good student, and that is a consolation to me. If both of them were crazy, I don’t know how I could go on living.

  TOSAKU: By the way, a Priestess has just come to the island. How would you like to have her pray for your son?—That’s really what I came to see you about.

  GISUKE: We’ve tried prayers before, but it’s never done any good.

  TOSAKU: This Priestess believes in the god Kompira. She works all kinds of miracles. People say the god inspires her, and that’s why her prayers have more effect than those of ordinary priests. Why don’t you try her once?

  GISUKE: Well, we might. How much does she charge?

  TOSAKU: She won’t take any money unless the patient is cured. If he is cured, you pay her whatever you feel like.

  GISUKE: Suejiro says he doesn’t believe in prayers. . . . But there’s no harm in letting her try.

  (Kichiji enters carrying the ladder and disappears behind the fence.)

  TOSAKU: I’ll go and bring her here. In the meantime you get your son down off the roof.

  GISUKE: Thanks for your trouble. (After seeing that Tosaku has gone, he calls again.) Yoshi! Be a good boy and come down.

  KICHIJI (who is up on the roof by this time): Now then, young master, come down with me. If you stay up here any longer you’ll have a fever tonight.

  YOSHITARO (drawing away from Kichiji as a Buddhist might from a heathen): Don’t touch me! The angels are beckoning to me. You’re not supposed to come here. What do you want?

  KICHIJI: Don’t talk nonsense! Please come down.

  YOSHITARO: If you touch me the demons will tear you apart.

  (Kichiji hurriedly catches Yoshitaro by the shoulder and pulls him to the ladder. Yoshitaro suddenly becomes submissive.)

  KICHIJI: Don’t make any trouble now. If you do you’ll fall and hurt yourself.

  GISUKE: Be careful!

  (Yoshitaro comes down to the center of the stage, followed by Kichiji. Yoshitaro is lame in his right leg.)

  GISUKE (calling): Oyoshi! Come out here a minute.

  OYOSHI (from within): What is it?

  GISUKE: I’ve sent for a Priestess.

  OYOSHI (coming out): That may help. You never can tell what will.

  GISUKE: Yoshitaro says he talks with the god Kompira. Well, this Priestess is a follower of Kompira, so she ought to be able to help him.

  YOSHITARO (looking uneasy): Father! Why did you bring me down? There was a beautiful cloud of five colors rolling down to fetch me.

  GISUKE: Idiot! Once before you said there was a five-colored cloud, and you jumped off the roof. That’s the way you became a cripple. A Priestess of the god Kompira is coming here today to drive the evil spirit out of you, so don’t you go back up on the roof.

  (Tosaku enters, leading the Priestess. She has a crafty face.)

  TOSAKU: This is the Priestess I spoke to you about.

  GISUKE: Ah, good afternoon. I’m glad you’ve come—this boy is really a disgrace to the whole family.

  PRIESTESS (casually): You needn’t worry any more about him. I’ll cure him at once with the god’s help. (Looking at Yoshitaro.) This is the one?

  GISUKE: Yes. He’s twenty-four years old, and the only thing he can do is climb up to high places.

  PRIESTESS: How long has he been this way?

  GISUKE: Ever since he was born. Even when he was a baby, he wanted to be climbing. When he was four or five years old, he climbed onto the low shrine, then onto the high shrine of Buddha, and finally onto a very high shelf. When he was seven he began climbing trees. At fifteen he climbed to the tops of mountains and stayed there all day long. He says he talks with demons and with the gods. What do you think is the matter with him?

  PRIESTESS: There’s no doubt but that it’s a fox-spirit. I will pray for him. (Looking at Yoshitaro.) Listen now! I am the messenger of the god Kompira. All that I say comes from the god.

  YOSHITARO (uneasily): You say the god Kompira? Have you ever seen him?

  PRIESTESS (staring at him): Don’t say such sacrilegious things! The god cannot be seen.

  YOSHITARO (exultantly): I have seen him many times! He’s an old man with white robes and a golden crown. He’s my best friend.

  PRIESTESS (taken aback at this assertion, and speaking to Gisuk
e): This is a fox-spirit, all right, and a very extreme case. I will address the god.

  (She chants a prayer in a weird manner. Yoshitaro, held fast by Kichiji, watches the Priestess blankly. She works herself into a frenzy, and falls to the ground in a faint. Presently she rises to her feet and looks about her strangely.)

  PRIESTESS (in a changed voice): I am the god Kompira!

  (All except Yoshitaro fall to their knees with exclamations of reverence.)

