NATSUME SŌSEKI

Sanshirō: a Novel

With an Introduction by HARUKI MURAKAMI

Translated with Notes JAY RUBIN

PENGUIN BOOKS

Contents

Note on Japanese Name Order and Pronunciation

Chronology

Introduction

Further Reading

Translator’s Note

SANSHIRŌ

Notes

PENGUIN image CLASSICS

SANSHIRŌ

NATSUME SŌSEKI (in the Japanese order, surname first) is universally recognized to be Japan’s greatest modern novelist. Born Natsume Kinnosuke in Edo in 1867, the year before the city was renamed Tokyo, he survived a lonely childhood, being traded between foster and biological parents, was deeply schooled in both the Chinese classics and English, and at the age of twenty-two chose from a Chinese source the defiantly playful pen name Sōseki (“Garglestone”) to signify his sense of his own eccentricity. In 1893, Sōseki became the second graduate of (Tokyo) Imperial University’s English Department and entered the graduate program, but in 1895 he abruptly took a position teaching English in a rural middle school. Though hoping to become a writer as early as the age of fourteen, Sōseki chose the more respectable path of English literature scholar, was sent to London by the Ministry of Education in 1900 for two years, and taught in his alma mater until 1907, when his early success as a part-time writer of stories and novels led him to accept a position as staff novelist for the Asahi Shinbun newspaper, in which he serialized the rest of his fourteen novels. Sōseki also published substantial works of literary theory and history (and contemplative essays, memoirs, lectures on the individual and society, etc.) and continued to think of himself as a scholar after his controversial resignation from the University. His works quickly lost any hint of academic artifice, however, relying initially on a freewheeling sense of humor, and then darkening as Sōseki wrestled with increasingly debilitating bouts of depression and illness. Sanshirō, his seventh novel, written in 1908, was the last in which the humor predominated. Sōseki wrote many Chinese poems and haiku as a form of escape from the stresses of the world he had created. He died in 1916 with his last—and longest—novel still unfinished. Each new generation of Japanese readers rediscovers Sōseki, and Western readers find in him a modern intellect doing battle in familiar territory, a truly original voice among those artists of the world who have most fully grasped the modern experience.

HARUKI MURAKAMI (in Western order) has written twelve novels, eight volumes of short stories, and over thirty books of nonfiction, while also translating well over thirty volumes of American fiction, poetry and nonfiction since his prizewinning debut in 1979 at the age of thirty. Known in the English-speaking world primarily for his novels A Wild Sheep Chase, Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, Norwegian Wood, Dance Dance Dance, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, and Kafka on the Shore, Murakami has also published commentary on the 1995 Tokyo subway sarin gas attack in Underground, written a book of essays on the relationship of long-distance running to his fiction, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, and edited a book of American, British and Irish fiction, Birthday Stories. His works have been translated into more than forty languages.

JAY RUBIN has translated Natsume Sōseki’s novel The Miner, Akutagawa Ryūnosoke’s Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories (Penguin, 2006), and Haruki Murakami’s Norwegian Wood, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, after the quake, and After Dark. He is the author of Injurious to Public Morals: Writers and the Meiji State and Haruki Murakami and the Music of Words, and the editor of Modern Japanese Writers. He began his study of Japanese at the University of Chicago, where he received his Ph.D. in 1970, and taught Japanese literature at the University of Washington and at Harvard University, where he is now an emeritus professor.

Note on Japanese Name Order and Pronunciation

All Japanese names that appear after this page in the book are written in the Japanese order, surname first. The author is known in Japan as Natsume Sōseki, and the writer of the Introduction as Murakami Haruki. “Sōseki,” however, is a traditional pen name (much like that of the seventeenth-century haiku poet, Matsuo Bashō), and it is by this, rather than the family name, that most Japanese and Western readers refer to the author. Sōseki’s name has been given in the Japanese order but Murakami’s in the Western order on the cover and title page because of their greater familiarity in the West and for convenience in cataloging.

Some guidelines to pronouncing Japanese names and terms:

All a’s are long, as in “father,” e is pronounced as in “bed,” i sounds like “ee,” and three-syllable names tend to have a stress on the first syllable. Thus, “Natsume” is pronounced “NAH-tsoo-meh” (three syllables) and “Sanshirō” is pronounced “SAHN-she-row.” “Yojirō” sounds like “YO-jee-row.” “Mineko” is “MEE-neh-ko.” “Hirota” has a very slight stress in the middle: “Hee-ROW-tah.”

Macrons have been included to indicate long syllables but have been eliminated from the place names Tōkyō, Kyōto, Ōsaka, Kōbe, Honshū, and Kyūshū, and from familiar words such as “shōji” and “Shintō.”

Chronology

1854 February: Commodore Matthew Perry returns to Japan with gunboats to enforce previous year’s demand from U.S. President Fillmore that Japan open its doors to trade. Tokugawa regime of warrior-bureaucrats, headquartered in city of Edo, agrees in writing to open the country, political unrest increases.

