by Helen Dewitt
About the Book
Sibylla, a single mother from a long line of frustrated talents, has unusual ideas about child-rearing. Yo Yo Ma started piano at the age of two; her son starts at three. J.S. Mill learned Greek at three; Ludo starts at four, reading Homer as they travel round and round the Circle Line. A fatherless boy needs male role models; so she plays the film Seven Samurai as a running backdrop to his childhood. While Sibylla types out back copies of Carpworld to pay the rent, Ludo, aged five, moves on to Hebrew, Arabic and Japanese, aerodynamics and edible insects of the world – they might come in handy, if he can just persuade his mother he’s mature enough to know his father’s name …
Helen DeWitt
THE LAST
SAMURAI
Contents
Cover
About the Book
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
About the Author
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Book I
1: Do Samurai Speak Penguin Japanese?
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Interlude
Book II
1: We Never Get Off at Sloane Square for Nebraska Fried Chicken
Chapter 6
2: 99, 98, 97, 96
3: We Never Get Off at Embankment to Go to McDonald’s
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
4: 19, 18, 17
5: We Never Go Anywhere
Chapter 10
6: We Never Do Anything
Chapter 11
7: End of the Line
Book III
1: 1, 2, 3
2: a, b, c
3: 9999997= 999993000020999965000034999979000006999999
Book IV
1: Trying to feel sorry for Lord Leighton
2: I know all the words
Chapter 12
3: Funeral Games
4: Steven, age 11
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
5: For David, with best wishes
Chapter 15
Book V
1: A good samurai will parry the blow
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
2: A good samurai will parry the blow
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
3: A good samurai will parry the blow
4: A good samurai will parry the blow
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
5: A good samurai will parry the blow
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
6: A good samurai will parry the blow
7: I’m a genuine samurai
This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
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Epub ISBN 9781446424612
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Published by Vintage 2001
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Copyright © Helen DeWitt 2000
The right of Helen DeWitt to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser
First published in Great Britain in 2000 by Chatto & Windus
Vintage
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 0 09 928462 6
To
Ann Cotton
THE LAST SAMURAI
Daughter of an American diplomat, Helen DeWitt grew up in Mexico, Brazil, Colombia and Ecuador. She started a degree at Smith College and dropped out twice, the first time to read Proust and Eliot while working as a chambermaid, the second time to take the Oxford entrance exam. She read Literae Humaniores at Lady Margaret Hall, went to Brasenose College to do a doctorate in Greek and Latin literature then spent a year at Somerville College as a junior research fellow. In 1988 she started her first novel. Over the next decade she started work on around 50 other novels while working as a doughnut salesperson, dictionary text tagger, copytaker, fundraiser, management consultant and night secretary for a Wall Street law firm’s London office. The Last Samurai is her first finished novel; rights to it have been sold in 13 countries. Helen DeWitt lives in London.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
In 1991 Ann Cotton went to a school in Mola, a village in a remote rural district of Zimbabwe, with the idea of doing research on girls’ education. She ended up talking to two schoolgirls who had come 100 km alone to attend the school. It did not take boarders, so they were living in a hut they had built themselves. They considered themselves lucky because most girls could not go to secondary school, as fees were charged; they dropped out and got married at twelve or thirteen instead. Ann went back to Britain and started raising money for scholarships by selling cakes in Cambridge Market. She founded the Cambridge Female Education Trust in 1993. She persuaded the Body Shop to fund a hostel in Mola. She persuaded other organisations to fund scholarships for more schools, first in Zimbabwe, then in Ghana. She persuaded me to become a Trustee; I could not have finished this book if she had not said ‘Of course’ each time I said I would do something for CamFed as soon as I had finished my book. Information about CamFed is available from 25 Wordsworth Grove, Newnham, Cambridge CB3 9HH and at http://www.camfed.org.
Professor David Levene has made the book more interesting and less prone to error in too many ways to count; it is impossible to express my debt to his unfailing generosity. I owe more than I can say to my mother, Mary DeWitt Griffin, not only for moral and financial support, but for sharing her remarkable gifts over the course of many years. Tim Schmidt, Maude Chilton and Steve Hutensky have been extraordinary friends; they know how much I owe them.
