The Columbia Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature: From Restoration to Occupation, 1868-1945: vol. 1 (Modern Asian Literature Series)

by J. Thomas Rimer

  1. “Him” probably refers to her older brother, who opposed her literary career and her marriage.

  2. “XXX” probably refers to her older brother’s wife.

  Chapter 3

  THE INTERWAR YEARS

  The period between World War I and Japan’s increasing involvement in its own wars in the 1930s contains a bewildering variety of influences and counterinfluences on the literature written during those two decades. The stimulation of contemporary European art and literature became even more important, particularly in the case of French writers such as Baudelaire, Rimbaud, and Gide, whose works were translated and eagerly read. With their concern for the poor and disenfranchised, socialism and Marxism might be considered European influences as well, and they greatly helped reshape the consciousness of Japanese artists and intellectuals. Any public expression of these convictions, however, because of the mounting suppression by the government, was muted by the early 1930s.

  Another way to examine the literary accomplishments of this interwar period is to observe the development of a genuine popular literature. Such varieties of entertainment had a long heritage dating back to the Tokugawa period and earlier, but now with a more literate population and the use of sophisticated printing techniques, modern mass communication had become possible. The result was a sharper division between what was sometimes called pure literature and mere “entertainment,” whether romantic tales, detective fiction, or adventure stories. The differences between the two may seem obvious at first, but the hidden reciprocal relationship between them helped move Japanese literature away from the earlier confessional modes toward a rebirth of artistic storytelling.

  The great masters, writers like Mori Ōgai and Natsume Sōseki, were gone but had been replaced by such grand figures as the greatest of all modern Japanese storytellers, Akutagawa Ryūnosuke; that master of patrician eroticism, Tanizaki Jun’ichirō; the poetic and sometimes nostalgic Kawabata Yasunari; and Shiga Naoya, who combined earlier literary techniques of self-revelation with an acute and ironic eye for social detail. It was writers like these who defined for Japanese readers what was “modern” about their literature. Although the careers of some of these writers were halted or at least muted by the advent of the war, most resumed their creative work after that period. A few, however, notably Shiga Naoya, continued to remain silent.

  FICTION

  AKUTAGAWA RYŪNOSUKE

  For many readers, Akutagawa Ryūnosuke (1892–1927) is the most celebrated writer of short fiction during the interwar years, and his works were among the first examples of modern Japanese literature to be translated into English. He drew on stories from the Japanese, Chinese, and European traditions as well as his observations of contemporary Japanese life. Akutagawa remained a masterful storyteller until his celebrated suicide, which seemed to many to reflect the unease felt by artists and intellectuals at a troubling moment in Japan’s political, social, and artistic history. Two of his stories are included here.

  “The Nose” (Hana), published in 1916 when the author was still a student, already shows Akutagawa’s skill at investing classical works with a sardonic and altogether modern sensibility. The second, “The Christ of Nanking” (Nankin no Kirisuto), written in 1920, is a particularly trenchant example of the author’s sophisticated irony.

  THE NOSE (HANA)

  Translated by Ivan Morris

  In the entire town of Ikenoo there was no one who had not heard of Father Zenchi’s nose. It was six or seven inches long and hung from his upper lip all the way down to his chin. It was so shaped that its tip was as thick as its root and it gave the impression of a sausage dangling aimlessly from the center of his face.

  Father Zenchi was now past the age of fifty and had attained high ecclesiastical rank as one of the Chosen Priests of the Imperial Palace Buddhist Center. For many years—ever since he had been a lay deacon—the matter of his nose had weighed constantly on his mind. On the surface, of course, he had always succeeded in dissimulating his concern, and even now he was careful to keep it secret. This was not simply because it seemed to him morally wrong for a priest, who should by all rights be thirsting day and night after the future Paradise of Buddha, to be exercised by such a trifle as a nose. More important was the fact that he detested the idea of other people’s knowing that it worried him. In his daily conversations he feared more than anything that the word “nose” would suddenly intrude.

