by Hitoshi Goto
However, once in Tokyo, I could do as I pleased. For a country bumpkin like me, everything was novel, all the sights and sounds, and I often went to the busy entertainment districts such as Asakusa and Ginza. The marching boots of militarism were gradually approaching, but you could still smell the lingering aroma of freedom everywhere. The only problem was a lack of contact with the opposite sex. It wasn’t for any lack of interest on my part, but it was an era in which society considered men and women openly consorting together to be decadent and immoral. Naturally, the friends I made were all men, and while feigning lack of interest in looking at women students, I had to make do with sneaking glances at them when no one was looking.
My classes were centred around art theory still heavily influenced by Seiki Kuroda, one of the leaders of Western-style painting in Japan. At the time universally highly acclaimed, he blended Impressionism with Classicism, and was a devoted follower of Raphael Collin’s pleinairism technique. To tell the truth, however, I was beginning to have serious doubts about the way art education attached such importance to imitation, and I couldn’t help feeling I was merely superficially copying the technique. And so the days and months went by.
In 1935 I headed for France. I was a few years shy of my thirtieth birthday and eking out a living through painting, but in order to establish myself as a painter of the European school I had to train in its cultural home, Paris. I confess that in a corner of my mind there were some residual thoughts of those posters of women I had encountered in my father’s in the storehouse. Of course there was also some element of rebellion against the daily approaching footsteps of war. There was a system of French governmental invitations to study, but only students who had graduated from a top university passed the selection and someone like me had no chance. And so I made up my mind to go to Paris at my own expense. Or to be more precise, at my father’s expense. It is him I have to thank. My sister was living in North America with my naval officer brother-in-law who was stationed there, so it was just my father and mother who came to see me off from Yokohama.
On the pier, even before boarding the ship, I was already regretting parting from my parents.
My mother had a lonely look on her face as she handed me a book, Bushido: The Soul of Japan, by Nitobe Inazo, who had just died a couple of years earlier. Professor Nitobe had written and published the book in English—a book in English about the samurai spirit. This was the gift from my mother, whose pride in her samurai lineage burned within her small body: I could be true to my samurai roots while living abroad. It brought my mother’s feelings as I left for a far-off country painfully home to me.
Next was my father. For the first time I heard from him how he’d seen through me sneaking into the storehouse to look at his art books. But he had something even more surprising than that to say.
“Yasuo, you may not realise it yet, but you certainly will become a top rate artist. I have an unerring eye.”
For the first time ever I wept before my father.
I boarded the ship and threw a streamer to my parents standing on the quay. My father adroitly caught it.
At last the ship began pulling away. I heard the strains of Chopin’s Tristesse playing somewhere.
It was possible I may never return to Japan. I couldn’t stop myself from welling up, and I waved wildly until eventually the tape broke and the ends fluttered in space.
By the time I’d finished wiping away my tears, I could no longer make out the figures of my mother and father.
†
We passed through the Suez Canal and landed at Marseilles, from where I travelled overland by train to Paris. The first time I saw Paris with my own eyes, I was so overcome with excitement that I was trembling all over. Its culture of stone was quite unlike Japan’s culture of wood, and felt immeasurably more substantial. Europe’s very culture and history exerted a powerful impact and effect on me. I was keenly aware of being Japanese and something of a representative of my country as I stepped out into the streets of Paris.
I wasn’t by any means faint-hearted, but there were times I felt my spirits sink when I thought of my life stretching out before me in this foreign country. It was the same with living expenses. For all that I received an allowance from my father, I would have to start out in poverty. I decided to rent a cheap apartment on rue Huyghens in Montparnasse. This district was named after Mount Parnassus, home to the nine Muses of arts and sciences in Greek mythology. The street had been named after the Dutch mathematician and scientist, Christiaan Huygens.
Montparnasse was well-known as the artistic district in Paris, and it lived up to my expectations. I was able to lead a free and uninhibited life style, and I hardly ever experienced prejudice or curious stares from passersby, unlike in the provincial cities I later visited. I could be myself; I could exist as Yasuo Hoshino. Unconstrained by anyone, everybody could spend the time as they pleased without having to put up any pretence. I had the feeling that even the bitter aromas wafting out onto the street from the corner cafés smelled differently according to the establishment. The pungent cigars and cigarettes each had their own unique smell, too.
And I encountered the women I had first come across in the storehouse at home in pictures, but here they were alive and strolling along the banks of the Seine and the Champs Élysées, and through the Place de l’Opera and Place de la Madeleine. In the crisp clear morning, fragrances wafted from the young women who passed me in the street before disappearing from the corner of my vision. Some perfumes were oppressively sweet and others heavy, yet all added a certain unique charm to the city, blending to create a particular Parisian culture.
