The Woman in the Dunes

by Cobo Abe

  The Woman in the Dunes

  Cobo Abe

  Kobo Abe (1924–1993) is a Japanese writer who has been compared to German writer Franz Kafka. Abe's The Women in the Dunes is one of the premier Japanese novels of the twentieth century. It combines the essence of myth, suspense, and the existential novel.

  The main character, schoolteacher Niki Jumpei, travels to a remote seaside village to collect insects for his research. In the evening, he misses the bus back to the nearest city, however. The villages then find a place for him to stay with a young woman in a shack at the bottom of a vast sand pit. The walls of the pit are so steep that Jumpei must climb down a rope ladder to enter the home. The mysterious woman spends each night shoveling the ever-advancing sand dunes that threaten her shack and the village. She places the sand in buckets which the villages retrieve using ropes. The villages then sell the sand to construction companies for concrete production. In return, the villages provide food and water for the woman. Jumpei is rather perplex at the woman's way of life. He asks her «Are you shoveling to survive, or surviving to shovel?» The next morning, Jumpei awakes to find that the rope ladder is gone. He frantically realizes that he is being held captive. Jumpei is pressed against his will into helping the woman in the Sisyphus-like task of shoveling the sand. He initially fights against his surreal predicament and makes numerous unsuccessful attempts to escape.At one point, Jumpei even ties up the woman to prevent her from shoveling the sand. Jumpei undergoes cycles of fear, despair, pride, and sexual desire until he finally succumbs to and accepts his circumstances. The theme of the novel is that freedom is an illusion and that one has to create his own meaning in life.

  Kobo Abe

  The Woman in the Dunes

  PART I

  1

  One day in August a man disappeared. He had simply set out for the seashore on a holiday, scarcely half a day away by train, and nothing more was ever heard of him. Investigation by the police and inquiries in the newspapers had both proved fruitless.

  Of course, missing persons are not really uncommon. According to the statistics, several hundred disappearances are reported every year. Moreover, the proportion of those found again is unexpectedly small. Murders or accidents always leave some clear piece of evidence, and the motives for kidnapping are normally ascertainable. But if the instance does not come under some such heading, clues — and this is especially true in the case of missing persons-are extremely difficult to come by. Many disappearances, for example, may be described as simple escape.

  In the case of this man, also, the clues were negligible.

  Though his general destination was known, there had been no report from the area that a body had been discovered. By its very nature, it was inconceivable that his work involved some secret for which he might have been abducted. His quite normal behavior had not given the slightest hint that he intended to vanish.

  Naturally, everyone at first imagined that a woman was involved. But his wife, or at least the woman he lived with, announced that the object of his trip had been to collect insect specimens. The police investigators and his colleagues felt vaguely disappointed. The insect bottle and net were hardly a feint for a runaway trip with a girl.

  Then, too, a station employee at Shad remembered a man getting off the train who looked like a mountain climber and carried slung across his shoulders a canteen and a wooden box, which he took to be a painting set The man had been alone, quite alone, the employee said, so speculation about a girl was groundless.

  The theory had been advanced that the man, tired of life, had committed suicide. One of his colleagues, who was an amateur psychoanalyst, held to this view. He claimed that in a grown man enthusiasm for such a useless pastime as collecting insects was evidence enough of a mental quirk. Even in children, unusual preoccupation with insect collecting frequently indicates an Oedipus complex. In order to compensate for his unsatisfied desires, the child enjoys sticking pins into insects, which he need never fear will escape. And the fact that he does not leave off once he has grown up is quite definitely a sign that the condition has become worse. Thus it is far from accidental that entomologists frequently have an acute desire for acquisitions and that they are extremely reclusive, kleptomaniac, homosexual. From this point to suicide out of weariness with the world is but a step. As a matter of fact, there are even some collectors who are attracted by the potassium cyanide in their bottles rather than by the collecting itself, and no matter how they try they are quite incapable of washing their hands of the business. Indeed, the man had not once confided his interests to anyone, and this would seem to be proof that he realized they were rather dubious.

  Yet, since no body had actually been discovered, all of these ingenious speculations were groundless.

  Seven years had passed without anyone learning the truth, and so, in compliance with Section 30 of the civil code, the man had been pronounced dead.

  2

  One August afternoon a man stood in the railroad station at S-. He wore a gray peaked hat, and the cuffs of his trousers were tucked into his stockings. A canteen and a large wooden box were slung over his shoulders. He seemed about to set out on a mountain-climbing expedition.

  Yet there were no mountains worth climbing in the immediate vicinity. Indeed, the guard who took his ticket at the gate looked at him quizzically after he passed through.

  The man showed no hesitancy as he entered the bus standing in front of the station and took a seat in the back. The bus route led away from the mountains.

  The man stayed on the bus to the end of the run. When he got off, the landscape was a mixture of hillocks and hollows. The lowlands were rice paddies that had been divided into narrow strips, while among them slightly elevated fields planted with persimmon trees were scattered about like islands. The man passed through a village and continued walking in the direction of the seashore; the soil gradually became whitish and dry.

