The Columbia Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature (Modern Asian Literature Series)

by Неизвестный

  Last year, we established “VOU Club” and have continued our lively strife for the newest art. Now the existence of our group has come to be attentively watched by the younger generations of this country.

  We started from Dada and passed surrealism. And at present we are connected with no “-ism” of Europe. Under the close influence of contemporary architecture and technology, we are making progress in our theory on art and are forming a characteristic form of ourselves.

  “VOU Club” consists of poets, artists, composers, architects, and technologists. The members are now twenty-one, two-thirds of them being poets.

  I send you two copies of our review VOU under separate cover. I shall be very much obliged if you will kindly make some ideas of our group by them.

  Hoping you will receive this letter as soon as possible.

  I remain,

  Yours truly,

  Katue Kitasono

  Translated by John Solt

  NAKANO SHIGEHARU

  Nakano Shigeharu (1902–1979) was a central figure in the development of a politically conscious literature, and he remains highly respected for his stories, poetry, and literary criticism. By no means a proletarian figure (he attended Tokyo University and was a friend of Hori Tatsuo), Nakano’s deep interest in Marxism led him to compose critiques chronicling his vision of the ills of contemporary Japanese society.

  IMPERIAL HOTEL (TEIKOKU HOTERU, 1926)

  Frank Lloyd Wright’s famous hotel, which was built in 1915 and survived the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, was a celebrated meeting place for foreign dignitaries and celebrities.

  I

  This is the West

  The dogs use English

  This is the proper West

  The dogs invite me to the Russian Opera

  This is the West A Western Exposition

  The Japanese marketplace for kimono and shopworn curios

  And this is a prison

  The guard jangles his keys

  This is a dreary, damp, dank prison

  Neither the prisoners nor the wardens trade words with a soul

  And the prisoners are called by number

  And the guards stand in the exits / the entranceways

  And then this is a cheap dive

  The old fat guy is roaring drunk

  And also this is a cheap whorehouse

  The women walk naked

  And this is a hole

  Black and fetid

  II

  A large hole

  A large whorehouse

  A large saloon

  A large dampish prison

  A big and seedy sample Japanese marketplace

  Undestroyed even by the earthquake

  In the center of Tokyo

  Over our heads

  Squats, letting loose a stench

  SONG (UTA, 1926)

  You, Don’t sing

  Don’t sing of flowery grasses or dragonfly wings

  Don’t sing of the wind’s whispering or the smell of woman’s hair

  All those weak things

  All those uncertain things

  All gloomy things—brush them aside

  Reject all elegance

  Sing of solely the honest parts

  Parts that will fill the belly

  Sing of that very edge where it pierces from the chest

  Songs that spring back from being knocked down

  Songs that draw up strength from the depths of shame

  Those sorts of songs

  Clear out fumigate your heart

  Fill out your lungs

  Sing out in severe rhythm

  Those sorts of songs

  Pound into the chests of the people going by going by

  PAUL CLAUDEL (POORU KUROODERU, 1927)

  Paul Claudel, a famous Catholic poet and diplomat, became France’s ambassador to Japan in 1921.

  Paul Claudel was a poet

  Paul Claudel was an ambassador

  And France occupied the Ruhr

  Romain Rolland fled to Jesus

  Vladimir Ilyich returned to Russia

  And Paul Claudel wrote poetry

  Japan sent troops to Siberia

  Fatty Semenov came running

  And Paul Claudel wrote poetry

  The farmers of France saved their money

  The rich took that away

  And the rich prayed to Mary

  And Paul Claudel prayed to Mary

  And Paul Claudel became the French ambassador to Japan

  And Paul Claudel wrote poetry

  Paul Claudel wrote poetry

  Paul Claudel circled the moat

  Paul Claudel played the shamisen

  Paul Claudel danced kabuki

  Paul Claudel did foreign relations

  Ahh and then

  Finally one day

  Paul Claudel

  Memorialized Charles-Louis Philippe

  The ambassador on Philippe!

  Ahh the great Paul Claudel!