More Japanese artists lived in Paris than in other European cities, including the most famous of all, Okamoto Taro. And not just painters, but architects and musicians lived there. If you added unknowns like me, whether budding or has-beens, there must have been several hundred of my fellow countrymen there. Thanks to my father’s support, I was economically blessed as a foreign student, but even so I had to live frugally on cheap wine, bread, cheese, and an occasional meat dish. If I had the urge to eat Japanese food, I went to the Japanese Association or a café called Botanya, the Japanese name for the peony. My favourite dish of fermented carp wasn’t available, but being able to eat any Japanese food at all in such a distant country was comforting.
I cut my hair in the pudding-bowl style and wore thick-rimmed round glasses with extremely weak lenses in imitation of the master painter Tsuguharu Foujita. Within six months I was strutting around town like a regular Parisian. From the beginning I attended a language school, and later began taking private classes with a famous artist at the École Nacionale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts.
†
Unfortunately this free and easy lifestyle was not to last long. The first black cloud on the horizon arrived in March 1936, when German military forces occupied the Rhineland. It’s true that the Rhineland was originally a German territory, but under the Locarno Treaties Germany was prohibited from maintaining any fortifications there. Yet now the German army had stormed into the area sending shock waves through Europe. This was clearly a first step, and it was unlikely to end here. For some reason the French government did not take any measures in response, although this was largely to be expected. France had won a fragile victory in the last war, but at enormous human cost. Mothers in France did not want to lose their sons in battle a second time.
In contrast, in Germany the Weimar Republic under which the arts had flourished had been supplanted by the Nazi Party under Hitler’s leadership. They were calling for the expulsion of Jews and the destruction of the Versailles System, which was of course in revenge against France. What’s more, the Nazis didn’t take power through a coup d’état, but astonishingly because they were voted in by German citizens of the Weimar Republic. In other words, the citizens also sought revenge against France. I was afraid of this trend in neighbouring Germany.
; Until then I had tried to keep politics and military affairs out of my life, but keeping track of events on the radio and in the local newspapers now became a part of my daily routine.
Hitler had already come to power in Germany at the time I’d moved to Europe, but I’d never seen him in real life. The prospect of meeting him, or even seeing him, was unthinkable. However, in time an opportunity came in the form of the Berlin Olympics—the Games of the XI Olympiad opened on 1 August. Fifty countries including France and Japan were participating, with some four thousand athletes.
To begin with I was not all that impressed. Of course I knew about the success of Japanese athletes in swimming and equestrian in the previous Olympics in Los Angeles. At the time I was still in Japan, but I was not so excited as to carry a lantern and join other people in the celebratory procession.
And then I received some news that set even my heart racing. It was the day before the opening ceremony. At a meeting held in the Hotel Adlon in Berlin it was decided, believe it or not, that Tokyo would host the next Olympics. I found out about this news in the newspaper. It was a victory over Helsinki. Before long, the Olympics would be coming to my home country. When my eyes first alighted on the article in the newspaper, a warm feeling spread through my chest. That day I bought an expensive red wine and drank a glass on my own, aware for the first time in ages of being Japanese.
Carried away, I also listened to the opening ceremony on the radio. I thought how true it was that the Olympics provided an arena to enhance national prestige. Just as I had begun to be aware again of myself as Japanese, I knew only too well that French people too were nervous about the Olympics. In the following morning’s newspapers, there was a sarcastic article about how when the French team raised their right arms for the Olympic salute, the German audience mistook it for a Nazi salute and gave them thunderous applause. Yet I didn’t hear any news about how Japan’s athletes were faring in Berlin, and I began to worry about their performance there.
The first half of the Olympics was mostly athletics. It was briefly reported that Murakoso took fourth place in both the 10,000 metres and 5,000 metres, after tough battles with the Finnish athletes. In soccer, small and weak Japan beat the so-called powerhouse Swedes 3-2. I found out about these victories in the newspaper and in my mind it overlapped with the image of Japan’s decisive victory over the Baltic squadrons of the Russian fleet in the Battle of Tsushima in the Russo-Japanese war.
At last the competition entered the middle phase and the swimming started. Having grown up on the banks of Lake Biwa, I was fond of water sports. It wasn’t enough to sit glued to the radio just listening to the commentary, which only gave news of the French athletes. And then it suddenly occurred to me: why not go to Berlin?
There is such a thing as fate. An art dealer acquaintance from Munich came to visit, and when I casually mentioned the Olympics to him, he said he had a cousin living in Berlin. He telephoned him there and then, and the cousin gladly offered lodging in his apartment, and so I decided to travel in all haste. By the sixth I was already on a train headed for Berlin.
The train drew into Potsdam Station. As I alighted on the platform, I was engulfed in a huge wave of people. It had a different atmosphere to Paris’s distinctive air. I can’t explain it very well, but I could feel some invisible order controlling even this great crowd. Carried along by the orderly wave of people, I made my way into town. The apartment where I would be staying was close to Nollendorfplatz. Clutching the piece of paper on which I’d written the address, I started walking.
