Modern Japanese Short Stories

by Ivan Morris

  Following 1868 every effort was made to adopt the techniques and culture of the West. Japan, which for two hundred and fifty years had to a large extent been isolated from the main stream of Western development, tried in the period of a few decades to absorb everything from the outside that would turn her into a modern nineteenth-century state; such a state might be able to deal with foreign nations on a basis of equality and, above all, to avoid the fate that had overtaken other materially backward Asian countries. By the last decade of the century the Meiji oligarchy had succeeded in forging a modern military establishment which enabled the country to defeat China in 1895 and, one decade later, to win the war against Russia, thus establishing Japan as one of the Great Powers.

  The cumulative effect on the country’s literature of all these immense changes can hardly be overestimated. Nonetheless, the destruction of the old and the adoption of the new was not immediately reflected in Japanese writing. The original aim of the oligarchy was to import the techniques of the West while preserving the Japanese “spirit” intact. Chimerical as this ideal eventually proved to be, it caused the emphasis to be placed at first on the material aspects of Westernization. There was a cultural lag of some fifteen years during which literature continued on its course, relatively unaffected by Western influences. This literature, it should be noted, had sunk to a remarkably low level. The prose fiction of the late Tokugawa period was in a groove of mediocrity, having largely lost the power and originality that animated the work of the great prose writers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, such as Saikaku, Kiseki, and Akinari. Frivolous tales about courtesans, banal stories of licentiousness in the gay quarters, and prolix works of a didactic nature were the stock-in-trade of the early nineteenth-century prose writers with only two or three notable exceptions.

  Had late Tokugawa literature been more vigorous and creative, it is possible that the literary impact of Western culture would have proved to be less overwhelming. As it was, the introduction of European culture resulted in a major break with the past that has no parallel in any of the important literatures of the West.

  Until about 1860 the only foreign literary influences of importance had come from China. For over two centuries, contacts with Europe had by and large been limited to the small Dutch settlement off Nagasaki; and there the focus was on trade rather than culture. Translations of European literature began in the 1860s, but it was not until 1878 that the first complete novel from the West was translated into Japanese. As in the case of many of the early translations, the choice, Bulwer-Lytton’s “Ernest Maltravers,” strikes one as peculiar. Practical information was at least as important a criterion as literary value in introducing books from the West and one of the most successful of all the early importations was Samuel Smiles’ utilitarian tract, “Self-Help.” The novels of Disraeli, reflecting modern political processes, were also given a strange degree of attention.

  In the 1880s the trickle of Western works grew into a stream and, by the end of the century, into a mighty torrent which is still continuing in the present day. Several of the most gifted writers of the Meiji period devoted much of their energies to the translation of one or more European authors; indeed, it was mainly through these translations that the reading public first became acquainted with the various aspects of modern fiction. In many cases Japanese writers then tried to produce the same type of novels in Japanese, with rather surprising results. One Japanese author, for example, under the impact of “Crime and Punishment,” wrote a story about the life and tribulations of a man belonging to the untouchable eta class. For even in these early days of direct assimilation, European literary influence was rarely a matter of straightforward imitation. Naive interpretation, and often misunderstanding, of the models played a capital part in the process of absorbing Western literature. As a modern Japanese critic, Mr. Yoshida Kenichi, has pointed out, Tolstoy’s “Resurrection” when first introduced into Japan was considered to be merely a romantic tale of unhappy love.

  The main effect of the influx from the West was not so much to provide specific literary models as to encourage Japanese to break away from sterile traditions and to describe in a more or less realistic way the brave new world that they saw growing up about them. The year 1885 is generally regarded as a key date in the development of modern Japanese fiction. That year saw the publication of “The Essence of the Novel” (Shōsetsu Shinzui) by Tsubouchi Shōyō (1859–1935). Not only was this the first important critical work of the new era, but it was the first serious theoretical study of the novel in Japan. During the Tokugawa period, and indeed ever since the days of “The Tale of Genji,” scholars had looked down on prose fiction, which was widely regarded as being fit only for women, children, and the lesser breeds. Writers like Saikaku were largely ignored and critical attention was concentrated on tanka and other forms of classical poetry and, to a lesser extent, on dramatic works. As a rule, the only novelists who were accorded any respect were didactic writers like Bakin. One result of the introduction of Western literature was to enhance the position of prose fiction in Japan.