1854 or 1855: Widower with two daughters, Natsume Kohē Naokatsu (1817–97), an Edo nanushi (landowning merchant-class “headman” with local administrative and police powers), marries Fukuda Chie (1826–81), divorced daughter of a pawnbroker. Chie will give Naokatsu six more children between 1856 and 1867.

1867 9 February: Chie gives birth to her sixth child on day designated by astrological charts as “Elder Brother of Metal,” which dooms the child to a life of thievery unless he is given a name with the character for “metal/gold/money” (kin) in it. Adding the male suffix “-nosuke” to “Kin,” the Natsumes name the boy “Kinnosuke”. Parents are embarrassed to have had a child at their advanced ages of forty-nine and forty (fifty and forty-two by Japanese count). Shortly after birth, Kinnosuke is sent to the relative of a Natsume family maid to nurse but is soon brought home by sixteen-year-old half-sister, who is scolded by father. A neighbor nurses the child.

1868 (1 year old) Tokugawa rule ends with the “restoration” of the emperor to a position of theoretical sovereignty. 3 September: Edo is renamed Tokyo (Eastern Capital). 23 October: the modernizing Meiji Period1 (1868–1912) begins. Naokatsu retains some authority under Meiji government and later holds various police positions, but family’s fortunes decline.

November: Kinnosuke adopted by Naokatsu’s former ward, Shiohara Masanosuke and wife Yasu. He remains “Shiohara Kinnosuke” until 1888. Shioharas shower him with love, nurture a fondness for traditional plebeian entertainments, storytelling and comedy, by taking him to the variety theater (see Chapter 3 of Sanshirō).

1874 (7) Shiohara marital turmoil. Kinnosuke changes hands, homes, schools several times over next two years. Growing consciousness of being traded like a piece of property will emerge in novel Michikusa (Grass on the Wayside, 1915).

1876 (9) April: Shioharas divorce. May: Kinnosuke is returned to the Natsume household, though still legally a Shiohara. Learns from a maid that his “grandparents” are actually his parents. Father stern, mother more loving.

1878 (11) Kinnosuke enters middle school, chooses course that emphasizes Chinese studies instead of English, though this invalidates him for entry into University Preparatory School.

1881 (14) Mother dies. Around this time, Kinnosuke leaves middle school for a private academy of Chinese studies. Enjoys Chinese literature, Japanese novels, thinks of becoming a writer, but elder brother scolds him for considering such an unworthy profession. Beginning to think of pursuing a university education.

1883 (16) Enters English academy, sells beloved Chinese books, begins serious study for University Preparatory School entrance exams.

1884 (17) Begins rooming-house life, returning to Natsume home occasionally when ill.

September: Enters University Preparatory School Preparatory Course.

1885 (18) English schoolwork consistently signed “K. Shiohara” until 4 January 1888.

1886 (19) April: Preparatory School renamed First Higher Middle School. Pleurisy causes him to fail exam for advancement to higher class. Shock of failure inspires him to go to the head of his class and remain there until graduation. Teaching to support himself. Tokyo University renamed Imperial University; will remain the only Imperial University until 1897 when it is renamed Tokyo Imperial University after the founding of Kyoto Imperial University. Others added in 1907 (Tōhoku), 1910 (Kyushu), etc.

1887 (20) Two of three elder brothers die of tuberculosis. Suffers first of many eye diseases, acute trachoma. Considers studying architecture, but friend persuades him to change his mind.

September: University English Literature Department founded.

1888 (21) 28 January: Name transferred from Shiohara to Natsume family registry upon large payment (¥170 down, ¥3 monthly, ¥240 total) by Naokatsu to Shiohara: legal name once again “Natsume.”

September: Advances to regular course of First Higher Middle School, Faculty of Letters, more or less certain he will major in English literature. (“Middle” dropped from school name in 1894. This is the prestigious First Higher School or First National College where Sanshirō’s Professor Hirota teaches.)

1889 (22) January: Becomes friends with tubercular classmate and budding haiku poet Masaoka Shiki (1867–1902). Begins writing haiku, which remains a lifelong practice.

11 February: Minister of Education, Mori Arinori (1847– 89), leaving home for ceremonial promulgation of new Meiji constitution, assassinated for supposed offenses against the national gods. 16 February: Like Sanshirō’s Professor Hirota, Kinnosuke and classmates may have stood in formation at Mori Arinori’s funeral. May: Speaks against mindless nationalism at student patriotic society. Writes a critique and nine poems—all in Chinese—for Shiki’s hand-circulated literary anthology, using playful pen name “Sōseki” (Garglestone) for the first time. Identifies himself with the eccentric protagonist of a Chinese story who stubbornly insisted on the correctness of his all-too-obviously mistaken declaration, “I shall pillow my head on the stream and rinse my mouth out with stones.”