  There were two principal reasons that Father Zenchi fretted about his nose. In the first place, its length was inconvenient from a practical point of view: Thus at mealtimes he was unable to eat without special assistance. Whenever he had in the past attempted to do so, his nose had reached right into the bowl and been smothered in the rice. Accordingly, he now arranged for one of the acolytes to sit opposite him at a small table and, while he ate, to hold up his nose with a wooden board about two feet long and one inch wide. This method of eating was far from convenient either for the priest or for the acolyte. On one unfortunate occasion the young man had sneezed so violently that his hand had shaken and Father Zenchi’s nose had fallen into the middle of a plate of rice gruel. This story spread as far afield as Kyoto.

  But these practical difficulties had never been the chief cause for the priest’s concern. Wounded pride lay at the root of it. The townsfolk of Ikenoo used to comment on how fortunate it was that priests were celibate, for who would want to be married to a man with a nose like Father Zenchi’s? Some people even suggested that it was because of his nose that he had taken the tonsure in the first place. Father Zenchi smarted under these insinuations, and wounded vanity prevented his finding consolation in the thought that being a priest he could not have married, long nose or short.

  Naturally he had overlooked no method which might repair this constant source of injury to his pride. First he had sought various means of making his nose appear somewhat shorter than it was. When alone, he would take his mirror and carefully study the reflection of his face from every angle, though without ever finding one that improved matters in the slightest. He therefore tried different devices such as resting his chin on his hand or, again, putting one finger to the end of his chin. After strenuous experimentation of this kind, his nose often ended by appearing even longer than it really was. Father Zenchi would sigh deeply as he put the mirror back into its case, and with an expression of utter hopelessness he would return to his lectern and recite the Sutra of Avalokitesvara, the goddess of mercy.

  Eventually he abandoned his efforts, and a period followed during which he was forever observing other people’s noses. The temple of Ikenoo was a very busy place: masses for the dead and other forms of service were constantly being performed; all day long people were entering and leaving the temple gates and bonzes were hurrying about the buildings, while in the great bath room the lower orders of clerics were engaged in filling the cauldrons, heating the water, and similar tasks.

  Almost every type of physiognomy was represented here, and Father Zenchi took to examining the face of each person, lay or clerical, hoping to console himself by finding just one or another nose like his. The blue silk hunting garments and white summer clothes of the visiting nobility hardly existed for him; even less was he aware of the dark green hats and brown robes of the priests. All that Father Zenchi saw were noses. But though there were hook noses galore, never once did he come across a nose that even vaguely resembled his own. Increasingly dismayed by this failure, he now acquired the habit of unconsciously holding his limply dangling nose as he spoke and also began to blush in a manner most unbecoming to his age.

  Next, Father Zenchi sought consolation by perusal of sacred and profane literature. Nowhere in scripture, however, could he find that Mahamaudgaly-yana, Sariputra, or any of the other Buddhist sages were equipped with long noses. The noses of the Buddhist elect, Nagarjuna and Asvaghosa, were also pictured as normal. Once he happened to come across an ancient Chinese story in which the ears of a certain Liu Xuante of Shuhan Province were describ
ed as unusually long. How heartened Father Zenchi would have been if instead of Liu’s ears, it had been his nose which was somewhat abnormal!

  While resorting to these psychological devices, Father Zenchi was at the same time looking for some practical method of shortening his nose. He had tried eating roasted snake gourd and also rubbing his nose with mice’s urine. All to no avail! One autumn, however, a student priest at Ikenoo returned from Kyoto with information as to the most modern method of shortening noses. He had gleaned this from a doctor of his acquaintance who was now a lay priest in attendance at the Chōraku Temple.

  As usual when the question of noses was discussed, Father Zenchi assumed a nonchalant air, though he did manage to hint that he disliked having to depend on an acolyte for help at every mealtime. At that the student priest repeated his praise of the remedy, and after a proper show of reluctance Father Zenchi eventually consented to try it.