Alison Samuel of Chatto & Windus brought a fresh eye and keen attention to detail to bear at a stage when both were much needed. I am also grateful to Martin Lam, author of Kanji from the Start, for advice on the Nisus program, and to Neil and Fusa McLynn for extensive help with Japanese; also to Leonard Gamberg for casting an eye over the atom, to Chris Done for looking at the astronomy in an early version, to James Kaler for kindly answering a question at the very last minute raised by Stars and their Spectra, and to Ian Rutherford for finding a Greek font at the postultimate minute. It should go without saying that they are in no way im
plicated in any mistakes that remain. I owe a special debt to the many people who helped me appreciate the achievement of Akira Kurosawa; the book would have been very different without their assistance.
Without the enthusiasm of Jonathan Burnham of Talk Miramax Books there would be a manuscript but no book; the extent of that debt speaks for itself.
I am grateful for permission to use copyright material from the following: The Biographical Dictionary of Film, by David Thomson, The Eskimo Book of Knowledge, by George Binney, by permission of the Hudson’s Bay Company; Theory of Harmony, by Arnold Schoenberg, translated by Roy E. Carter (English translation ©1983 Faber and Faber Ltd); interview with John Denver, Melody Maker 27/3/76, p. 11, © Chris Charlesworth/Melody Maker/IPC Syndication; Foundations of Aerodynamics: Bases of Aerodynamics Design, by Arnold M. Kuethe and Chuen-Yen Chow, ©1986, reprinted by permission of John W. Wiley & Sons, Inc.; Half Mile Down, by William Beebe (Bodley Head); The Films of Akira Kurosawa, by Donald Richie (University of California Press), ©1984 The Regents of the University of California; The Solid State, by H.M. Rosenberg (©1988 Oxford University Press) by permission of Oxford University Press; Gesenius’ Hebrew Grammar edited and enlarged by E. Kautzsch, second English edition by A.E. Cowley (1910), by permission of Oxford University Press; Njal’s Saga (extracts from pages 244-246), translated by Magnus Magnusson and Herman Pálsson (London, 1960) © 1960 Magnus Magnusson and Herman Pálsson, reproduced by permission of Penguin Books Ltd. I would like to thank Kurosawa Production K. K. for permission to reprint material from the screenplay Seven Samurai (Shichinin no Samurai).
Prologue
My father’s father was a Methodist minister. He was a tall, handsome, noble-looking man; he had a deep, beautiful voice. My father was an ardent atheist and admirer of Clarence Darrow. He skipped grades the way other boys skip class, he lectured my grandfather’s flock on carbon 14 and the origin of species, and he won a full scholarship to Harvard at the age of 15.
He took the letter from Harvard to his father.
Something looked through my grandfather’s beautiful eyes. Something spoke with his beautiful voice, and it said: It’s only fair to give the other side a chance.
My father said: What do you mean?
What it meant was that my father should not reject God for secularism just because he won arguments with uneducated people. He should go to a theological college and give the other side a fair chance; if he was still of the same mind at the end he would still be only 19, a perfectly good age to start college.
My father, being an atheist and a Darwinist, had a very delicate sense of honor, and he could not resist this appeal. He applied to various theological seminaries, and all but three rejected him out of hand because he was too young. Three asked him to come for an interview.
The first was a seminary with a fine reputation, and my father because of his youth was interviewed by the head.
The man said: You’re very young. Is it possible that you want to be a minister because of your father?
My father said he did not want to be a minister, but he wanted to give the other side a fair chance, and he explained about carbon 14.
The man said: The ministry is a vocation and the training we offer is designed for people who feel called to it. I doubt very much that you would benefit from it.
He said: This offer from Harvard is a remarkable opportunity. Couldn’t you give the other side a fair chance by taking a course in theology? I believe the college started out, after all, as a College of Divinity, and I imagine they must still teach the subject.
The man smiled at my father kindly and he offered to give him a list of books to read if he would like to do any more in the way of giving the other side a fair chance. My father drove home (they were living in Sioux City at the time) and all the way he thought that this might give the other side a fair chance.