  PRIESTESS (with affected dignity): The elder son of this family is under the influence of a fox-spirit. Hang him up on the branch of a tree and purify him with the smoke of green pine needles. If you fail to do what I say, you will all be punished!

  (She faints again. There are more exclamations of astonishment.)

  PRIESTESS (rising and looking about her as though unconscious of what has taken place): What has happened? Did the god speak?

  GISUKE: It was a miracle.

  PRIESTESS: You must do at once whatever the god told you, or you’ll be punished. I warn you for your own sake.

  GISUKE (hesitating somewhat): Kichiji, go and get some green pine needles.

  OYOSHI: No! It’s too cruel, even if it is the god’s command.

  PRIESTESS: He will not suffer, only the fox-spirit within him. The boy himself will not suffer at all. Hurry! (Looking fixedly at Yoshitaro.) Did you hear the god’s command? He told the spirit to leave your body before it hurt.

  YOSHITARO: That was not Kompira’s voice. He wouldn’t talk to a priestess like you.

  PRIESTESS (insulted): I’ll get even with you. Just wait! Don’t talk back to the god like that, you horrid fox!

  (Kichiji enters with an armful of green pine boughs. Oyoshi is frightened.)

  PRIESTESS: Respect the god or be punished!

  (Gisuke and Kichiji reluctantly set fire to the pine needles, then bring Yoshitaro to the fire. He struggles against being held in the smoke.)

  YOSHITARO: Father! What are you doing to me? I don’t like it! I don’t like it!

  PRIESTESS: That’s not his own voice speaking. It’s the fox within him. Only the fox is suffering.

  OYOSHI: But it’s cruel!

  (Gisuke and Kichiji attempt to press Yoshitaro’s face into the smoke. Suddenly Suejiro’s voice is heard calling within the house, and presently he appears. He stands amazed at the scene before him.)

  SUEJIRO: What’s happening here? What’s the smoke for?

  YOSHITARO (coughing from the smoke, and looking at his brother as at a savior): Father and Kichiji are putting me in the smoke.

  SUEJIRO (angrily): Father! What foolish thing are you doing now? Haven’t I told you time and time again about this sort of business?

  GISUKE: But the god inspired the miraculous Priestess . . .

  SUEJIRO (interrupting): What nonsense is that? You do these insane things merely because he is so helpless.

  (With a contemptuous look at the Priestess he stamps the fire out.)

  PRIESTESS: Wait! That fire was made at the command of the god!

  (Suejiro sneeringly puts out the last spark.)

  GISUKE (more courageously): Suejiro, I have no education, and you have, so I am always willing to listen to you. But this fire was made at the god’s command, and you shouldn’t have stamped on it.

  SUEJIRO: Smoke won’t cure him. People will laugh at you if they hear you’ve been trying to drive out a fox. All the gods in the country together couldn’t even cure a cold. This Priestess is a fraud. All she wants is the money.

  GISUKE: But the doctors can’t cure him.

  SUEJIRO: If the doctors can’t, nobody can. I’ve told you before that he doesn’t suffer. If he did, we’d have to do something for him. But as long as he can climb up on the roof, he is happy. Nobody in the whole country is as happy as he is—perhaps nobody in the world. Besides, if you cure him now, what can he do? He’s twenty-four years old and he knows nothing, not even the alphabet. He’s had no practical experience. If he were cured, he would be conscious of being crippled, and he’d be the most miserable man alive. Is that what you want to see? It’s all because you want to make him normal. But wouldn’t it be foolish to become normal merely to suffer? (Looking sidewise at the Priestess.) Tosaku, if you brought her here, you had better take her away.

  PRIESTESS (angry and insulted): You disbelieve the oracle of the god. You will be punished! (She starts her chant as before. She faints, rises, and speaks in a changed voice.) I am the great god Kompira! What the brother of the patient says springs from his own selfishness. He knows if his sick brother is cured, he’ll get the family estate. Doubt not this oracle!

  SUEJIRO (excitedly knocking the Priestess down): That’s a damned lie, you old fool.

  (He kicks her.)

  PRIESTESS (getting to her feet and resuming her ordinary voice): You’ve hurt me! You savage!

  SUEJIRO: You fraud! You swindler!

  TOSAKU (coming between them): Wait, young man! Don’t get in such a frenzy.

  SUEJIRO (still excited): You liar! A woman like you can’t understand brotherly love!

  TOSAKU: We’ll leave now. It was my mistake to have brought her.

  GISUKE (giving Tosaku some money): I hope you’ll excuse him. He’s young and has such a temper.