  After a time there were no more houses, only straggling clumps of pine. Then the soil changed to a fine sand that clung to his feet. Now and again clumps of dry grass cast shadows in hollows in the sand. As if by mistake, there was occasionally a meager plot of eggplants, the size of a straw mat. But of human shadows there was not a trace. The sea, toward which he was headed, lay beyond.

  For the first time the man stopped. He wiped the perspiration from his face with his sleeve and gazed around. With deliberation, he opened the wooden box and from the top drawer took out several pieces of pole that had been bundled together. He assembled them into a handle and attached an insect net to one end. Then he began to walk again, striking the clumps of grass with the bottom of the shaft. The smell of the sea enveloped the sands.

  Some time went by, but the sea still could not be seen. Perhaps the hilly terrain obstructed the view. The unchanging landscape stretched endlessly on. Then, suddenly, the perspective broadened and a hamlet came into sight. It was a commonplace, rather poor village, whose roofs, weighted down with stones, lay clustered around a high fire tower. Some of the roofs were shingled with black tile; others were of zinc, painted red. A zinc-roofed building at the hamlet's single crossroad seemed to be the meeting house of a fishermen's cooperative.

  Beyond, there were probably more dunes, and the sea. Still, the hamlet was spread out to an unexpected extent. There were some fertile patches, but the soil consisted mostly of dry white sand. There were fields of potatoes and peanuts, and the odor of domestic animals mingled with that of the sea. A pile of broken shells formed a white mound at the side of the clay-and-sand road, which was as hard as cement. As the man passed down the street, children were playing in the empty lot in front of the cooperative, some old men were sitting on the sagging veranda repairing their nets, and thin-haired w
omen were gathered in front of the single general store. All movement ceased for a moment as they looked curiously at him. But the man paid no attention. Sand and insects were all that concerned him.

  However, the size of the village was not the only surprising thing. Contrary to what one would expect, the road was gradually rising. Since it led toward the sea, it would be more natural for it to descend. Could he have misread the map? He tried questioning a young village girl who was passing by just then. But she lowered her eyes and, acting as if she had not heard a thing, hurried on. Yet the pile of shells, the fishing nets, and the color of the sand told him that certainly the sea lay nearby. There was really nothing yet that foretold danger.

  The road began to rise more and more abruptly; more and more it became just sand.

  But, curiously enough, the areas where houses stood were not the slightest bit higher. The road alone rose, while the hamlet itself continued to remain level. No, it was not only the road; the areas between the buildings were rising at the same rate. In a sense, then, the whole village seemed to have become a rising slope with only the buildings left on their original level. This impression became more striking as he went along. At length, all the houses seemed to be sunk into hollows scooped in the sand. The surface of the sand stood higher than the rooftops. The successive rows of houses sank deeper and deeper into the depressions.

  The slope suddenly steepened. It must have been at least sixty-five feet down to the tops of the houses. What in heaven's name could it be like to live there? he thought in amazement, peering down into one of the holes. As he circled around the edge he was suddenly struck by a biting wind that choked his breath in his throat. The view abruptly opened up, and the turbid, foaming sea licked at the shore below. He was standing on the crest of the dunes that had been his objective!

  The side of the dunes that faced the sea and received the monsoon winds rose abruptly, but straggling clumps of scrub grass grew in places where the incline was not as steep. The man looked back over his shoulder at the village, and he could see that the great holes, which grew deeper as they approached the crest of the ridge, extended in several ranks toward the center. The village, resembling the cross-section of a beehive, lay sprawled over the dunes. Or rather the dunes lay sprawled over the village. Either way, it was a disturbing and unsettling landscape.

  But it was enough that he had reached his destination, the dunes. The man drank some water from his canteen and filled his lungs with air — and the air which had seemed so clear felt rough in his throat.

  The man intended to collect insects that lived in the dunes.

  Of course, dune insects are small and soberly colored. But he was a dedicated collector, and his eye was not tempted by anything like butterflies or dragonflies. Such collectors do not aspire to decking out their specimen boxes with gaudy samples, nor are they particularly interested in classification or in raw materials for Chinese medicines. The true entomologist's pleasure is much simpler, more direct: that of discovering a new type. When this happens, the discoverer's name appears in the illustrated encyclopedias of entomology appended to the technical Latin name of the newly found insect; and there, perhaps, it is preserved for something less than eternity. His efforts are crowned with success if his name is perpetuated in the memory of his fellow men by being associated with an insect.

  The smaller, unobtrusive insects, with their innumerable strains, offer many opportunities for new discoveries. For a long time the man had also been on the lookout for double winged flies, especially common house flies, which people find so repulsive. Of course, the various types of flies are unbelievably numerous, and since all entomologists seem to think pretty much alike, they have pursued their investigations into the eighth rare mutant found in Japan almost to completion. Perhaps mutants are so abundant because the fly's environment is too close to man's.