Somehow I managed to reach the home of the art dealer’s relatives and could at last put down my luggage. The art dealer’s cousin was a teacher aged around 40, and his slightly younger wife was a dressmaker. She was rather plump around the hips, and the smell of Macassar oil hung around her as she opened the door to me.
The swimming competitions I wanted to see were from the eighth, so I decided to go sightseeing around town first. The whole town was caught up in Olympics fever, and seeing a Japanese man in their midst some people came up to congratulate me on the tough fight pole vaulters Nishida and Oe had put up against the Americans. Even understanding practically no German, I could still catch the names Nishida, Oe, and Murakoso when they were spoken to me.
To be honest, when I set eyes on Unter den Linden and the Brandenburg Gate my legs started shaking. Stone pillars bearing the Olympic and Nazi flags lined the grand avenue right and left. Whereas Paris was gorgeous, Berlin was solemn and orderly.
The swimming started on the eighth. The pool was in a corner of the imperial sports stadium in the Grunewald forest. In the previous Olympics in Los Angeles, Japan had won five gold medals in the six men’s swimming events, but this time it appeared America had sworn a comeback. It was to be a clash with America for the honour of reigning supreme in swimming.
In men’s swimming, after the 1500m freestyle and 200m breaststroke, the Americans’ score sheet was down 1 to 2. I was at the poolside praying for victory, ardently cheering the Japanese swimmers on, and maybe my prayers reached them for we were able to retain the crown in these two events.
But to be honest, it was for the women’s swimming that I’d come here—or to be more specific, for the 200m breaststroke. Hideko Maehata, who had taken the silver in Los Angeles, would be competing in this. I’d heard that she had grown up swimming in the Kinokawa River in Wakayama, not far from where I’d grown up, and I was proud of her as a fellow-Kansai native.
The final was held on the fourth day. Having been fortunate enough to be one of the spectators, I can still clearly picture it in my mind, or rather see it before my eyes, even now. The entire audience was on their feet, and I was cheering on Maehata so loudly my voice soon became hoarse. I’m sure all the Germans around me were rooting for Martha Genenger, but somehow we were all united in our cheering. The race was a hard fought battle between Maehata and Genenger. As they passed the 150m mark, Maehata was in the lead, although only by a narrow margin, and as they reached the finish I didn’t know which of them had won. When the final result was at last announced, I couldn’t repress a loud yell of joy. Being so far from my homeland, some passion had been revived deep within me.
And to my surprise, Hitler also put in an appearance at the Games that day. He was far from me so I couldn’t see him well, but it was definitely him.
Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get in to the closing ceremony held on 16 August, the last day of the Games. I hung around the Grunewald Stadium until sundown, soaking up the atmosphere as best I could. Just as I realised it had grown dark, I heard the sound of a fanfare and the canopy was lit up by a band of light. The stadium was aglow.
I was stunned by this reconstruction of a Germanic mythical world, quite unlike the French aesthetic.
That evening, the art dealer’s cousin and his wife treated me to typical German ham, sausage and Franconian wine. After a hard night of drinking, the next morning I thanked them for their hospitality and departed from Berlin. On the train, I studied the medal table to see which countries had taken gold medals. Germany had by far the most, with thirty-three. America was in second place with twenty-four. Even taking into consideration they were on home ground, Germany’s dominance was striking. In third place Hungary had taken ten, then Italy with eight, France and Finland with seven, and Japan and Sweden with six.
As I looked back over the numbers now, something interesting occurred to me. Germany had triumphed over America, Italy over France, and Japan over England. This probably later convinced the Axis Powers of the superiority of fascism and helped to propel them into going to war.
The closing ceremony had made such an impression on me that I wanted to follow in the footsteps of the Wagnerian world, and visited Bayreuth, the Linderhof Palace and Neuschwanstein Castle before returning to Paris.
And so the festival for peace was over. Or rather, Nazi Germany had probably just been hiding its provocative b
ehaviour behind the mask of peace. After I returned to Paris, it soon felt as though that festival had just been an illusion, or at least that was how it felt to me, for the sound of approaching jackboots had returned. And this time they were coming faster.
†
In November 1936, Japan and Germany concluded the Anti-Comintern Pact. Italy had not yet joined at this stage, but still it sent shockwaves throughout France. Germany was already a potential adversary, and now their ally Japan was too. Japanese residents in France keenly felt the wave of condemnation aimed at them.
Forcing myself to suppress my mounting concern with international politics and the military situation, I turned my back on the world situation and did my best to focus single-mindedly on my canvas. Whenever I needed a change of scene, I went to the library and immersed myself in books or hung out in cafes.
In Japan I always avoided members of the opposite sex, but here in France I began making more women friends. Whether it was the novelty of a Japanese artist or testimony to the better side of individualism, women befriended me quite readily despite the general anti-Japanese sentiment in society. Initially they were somewhat wary of me, probably as the result of some prejudice against Asians, but as we talked they gradually become friendlier. They were very different to Japanese women, and openly flirted with members of the opposite sex.