  Like so many of the important literary figures of the Meiji period, Tsubouchi Shōyō devoted a considerable part of his time to translation. He was a specialist in English literature and among other things he translated the complete works of Shakespeare into Japanese. His acquaintance with the writing of the West brought home to him the low state of fiction in Japan. A considerable part of “The Essence of the Novel” is concerned with criticizing the current state of Japanese fiction in the light of literary lessons from Europe. Tsubouchi referred to the recent resurgence of the novel in Japan as a result of new printing methods and of increasing literacy. The standard, however, was low: “An endless number of the most diverse novels and romances is now being produced in our country and the bookshelves groan under their weight; yet they all consist of mere foolishness.”1

  Tsubouchi blamed this on the lack of discrimination among readers and on the failure of writers themselves to cut loose from the late Tokugawa tradition of tedious didacticism. In the typical spirit of the Meiji intellectual, Tsubouchi declared that the solution lay in “modernizing” Japanese literature. This involved, on the one hand, adopting the realistic approach of modern Western fiction. In particular, Japanese writers should strive for psychological realism whereby they might faithfully reproduce the actual complex workings of men and women. According to Tsubouchi, the novelist’s task was not to apportion praise or blame, but to observe and describe the underlying passions that make human beings act as they do. Here we find an adumbration of the naturalist approach that was to play so important a part in subsequent Japanese literature. At the same time, however, Tsubouchi stressed the aesthetic purpose of the novel. The function of the writer was neither to teach nor to expound approved moral sentiments, but to produce works of artistic merit which would serve to elevate the public taste.

  Banal as many of Tsubouchi’s ideas may strike the present-day reader, their effect on Meiji literature was momentous. Indeed, the development of modern realistic fiction can be dated from the publication of “The Essence of the Novel.” After 1885, fantastic tales of jejune romances began to give place to accounts of real people living in contemporary society. Tsubouchi tried to put his own theories into practice in a novel with the inauspicious title of “The Spirit of Present-Day Students.” His effort was singularly unsuccessful.

  The first important work to reflect Tsubouchi’s theories was “The Drifting Cloud” (Ukigumo), a novel by Futabatei Shimei (1864–1909) that appeared between 1887 and 1889. This unfinished work deals realistically with a commonplace, rather lethargic young intellectual of the Meiji period. Futabatei’s study of Russian literature, in particular of Turgenev, had convinced him of the need for realism both in subject and in style. He was the first important novelist to abandon the conventional literary language and to use ordinary colloquial forms in describing the inner struggles of the modern man. In this and many other ways “The Dri
fting Cloud” occupies a pioneer role in the development of modern Japanese fiction, although it will hardly strike most present-day readers as a literary masterpiece.

  Another outstanding figure in Meiji literature was Ōgai Mori (1863–1922), the first of the twenty-five writers represented in the present anthology (see page 37). Whereas previous writers knew the West mainly through their readings, Ōgai became acquainted with Europe at first hand as an army doctor in Germany from 1884 to 1888. During these years he became familiar with current European literature and his voluminous translations and essays greatly affected the development of modern Japanese drama and poetry, as well as of the novel and the short story. In his literary criticism Ōgai was greatly influenced by the idealistic aestheticism which was current in Germany during the latter part of the nineteenth century and which was expressed by such philosophers as Karl von Hartmann. He returned from Europe at a time when German influence was steadily becoming stronger in Japan, as seen for example in the enactment of the Meiji Constitution (1889), based to an important extent on German principles of absolutism.

  Ōgai criticized many of Tsubouchi’s theories concerning realistic literature and in their place advanced a form of romanticism that laid stress on the emotional realization of the self. His first piece of fiction, which appeared in 1890, was the romantic account of a tragic love affair in Berlin between a young Japanese gentleman engaged in research work and a beautiful German ballet dancer named Alice. Evidently based on personal experience, “The Dancing Girl” (Maihime) was written in the first person and was described by Ōgai himself as an Ich Roman. “I have attempted,” wrote Ōgai, “to portray a Japanese who was living in Berlin at the same time as I and who came to grips with the kind of situation described in the story.” Then (as a typical afterthought of the Western-influenced Meiji writer) Ōgai added: “There are a good many European works of fiction with similar plots.” “The Dancing Girl” is hardly a great work of literature, but it stands out as one of the earliest examples of the shi-shōsetsu (“I-novel” and “I-story”), the autobiographical, confessional type of writing that has occupied such an important role in modern Japanese literature.

  It is one of the peculiarities of this literature that the writers who were most enthusiastically to adopt the shi-shōsetsu should have been the members of the naturalist school. The introduction into Japan of the writings of Zola and Maupassant had far-reaching effects in literary circles. It accelerated the movement away from traditionalism and, at about the time of the Russo-Japanese War (1904–05), produced a group of influential writers who proclaimed that the purpose of literature was to search for the truth and to describe it with the detached accuracy of a scientist. Literary embellishments and conventional sentiments had to be discarded in favor of a cold, objective presentation of life as it was actually lived by ordinary men and women. Factual detail was more important than style, form, or atmosphere; the modern writer must strive to achieve the unadorned directness of the policeman’s statement or the clinical report.