  PRIESTESS: You kicked me when I was inspired by the god. You’ll be lucky to survive until tonight.

  SUEJIRO: Liar!

  OYOSHI (soothing Suejiro): Be still now. (To the Priestess): I’m sorry this has happened.

  PRIESTESS (leaving with Tosaku): The foot you kicked me with will rot off!

  (The Priestess and Tosaku go out.)

  GISUKE (to Suejiro): Aren’t you afraid of being punished for what you’ve done?

  SUEJIRO: A god never inspires a woman like that old swindler. She lies about everything.

  OYOSHI: I suspected her from the very first. She wouldn’t do such cruel things if a real god inspired her.

  GISUKE (without any insistence): Maybe so. But, Suejiro, your brother will be a burden to you all your life.

  SUEJIRO: It will be no burden at all. When I become successful, I’ll build a tower for him on top of a mountain.

  GISUKE (suddenly): But where’s Yoshitaro gone?

  KICHIJI (pointing at the roof): He’s up there.

  GISUKE (having to smile): As usual.

  (During the preceding excitement, Yoshitaro has slipped away and climbed back up on the roof. The four persons below look at each other and smile.)

  SUEJIRO: A normal person would be angry with you for having put him in the smoke, but you see, he’s forgotten everything. (He calls.) Yoshitaro!

  YOSHITARO (for all his madness there is affection for his brother): Suejiro! I asked Kompira and he says he doesn’t know her!

  SUEJIRO (smiling): You’re right. The god will inspire you, not a priestess like her.

  (Through a rift in the clouds, the golden light of the sunset strikes the roof.)

  SUEJIRO (exclaiming): What a beautiful sunset!

  YOSHITARO (his face lighted by the sun’s reflection): Suejiro, look! Can’t you see a golden palace in that cloud over there? There! Can’t you see? Just look! How beautiful!

  SUEJIRO (as he feels the sorrow of sanity): Yes, I see. I see it, too. Wonderful.

  YOSHITARO (filled with joy): There! I hear music coming from the palace. Flutes, what I love best of all. Isn’t it beautiful?

  (The parents have gone into the house. The mad brother on the roof and the sane brother on the ground remain looking at the golden sunset.)

  TRANSLATED BY YOZAN T. IWASAKI AND GLENN HUGHES

  THE TIGER

  [Tora, 1918] by Kume Masao (1891-1952)

  •

  As was his custom, Fukai Yasuke, the Shimpa1 actor, did not awaken until it was nearly noon. With a rather theatrical blink of his sleep-laden eyes, he looked out at the blue sky of a cloudless autumn day, and surrendered himself to a huge, deliberate stretch. But, with a sudden realization that this performance was somewhat overdone,
even for him, he darted a furtive glance about the room and smiled sheepishly at the thought of how much a part of him the grandiose gestures of the stage had become. He was, even for an actor, a born exaggerator: the very essence of his acting style lay in his ability to create farcical effects through the overuse of the bombastic and the grandiloquent. He was the best known comic actor of the Shimpa.

  Fukai had started life as the dashing young man of a fish market down by the river; but when he heard that Kawakami, the founder of the Shimpa Theatre, was rounding up a collection of bit-players, Fukai had gone at once to apply for a job, ignoring the caustic comments of his friends. When it at last came Fukai’s turn to undergo his stage test, Kawakami had taken one hard look at the young fishmonger with his close-cropped head, and said in tones of undisguised contempt, “You’ll never make an actor, I can see.”

  Fukai had poured forth in his defense every argument he could muster, but Kawakami only smiled and paid him no further attention. Even this experience did not chasten Fukai. The next time he shaved every last hair from his head, and went in disguise to take another test. It so happened that one theatre needed a large number of players, and Fukai, by mingling in with the other applicants evaded Kawakami’s watchful eye long enough to get himself hired. Once he entered the company, however, Kawakami noticed him immediately.

  “So! You’ve finally wormed your way in!” Kawakami said in considerable surprise.

  “That’s right. I’m a thickheaded fellow,” Fukai replied, knocking on his shaven pate.

  Kawakami laughed. “It can’t be helped, I suppose. Now that you’re in, let’s see you buckle down and work hard.” It had occurred to him that such a man might possibly have his uses, and there was no reason not to let him into the company gracefully.

  Such was Fukai’s initiation into the theatre. Since then he had become an outstanding player of comic parts, and having weathered the various vicissitudes of Shimpa, he had eventually succeeded in making himself indispensable. His salary was quite a handsome one; he would every now and then, in true actor’s fashion, take up with some woman; there was no doubt but that he had made quite a success of himself.