Hello Gentle Reader
When the supermoon happened on May sixth, there was certainly an ambience of romance in the air. Personally I was wondering I was going to be able to see it. The weather had turned absolutely dreadful, with rain and snow a constant mix in early May. However in the end the moon prevailed, and there certainly was a sense of budding romance, and kisses around, in with the mixture of awe and wonder at the natural beauty that still surround us as people. Such moments of beautiful wistful expose becomes the psychological scenes that are painted in Yasunari Kawabata’s fiction. Of course with his pen, he splashes dashes of melancholy with an understated and gentle sleight of hand, trick. The ritual of drinking sake (or was it tea?) at a temple, while the moons reflection sat in the liquid, conjures up images in my mind, of a beautiful glowing white orb of the moon, caught in a cup. It is with these images, and metaphors of the traditional Japan, that Yasunari Kawabata is able to write about traditions and the constant battle of traditional life to the more modern and decadent lifestyle of a more western influenced Japan. Western clothes are put against the back drop of the traditional Kimono, and even the art of painting is placed under the magnifying glass and scrutiny of Yasunari Kawabata’s study and his lamentation of a traditional Japanese society, to a more unheard of a unknown Western influenced Japan. Yet the cultural exchange of the two, has become something that both have learned to respect and admirer. With this last published novel Yasunari Kawabata, probes the intricate complexities of human relationships. Passion, obsession, devotion, and the bitter sweet nostalgia of a time that has passed and abruptly come to an end, are all explored in this novel. However Yasunari Kawabata also explores with his understating prose, jealousy and the scorn of a woman, and the desire to take action and revenge. Written in the same vein, like his short and exquisite ‘Pam-of-The-Hand Stories,’ Yasunari Kawabata uses vignette’s and chapters to fully flesh out his characters, and dialogue can be sparse and minimal, with Yasunari Kawabata revealing more about the situation, not in their speech but by how they hold themselves, and the characters very body language. The natural world, and he scenes around them become, an inside look into the minds of the characters, making for an intense and psychologically riveting ride all the way into the end. However Yasunari Kawabata presents a very irrational character in this book who often appears more of an exaggerated form of a mentally ill woman at times, and made me wonder what she was after, leading to many moments of confusion even in the end, I was not certain what her goal had been, or if it had changed sometime down the road, as it had almost appeared to be.
It is an erotic novel at times. Sexual symbols abound. The delicate nature of a woman’s breast swollen with milk; or the comparison of a woman’s nipple like a budding flower, fragile and delicate and all that more wistful to gaze at, and caress. Ears become an erotic sensory of pleasure to touch and to tease. The slim pale neck of a woman resembles that of a swan, becomes something of a symbol for feminine beauty and the very thin line of life and death; and the erotic fixation that such thoughts can be bring on. Of course this is not some erotic novel, which could be described as pornographic. Graphic descriptions of sexual interaction that is not Yasunari Kawabata’s style, which is built upon more subtle and subdued imagery that reviles that of poetry in some cases, and with its heightened sense of lyricism and psychological probing makes the novel, which on the surface is a simple love story, and turns into a more complex meditation on beauty and the power that can come with it.
The novel opens long after the dreaded affair had begun, and the writer Oki is traveling to Kyoto on impulse to listen to the New Year’s Bells ringing in the old capital. However there is another reason to for Oki to travel to, Kyoto and it’s not just simply to hear the New Year’s Bells ring in the New Year. The other reason why Oki wishes to travel to Tokyo is to see an old lover Otoko Ueno, who has become a painter but also a recluse, and paints in the traditional style of Japanese art. Oki Toshio hopes that seeing his old lover, which the two will be able to reconnect. However it turns out to be a failure, for Toshio, as both time has taken its course, and though both have a secret longing for each other, it could never be acted upon. The affair itself had damaged both of their lives. Oki Toshio was able to turn the affair to a novel “A Girl of Sixteen,” that had brought him money and fame, as a writer. However the act of writing the novel itself had caused some incredible damage to his marriage with his wife. The affair itself had tortured her enough, causing great amounts of jealousy, however she still typed up the manuscript for Oki Toshio, which furthered her resentment towards the love affair between Oki and Otoko. Taichiro the son of Oki and his wife (whose name evades me) remarks that on the damage done to his mother by the love affair; emotional outbursts and the quiet emotional breakdown that had taken its hold of her. The novel that had supported her and her family through the years, had presented as a crazed and jealous wife, when it would appear in reality she was a heart broken woman, disillusioned with the idealistic thoughts of marriage, love and family – seeing as their sanctity had been soiled by the extramarital affair.