  From the outset, however, Japanese naturalism began to diverge from the movement in Europe that had inspired it. The publication in 1908 of “The Quilt” (Futon), a novel by Tayama Katai, one of the leading naturalists, served to establish the autobiographical approach as the standard for Japanese writers of the naturalist school. This novel deals in exhaustive detail with the events and emotions in the life of the author-hero and is one of the first in the long series of Japanese novels that unabashedly describe the experiences and emotions of the character known as watakushi (“I”).

  Many reasons have been suggested for this confessional aspect of Japanese naturalism. According to some critics, the late collapse of feudalism and the fact that important changes have always come from above rather than as a result of popular effort resulted in a peculiarly wide gulf between individual and social life, and made the Japanese far less interested in political and social questions than people in most modern Western countries. Strong authoritarian traditions gave rise to a widespread feeling of indifference or resignation to outside problems, and official censorship discouraged Meiji writers from voicing any criticism of current conditions. Writers who wished to present life strictly on the basis of facts concentrated on their direct personal experiences, tending to neglect the wider subjects that had been treated by Zola and the other naturalists of the West. Readers, for their part, were prone to be more interested in books that described the detailed experiences of a single individual, preferably the writer himself, rather than in novels giving a broad picture of society by means of a more objective handling of a variety of characters.

  The main legacy of naturalism in Japan has been the belief of many writers that the only worthwhile and “sincere” form of literature is that which takes its material directly from the facts of the author’s physical and spiritual life. This trend affected several writers who were in other respects strongly opposed to the naturalists. Among them was Naoya Shiga (see page 83), whose success in the genre encouraged many less talented authors to probe into their personal experiences for literary material.

  The shi-shōsetsu tradition, though it has sometimes given rise to works of unusual sharpness and honesty, has had a number of baneful effects. In their efforts at faithful reproduction, many modern Japanese writers tended to forget the demands of fiction and of literary style. Furthermore, the confessional type of literature implies a rather dangerous form of conceit, based on the idea that there is something intrinsically interesting in an honest account of one’s inner life. In the case of gifted authors this assumption has sometimes been justified. However, less talented and original writers have often been led to produce works of extraordinary dullness in which the fictional element is so attenuated that the term novel or short story seems hardly appropriate.

  The great decade of modern Japanese writing was that which followed the end of the Russo-Japanese War. It was during these years that many of the most important writers did their best work, while others started their careers. (Among those included in the present collection are Ōgai Mori, Shūsei Tokuda, Kafū Nagai, Naoya Shiga, Jun’ichirō Tanizaki, Ton Satomi, and Ryūnosuké Akutagawa.) Victory against a major foreign power led to an upsurge of national self-confidence and prosperity. At the same time the multifarious European cultural influences were coming to fruition. Although the literary scene was dominated by the naturalists, many of the important authors who were active during this period were vocally opposed to the naturalist approach and reflected this opposition in their writing.

  Several of the “schools” of writing that Japanese critics spend so much time in classifying and sub-classifying (neo-romanticist, neo-idealist, neo-realist, etc.) arose in protest against the prevailing naturalism. The early careers of a surprisingly large number of important modern writers were marked by a conscious revolt against the gloom, aridity, and lack of style that marked the naturalists (see biographical notes on Ōgai Mori, Kafū Nagai, Naoya Shiga, Jun’ichirō Tanizaki, Ryūnosuké Akutagawa, etc.). It is worthwhile to observe that it is frequently the works of these writers that are read and valued today, whereas much of the naturalist literature against which they were rebelling has passed into oblivion.

  The proliferation in Japan of exclusive literary groups may require a few words of comment. The phenomenon of cliquishness is by no means limited to the world of literature; it exists in almost every sphere of Japanese life, including the academic world, politics, bureaucracy, and business, as well as music, painting, and all the traditional arts. The tendency of writers and others to band together in groups or societies derives directly from the pre-modern period, when the individual young artist had scant chance of recognition unless he could be identified with some established family or school that would give him its protection and encouragement. This relates to the feudal tradition of a close relationship between master and pupil, which even today plays an important part in literature and other fields.

  Japan, of course, is not unique in
having literary coteries, but there can be few countries where their existence and the resulting rivalries have had so much influence. The ramifications of the various schools and factions need not concern the general Western reader, but some of the more important groupings, such as the Shirakaba and the neo-perceptionists, are identified in the biographical notes. The personal nexus, reinforced by bonds of loyalty and obligation, often plays at least as important a part in the development of these cliques as does common adherence to a literary program. This also applies to the fields of politics and elsewhere.