  Paul Claudel ambassador they say is a poet

  “Our little Philippe” will

  From within his humble grave most likely say

  “Paul Claudel became ambassador?”

  TRAIN (KISHA, 1927)

  Section 3 (of 3)

  Bye Bye Bye Bye

  Good-bye Good-bye Good-bye Good-bye

  We saw that

  We heard that

  A hundred factory gifts alight

  Where a thousand factory girls ride on.

  What are factory girls?

  What are mill factory girls?

  What are companies factories chimneys dormitories?

  What does it mean that the girls are wrung out

  What does it mean that they are wrung out like wet towels?

  And what is New Year’s?

  What is New Year’s break?

  Ahh—the girls have been thoroughly wrung out And pushed out—in the name of New Year’s

  And we saw that

  A hundred factory girls alight where a thousand factory girls ride on

  And we saw that

  Fathers and mothers and brothers and sisters come out from the snow

  Atop their oil-papered raincoats

  Atop their capes

  Atop their wraps the white snow collecting

  And their straw shoes wet all the way along up

  And we saw how they and the girls embraced

  And we saw that

  They and the girls stroking each other

  They and the gifts stroking each other’s heads and faces and shoulders

  And how the snow kept falling on

  Bye Bye Bye Bye

  And the girls knew

  That only for a while they were able to embrace

  Only just a while for giving pats receiving pats

  Ah—the girls knew

  Who they themselves are

  Where their villages are

  And what sorts await in the village

  The girls were pushed out in the name of New Year’s

  The girls were thoroughly wrung out

  And in the villages new buyers for them making all the rounds

  Leaving those small stations

  Through the snow

  The girls are returning to the buyers there in ambush

  This they all knew

  Bye Bye Bye Bye

  Good-bye Good-bye Good-bye Good-bye

  That there was Etchū

  That there the land of special treats for the rich

  Atop the dirt floor exposed to the wind in that small station

  Daughters and parents and brothers and sisters each patted the other

  The parting words of those who sit and those who keep riding

  Of the girls probably to be bought and rebought up again by different factories

  Of the mill factory girls probably never to meet again

  The chorus of their thousand voices

  Spun round and round that never stopping sky of snow


  THE RATE OF EXCHANGE (KAWASE SŌBA, 1936)

  The words in italics originally were censored.

  If Japan is

  That different from all of the countries of the world

  Even if Nihonjin

  Is read as NIPPONJIN The sound sounds good

  If we’re that different from all the foreigners in the world

  Tell me how you tell yourself apart

  If one yen is not two marks

  And it happens that it’s not a half a mark

  If on the whole the yen is not a mark and not a pound or a ruble or any of these things

  What is this darn thing called one yen

  I know The professors taught me

  Said some long ago know-nothing barbarian uncivilized folks

  Used some sort of clamshells for their cash

  And now even the professors

  Don’t even know how many yen’s a shell.

  On the front the chrysanthemum’s 16 petals

  On the back rippling waves and cherry blossom flowers

  This is then my own 10 sen

  And thrown into the bargain a hole like they didn’t used to have

  And by the way why do the mails

  If all foreigners are unrefined

  Putting on the front of their coins kings and presidents and sickles and hammers

  Arrive at these far destinations

  Why do “cheap and quality Japanese goods”

  Have their way in foreign markets?

  Soon all sorts of geniuses

  Trying to make theory from all this

  Will be suffering for sure

  But that is fruitless effort

  They’ve got to learn the exchange rate

  And I for one Even if you don’t know

  I know the international clamshell exchange

  Translated by Miriam Silverberg

  POETRY IN TRADITIONAL FORMS

  KITAHARA HAKUSHŪ

  Kitahara Hakushū (1885–1942), who wrote poetry in forms other than the tanka included here, was influenced by the idea of art for art’s sake and the cult of Europe imported at the turn of the twentieth century. His first collection, published in 1913, reveals his fascination with French symbolism and his predilection for exotic topics, including an interest in the “Christian century” in Japan, which continued to play a central role in his poetic conceptions throughout his career.