  The method was extremely simple: it merely consisted of steaming the nose in hot water and treading on it. As water was heated daily in the temple bathroom, the student priest was able to ladle it directly from the bath into a metal container. The water was too hot for one’s finger, and if the priest inserted his nose, the chances were that his face would be badly scalded by steam. The student priest hit on the idea of boring a hole in a thin wooden board and placing this over the basin as a lid. Then he asked Father Zenchi to stick his nose through the hole into the hot water.

  The nose remained immersed for a considerable period, but though the water was almost boiling, the priest was unaware of the slightest heat. After some minutes the student priest said, “It should be well cooked by now, Father.” Zenchi smiled bitterly, reflecting that if anyone had overheard these words, he scarcely could have guessed the nature of the object under reference.

  After having been thoroughly steamed, his nose now felt itchy as if it had been bitten by a flea. He withdrew it from the hole in the tray, and while the steam was still rising from it, the student priest began to tread on it energetically with both feet. Zenchi lay on his side with his nose spread out on the floorboards and watched the feet of the student priest moving up and down directly before his eyes. Occasionally the student would look down with an expression of sympathy at Father Zenchi’s shaven pate. After a while he remarked, “It must be painful, Father. The doctor told me to just keep on treading . . . but it really must be painful.” Zenchi tried to shake his head to show that it was not painful, but in his present position this was impossible. In fact, since his nose was still itching, the sensation of having someone tread on it was, if anything, rather pleasant.

  After the treading had continued for some time, little nodules, rather like grains of millet, began to appear on the nose, which now resembled a small plucked fowl fresh from the oven. Seeing this, the student priest stopped his footwork and heaved a sigh of relief.

  “Ah, just as it should be! Now we’ll give it one more steaming, and then the cure will be done.”

  Father Zenchi pouted discontentedly but continued to submit himself silently to the ministrations of the student priest. While he appreciated the young man’s efforts, it irked him to hear a part of his body referred to like some piece of inanimate merchandise.

  After the nose had been boiled a second time, it was evident that it had become far shorter; in fact, it now looked much like any ordinary aquiline nose. Father Zenchi stroked it and peered diffidently into the mirror which the student priest produced. The nose that had once hung all the way down to his chin had disappeared, and in its place a new nose perched timidly above his upper lip! Here and there it showed slightly mottled marks—traces, no doubt, of its recent kneading—but it was no longer a nose to provoke laughter. The priest’s face reflected in the mirror looked at the priest’s face in front of the mirror and blinked with an air of satisfaction.

  The only remaining worry was that the organ might suddenly resume its original proportions. All day, while he was reciting his sutras and eating and taking his bath, Father Zenchi kept putting his finger to the tip of his nose. It remained obediently above his upper lip and showed not the slightest tendency to droop. As soon as he awoke the following morning, he felt for his nose; it was quite as short as when he had gone to bed. He was overcome by a great sense of relief, much like the feeling experienced on completing the infinitely meritorious task of copying out the entire text of the Lotus Sutra.

  After a few days, however, a strange truth dawned on Father Zenchi. He noticed that the samurai who used to visit the Ikenoo Temple on business now looked at him even more strangely than before; the samurai gazed askance at his nose without a word. Furthermore, the acolyte who had had charge of supporting the protuberance, as well as other young denizens of the temple, would behave most peculiarly when they ran into Father Zenchi outside the Assembly Hall, first staring solemnly at their feet, then giving up the struggle, and bursting out laughing. More than once while giving instructions to lower-ranking clericals, Father Zenchi was interrupted by the sound of helpless tittering.

  At the beginning the priest explained all this as a natural reaction to the transformation in his face. After all, the same people laughed at him now as had laughed before! And yet this laughter was different both in kind and in degree. Father Zenchi would break off his reading of the scriptures, turn up his tonsured head, and gaze blankly ahead of him. Sometimes his glance would alight on the image of the Buddhivista Samatabhadra—he whose elephant had a trunk the color of a red lotus blossom. He would remember the time, only four or five days ago, when his nose was long, and into his eyes would come the look of “one who humbled by the world, recalls a happier past.”