With his description of the fictional novel “A Girl of Sixteen,” Yasunari Kawabata almost pokes fun at himself with the following lines:
“It was the tragic love story of a very young girl and a man himself still young but with a wife and child: only the beauty of it had been heightened, to the point that it was unmarred by any moral questioning.”
His arrival in Kyoto and the less then heartwarming reunion that Oki had expected with his once young lover of fifteen, Otoko; leads to meeting with the masochistic and mentally unstable protégé of Otoko; whose paintings unlike her teacher, are more abstract, and full of emotional landscapes that reflect the emotional whirlpools of the artist herself. Enter then the Japanese Ophelia of this novel Keiko – who is out more for revenge then for the unrequited love.
Keiko is well aware of her beauty. She knows of the tragic love affair between her teacher, and Oki Toshio, whose novel publicized the affair, and turned the personal into a piece of art work. Keiko is well aware of the tragedy that continued long after the affair as well. The miscarried child and the heartbreak of both the lover’s heart and the maternal womb. Otoko after that point was no longer able to have children, and from that point on until the beginning of the novel at the age of thirty eight, had become a spinster and a painter – and somewhere along the line Keiko had become both her protégé and lover.
However the pain and the tragic affair and its consequential ending for her teacher and lover, leads her to become protective and seek revenge for her. Believing that the only one that had profited from the affair was Oki himself – though he also paid for the affair, in different circumstances.
Keiko is well aware of her beauty. She uses it as a source of power, and a way to use it to gain revenge against Oki by seducing him. Which goes according to plan, however while engaged in the act, of making love Keiko shouts out Otoko’s name and causes Oki to retreat from his actions. But Keiko is far from done with her plan of revenge – to which Otoko is well aware of and greatly disapproves of, as if in a way jealous of her protégé’s actions, or perhaps she would rather leave the past where it belongs in the past.
Yet with Yasunari Kawabata’s prose and his inability to keep everything black and white he presents Otoko as a selfish person herself:
“Even if she had been led into her infatuation with her pupil Keiko, so much younger and of her own sex, was that not another form of infatuation with herself?”
But perhaps the most revealing quote about Otoko’s feelings on the matter comes from the following passage, and the own revelation of her own hidden and conflicted desires:
“Had Otoko not wanted to create a pure, lovely image of herself? Apparently the girl of sixteen who loved Oki would always exist within her, never to grow up. Yet she had been unaware of it…”
When Oki retreats from the love and beauty – not to mention the jealousy of Keiko, her vengeful eyes are turned to his son Taichiro, but what may blossom underneath the two, who have lived in the shadows of the affair between their respected elders – one a father and the other a lover. Both had seen the effects, and both also share a sense of resentment towards the other about it. Keiko however, takes her revenge, and tells Taichiro’s mother that they are to marry, enraging his mother, and opening old sensitive wounds, as she demands that Taichiro renounce the prospect – and yet Taichiro says nothing and remains ambiguous. Not truly revealing where he stands. Keiko’s actions however also destroy her own life, as Otoko begins to get increasingly jealous upset at Keiko’s disregard for others, and eventually grows fed up, and informs her protégé that if she leaves, she needn’t bother to return.
The last passage or scene is the final ring of the bell. Shocking and ambiguous in its ending. Leaving one to wonder, the true fate of the characters, and the motivation of Keiko’s true feelings, if she had actually began to love Taichiro or had once again simply pretended.
Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*
M. Mary