  Birds of spring, Haru no tori

  Don’t sing, please don’t sing! na naki so naki so

  A blaze of red aka-aka to

  In the grass outside my window, to no mo no kusa ni

  The sun sets this evening. hi no iru yūbe

  My senses are stirred Fukura naru

  By the fluffy fragrance of boa no nioi wo

  A feather boa: atarashimu

  A secret meeting with her jūichigatsu no

  One morning in November asa no aibiki

  Translated by Donald Keene

  A summer mist Kaguroba ni

  Enveloping those dark leaves shizumite niou

  Perfumes the air. natsu kasumi

  In my youth I saw wakakaru ware wa

  And did not see. mitsutsu mizariki.

  Completely blind Shiihatete

  Yet ever gentle. naoshi yawara to

  What secret did you cherish, masu mami ni

  Saintly monk, hijiri nani wo ka

  Within those eyes? yadoshitamaishi

  Translated by Margaret Benton Fukasawa

  An ailing child yameru ko wa

  Plays a harmonica hamonika wo fuki

  Into the night yo ni irinu

  Above the cornfield morokashibata no

  A yellow moon in ascent ki naru tsuki no de

  Translated by Makoto Ueda

  The moon god’s light tsukiyomi wa

  outside hikari sumitsutsu

  is bright and clear to ni maseri

  And I who think this kaku omou ware ye

  am like water mizu no gotokaru

  Translated by Janine Beichman

  OKAMOTO KANOKO

  Despite the vicissitudes of her personal life and loves, Okamoto Kanoko (1889–1939) continued to write tanka, especially after Yosano Akiko took an interest in them. In the 1930s, Okamoto became a friend of the novelist Kawabata Yasunari, who encouraged her to write prose, and her later stories are much valued.

  innately reserved tsutsu mashiku

  a silkworm does not cry nakanu utawanu

  but seals its grief-laden heart kanashiku komete

  in a cocoon it weaves mayu amareken

  stark naked hadaka nite

  I hold in my hand ware wa mochitari

  a red apple kurenai no

  holding it in my hand ringo mochitari

  I take a morning bath asaburo no naka ni

  ten years ago kyōjin no

  I was a madwoman ware ga minikeru

  with eyes fixed on totose mae no

  fiery red cherry blossoms makkana sakura

  inky black cherry blossoms makuroki sakura

  as I gaze upon osore moteru

  a bundle of small red roses waga mite areba

  with fear in my heart beni kobara

  each and every flower hitotsu hitotsu mina

  turns into an eye me to narinikeri

  a flower blooms onozu kara

  showing the natural color naru inochi no iro ni

  it was born with hana sakeri

  while I have never known waga saku iro wo

  in what color I am to bloom ware wa shiranu ni

  having let flow nagaruru chi

  all the blood to flow nagashi tsukushite

  in the kitchen kuriyabe ni

  a dead fish lies gleaming shigyo hikaru nari

  in the stillness of noon hiru no shizukesa

  Translated by Makoto Ueda

  SAITŌ MOKICHI

  To many SaitŌ, people Mokichi (1868–1953) is the best and most representative of all twentieth-century tanka writers. He pursued both a literary and a medical career at the same time. One of the first physicians to study psychiatry in Germany, he later became the director of a psychiatric hospital in Tokyo. His son, the writer Kita Morio, loosely based the character of the protagonist in his novel The House of Nire (Nireke no hitobito) on Mokichi.

  Crimson kurenai no

  the crape-myrtle sarusuberi wa

  had bloomed sakinuredo

  and yet this madman kono kyōjin wa

  said not a word mono wa iwazukeri

  As I lie beside my mother shi ni chikaki

  who is close to death, haha ni soine no

  piercingly the call shinshin to

  of frogs in distant fields tōta no kawazu

  echoes in the heavens. ten ni kikoyuru

  At daybreak, asa akete

  the great steam horn fune yori nareru

  sounds from the ship, futobue no

  its echo lingering; kodama wa nagashi