  The human heart harbors contradictory feelings. Few there are who cannot find it in themselves to sympathize with the sufferings of others; and yet if the sufferer surmounts his unhappiness, sympathy may be replaced by a certain feeling of disappointment. In due course, hostility—albeit unconscious hostility—comes to be felt. It was this peculiar reaction on the part of clergy and laity of Ikenoo that now began to discomfit Father Zenchi.

  As the days passed, he became increasingly irritable. When anyone spoke to him, he would snap back ill humoredly. One morning while crossing the courtyard, he caught sight of the acolyte brandishing a board about two feet long and crying laughingly, “I’ll smack that nose! I’ll smack that nose!” Father Zenchi dashed up to him, snatched away the board, and used it to strike him across the face with all his might. It was the same board that had previously served to hold up his nose while he was eating. “Father Zenchi seems to have acquired the classical sin of priestly harshness,” remarked the student priest who had administered the treatment.

  It was not long before Father Zenchi began to regret the shortening of his nose. One evening as he lay in bed going over the happenings of the last days, he became aware of an unusual itching in that troublesome organ. Putting his hand to it, he noticed that it was somewhat swollen and presumed this was a local irritation or possibly the result of sudden cold weather. From where he lay he could hear the persistent clanging of the storm bell on the temple roof, and the wind blew in through the open window of his cell. He fell asleep at last with his nose held between his fingers as delicately and respectfully as if it had been a flower he was offering at the statue of Buddha.

  When he awoke next morning and looked through the window, he saw that during the course of the night all the autumn leaves had been blown from the ginkgo trees and maidenhair trees in the temple enclosure. The entire lawn was dazzling gold. The roof of the temple tower was covered with frost, and the nine-ringed spire at the top of the pagoda glittered in the thin morning sun. Father Zenchi opened the shutters and breathed in deeply the fresh dawn air.

  Just then a certain sensation almost forgotten returned to him with a shock. He put his hand to his nose, and what he felt was not the short nose of the previous evening. It was a long nose hanging six or seven inches from above his upper lip all the way down to his chin! The sudden change of we
ather must somehow have undone the effect of his recent treatment. With this realization came an upsurge of joy—not unlike that experienced when his nose first became short.

  “Now they won’t laugh at you any more,” a voice whispered in his ear. And his long nose dangled limply in the cool autumn air.

  THE CHRIST OF NANKING (NANKIN NO KIRISUTO)

  Translated by Van C. Gessel

  1

  It was the middle of a night in autumn. In one room of a house located on the Street of Hopes in Nanking, a pale young Chinese woman sat behind an old table, her chin in her hands, tediously chewing on the seeds of a watermelon that lay on a tray before her.

  A lamp on the table emitted a faint light. The light seemed less to brighten up the room than to add to its gloom. The wallpaper had started to peel off, and in one corner a rattan bed, its blanket poking out, was hung with dusty curtains. An old chair had been set as if abandoned on the opposite side of the table. Beyond that, no matter which corner of the room you examined, there was not a single item that could pass for a furnishing.

  Despite the barrenness of the room, the young woman would from time to time stop chewing on the watermelon seeds and lift her cool gaze to stare at the wall facing the table. Hanging unpretentiously from a bent nail on that wall, just in front of her nose, was a small brass crucifix. The worn contours of the artless figure of the suffering Christ, His arms raised high into the air, floated on the cross like an indistinct shadow. Each time the young woman looked at this carving of Jesus, the tinge of loneliness behind her long eyelashes faded away for a brief moment, replaced by what seemed to be a vibrant revival of the light of innocent hope. However, as soon as she shifted her gaze, she would invariably heave a sigh, and letting her shoulders covered in a drab black satin robe droop heavily, she once again began chewing on the melon seeds in the bowl.