He spoke to his father. The point was made that one course in theology in a strongly secular environment would probably not make a very considerable impact, but all the same my father must decide for himself.
My father went to the second seminary, which had a good reputation. He was interviewed by the Dean.
The Dean asked him why he wanted to become a minister, and my father explained that he did not want to become a minister, and he explained about carbon 14.
The Dean said he respected my father’s intentions, but still there was something whimsical about it, and he pointed out that my father was very young. He recommended that my father go to Harvard first and then if he still wanted to give the other side a fair chance he would be delighted to consider his application.
My father returned to his father. The beautiful voice pointed out that a man with a degree from Harvard would find it hard to resist the temptation of going instantly into a career, but it said that of course my father must decide for himself.
My father drove to the third seminary, which was small and obscure. My father was interviewed by a Deputy Dean. It was a hot day, and though a small fan was blowing the Deputy Dean, a red fat man, was sweating hard. The Deputy Dean asked why my father wanted to be a minister and my father explained about the fair chance and about carbon 14.
The Deputy Dean said that the church paid the fees of the seminarians who planned to become ministers. He said that as my father did not plan to become a minister they would have to charge $1,500 a year.
My father returned to his father, who said that he supposed my father could earn $750 over the summer at one of the gas stations, and that he would then give him the rest.
So my father went to a theological college. When I say that he went to a theological college I mean that he enrolled at a theological college & went every Saturday to synagogue out of interest because there was no rule to say you couldn’t, and spent most of the rest of the time shooting pool at Helene’s, the only bar in town that would serve a 16-year-old.
He waited for my grandfather to ask how he was finding it, but my grandfather never asked.
At the synagogue my father met someone ten years older who ran the services and did most of the readings. He looked a lot like Buddy Holly, and in fact people called him Buddy (he preferred it to Werner). At first my father thought this was the rabbi, but the town was too small to support a rabbi: The services were run by local volunteers. Buddy had wanted to be an opera singer, but his father had insisted he train as an accountant, and he had come from Philadelphia to take up a job as an accountant. He too spent a lot of time shooting pool at Helene’s.
By the end of three years my father was very good at shooting pool. He had saved up about $500 from his winnings, and he played carelessly so as not to win too much or too often. He could beat everyone in the bar, but one night a stranger came in.
By some accident the stranger played everyone else first. He played with smooth, economical movements, and it was obvious he was in a different class from anyone my father had played so far. My father wanted to play him; Buddy kept trying to warn him off. He thought there was something not quite right about the stranger; either he would win more than my father could afford to lose, or he would lose and pull a gun. My father thought this was ridiculous, but then the stranger’s jacket rode up as he bent over and they saw a gun strapped to his waist.
The game came to an end and my father walked up. He said: My friend here says you’re dangerous.
The stranger said: I can be.
My father said grinning broadly: He says you’ll kill me if I win.
The stranger said: Are you so sure you’ll win?
My father said: There’s only one way to find out.
The stranger said: And who might you be?
My father said he was at the seminary.
The stranger expressed surprise at finding a seminarian in the bar.
My father said We are all sinners, brother, in a rather sarcastic tone of voice.
The stranger and my father played a game and five dollars changed hands.
The stranger said: Do you want your
revenge?
They played another game which took longer. My father was still playing carelessly; he naturally did not talk while the stranger was playing, but when it was his own turn he answered the stranger’s questions with sarcastic stories about the seminary. The stranger was a man of few words, but he seemed amused. My father won in the end with a lucky shot and five dollars changed hands.
The stranger said: Now let’s make it interesting.
My father said: How interesting do you want to make it?
The stranger asked how much money my father had in the world and Buddy Holly mouthed the words NO NO Don’t tell him you stupid jerk from behind his back and my father said he had $500.
The stranger said he would give any odds against the $500. My father couldn’t tell if he was serious.
He said: A hundred bucks. Best of five.
The stranger said in that case he’d like to see the color of his money, because he had to get back on the road and he was not going to hang around for a hundred bucks. He said 5 to 1.
My father had $25 on him. He borrowed $25 from Buddy and the rest in tens and fives from people in the bar who knew he was good for it.