  He had best begin by observing environment. That there were many environmental variations simply indicated a high degree of adaptability among flies, didn't it? At this discovery he jumped with joy. His concept might not be altogether bad. The fact that the fly showed great adaptability meant that it could be at home even in unfavorable environments in which other insects could not live — for example, a desert where all other living things perished.

  From then on he began to manifest an interest in sand. And soon this interest bore fruit. One day in the dry river bed near his house he discovered a smallish light-pink insect which resembled a double-winged garden beetle (_Cicindela japonica Motschulsky_). It is common knowledge, of course, that the garden beetle presents many variations in color and design. But the form of the front legs, on the other hand, varies very little. In fact, the front legs of the sheath-wing beetle constitute an important criterion for its classification. And the second joint on the front legs of the insect that had caught the man's eye did indeed have striking characteristics.

  Generally speaking, the front legs of the beetle family are black, slender, and agile. However, the front legs of this one seemed to be covered with a stout sheath; they were round, almost chubby, and cream-colored. Of course, they may have been smeared with pollen. One might even assume some sort of condition — the presence of hair, for example — which would cause the pollen to adhere to the legs. If his observations were correct he had certainly made a most important discovery.

  But unfortunately he had let it escape. He had been too excited, and besides the beetle's pattern of flight was confusing. It flew away, and then as if to say «Catch me!» it turned and waited. When he approached it cautiously it flew away again, turned around, and waited. Mercilessly tantalizing, its course had at last led it to a clump of grass into which it disappeared.

  The man was completely captivated by the beetle with the yellowish front legs.

  When he had observed the sandy soil, it seemed to him that his guess was correct. Actually, the beetle family is representative of desert insects. According to one theory, their strange pattern of flight is a snare for the purpose of enticing small animals away from their nests. Prey such as mice and lizards are lured out in spite of themselves, wander into the desert, and collapse from hunger and fatigue. Their bodies then become the beetles' food. These beetles have the elegant Japanese name of «letter-bearer» and present graceful features, but actually they have sharp jaws and are ferocious and cannibalistic by nature. But whether or not his theory was correct, the man was unquestionably beguiled by the mysterious pattern of the beetle's flight.

  And his interest in sand, which was the condition for the beetle's existence, could not help but grow. He began to read everything he could about it. And as his research progressed he realized that sand was a very interesting substance. For example, opening to the article on sand in the encyclopedia, he found the following:

  SAND: an aggregate of rock fragments. Sometimes including loadstone, tinstone, and more rarely gold dust. Diameter: 2 to 1/16 mm.

  A very clear definition indeed. In short, then, sand came from fragmented rock and was intermediate between clay and pebbles. But simply calling it an intermediate substance did not provide a really satisfactory explanation. Why was it that isolated deserts and sandy terrain came into existence through the sifting out of only the sand from soil in which clay, sand, and stones were thoroughly mixed together? If a true intermediate substance were involved, the erosive action of wind and water would necessarily produce any number of intermingling intermediate forms in the range between rock and clay. However, there are in fact only three forms that can be clearly distinguished from one another: stones, sand, and clay. Furthermore, sand is sand wherever it is; strangely enough, there is almost no difference in the size of the grains whether they come from the Gobi Desert or from the beach at Eno-shima. The size of the grains shows very little variation and follows a Gaussian distribution curve with a true mean of 1/8 mm.

  One commentary gave a very simple explanation of the decomposition of land through the erosive action of wind and water: the lighter particles were progr
essively blown away over great distances. But the particular significance of the 1/8-mm. diameter of the grains was left unexplained. In opposition to this, another book on geology added an explanation along these lines: Air or water currents set up a turbulence. The smallest wavelength of this turbulent flow is about equal to the diameter of the desert sand. Owing to this peculiarity, only the sand is extracted from the soil, being drawn out at right angles to the flow. If the cohesion of the soil is weak, the sand is sucked up into the air by light winds — which, of course, do not disturb stones or clay — and falls to the ground again, being deposited to the leeward. The peculiarities of sand would seem to be a matter of aerodynamics.

  Hence, we can add this to the first definition as «b»: a particle of crushed rock of such dimension as to be easily moved by a fluid.

  Because winds and water currents flow over the land, the formation of sand is unavoidable. As long as the winds blew, the rivers flowed, and the seas stirred, sand would be born grain by grain from the earth, and like a living being it would creep everywhere. The sands never rested. Gently but surely they invaded and destroyed the surface of the earth.

  This image of the flowing sand made an indescribably exciting impact on the man. The barrenness of sand, as it is usually pictured, was not caused by simple dryness, but apparently was due to the ceaseless movement that made it inhospitable to all living things. What a difference compared with the dreary way human beings clung together year in year out.

  Certainly sand was not suitable for life. Yet, was a stationary condition absolutely indispensable for existence? Didn't unpleasant competition arise precisely because one tried to cling to a fixed position? If one were to give up a fixed position and abandon oneself to the movement of the sands, competition would soon stop. Actually, in the deserts flowers bloomed and insects and other animals lived their lives. These creatures were able to escape competition through their great ability to adjust — for example, the man's beetle family.