1890 (23) July: Graduates from First Higher Middle School, but feeling depressed. September: Enters Imperial University English Literature Department with annual tuition advance of ¥85.

1891 (24) Outstanding record wins him a full scholarship, but Scottish instructor’s insistence on rote-learning dulls his enthusiasm for English literature, which he will never love like Chinese. July: Deeply saddened by death of sister-in-law Tose (a secret love?) from complications of pregnancy. Boarding-house friend Tachibana Masaki becomes first graduate of English Literature Department (and later becomes customs official in Shanghai and Da-lien).

1892 (25) April: Changes official domicile to Hokkaidō, perhaps to avoid draft. May: Begins part-time teaching at private college (until 1895). Publishes several literary essays.

1893 (26) July: Becomes second graduate of Imperial University English Department, the only graduate that year. Enters graduate program, but has doubts about devoting himself to literary research, feeling he has been “deceived by English literature.” October: Takes second part-time lectureship, in English, at Higher Normal School (annual salary ¥450), helping to support his father and half-sister Fusa.

1894 (27) Diagnosed with possible early stages of tuberculosis, afraid of meeting two brothers’ fate, works to improve health, but plagued by depression.

1 August: Sino-Japanese War begins.

December–January: Seeks Zen enlightenment in Kamakura temple, befriends monks but leaves feeling he has failed.

1895 (28) April: Abruptly takes teaching position at middle school in Shiki’s rural home town, Matsuyama. Hoping to save up for a trip to the West, but ¥80 monthly salary lasts only two weeks. 23–27 April: Sino-Japanese War ends with demeaning treaty that will be avenged with the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05. Long-distance negotiations for arranged marriage begin. Writing haiku, especially after Shiki comes to live with him in August. October: Feeling lonely after Shiki leaves for Tokyo. December: Visits Tokyo to meet Nakane Kyōko (1877–1963), daughter of Chief Secretary of the House of Peers, at formal “interview” (miai). Decides to marry.

1896 (29) Increasingly depressed by life in Matsuyama. April: Resigns teaching post in Matsuyama, takes instructorship (¥100/month) at Fifth National College in Kumamoto (Sanshirō’s alma mater). June: Kyōko and father come to Kumamoto, wedding performed in Sōseki’s rented house. July: Promoted to professor.

September: Terada Torahiko (1878–1935), the model for Sanshirō’s scientist, Nonomiya, enters the College. Lafcadio Hearn (1850–1904) appointed lecturer in English literature at Imperial University in Tokyo. Meanwhile, in Kumamoto, Sōseki actively involved with student journal, class outings, peaceful home life, writing haiku, Chinese verse, occasional scholarly papers.

1897 (30) Father-in-law urges him to take a teaching post in Tokyo, but he declines. April: Writes to Shiki that he wants to quit teaching, spend all his time reading and writing literature. 29 June: Naokatsu dies, but Kinnosuke continues supporting half-sister Fusa until 1915. July: Travels to Tokyo with Kyōko, who experiences a miscarriage. September: Returns to Kumamoto, Kyōko follows in October. Peaceful life resumes, but letter from adoptive mother Yasu threatens complications.

1898 (31) Writing Chinese verse, literary essays, guiding students in haiku composition. Kyōko suffers from attacks of hysteria, attempts suicide in June or July, especially bad with bouts of extreme morning sickness in autumn. November/December: Publishes playful literary essay in Shiki and friends’ haiku magazine Hototogisu under the pen name “Hechima Sensei” (Professor Loofah).

1899 (32) 31 May: Daughter Fudeko born.

August: Terada Torahiko leaves to study science at Tokyo Imperial University. Good friends leaving Kumamoto for Tokyo.

1900 (33) April: Appointed acting assistant principal. Kyōko becomes pregnant with second child. 12 May: Ordered by Ministry of Education to spend two full years in England studying the language at government expense (annual stipend of ¥1,800 plus meager family support in his absence of ¥300 per year). Initially declines (neither the Ministry nor he had any idea what he should do in England), but eventually accepts. July: Sells or gives away all household goods, leaves Kumamoto, depositing Kyōko and Fudeko with Tokyo in-laws. 8 September: Boards German ship for Genoa, arriving 19 October. 21 October: Arrives in Paris by train. Visits Louvre, World’s Fair (Exposition Universelle). 28 October: Arrives in London without a clear purpose. Sees the sights. November: Visits Cambridge, but concludes that government stipend too low for study there. November/December: Attends a class at University College, London. Lives in a series of shabby rooming houses, mostly reading in his room, but contracts with Shakespeare scholar William James Craig (1843–1906) for weekly individual tutoring at 5 shillings per hour (an arrangement that would continue until October 1901). No more formal study than this.

1901 (34) 27 January: Second daughter, Tsuneko, born. 2 February: Views Queen Victoria’s funeral cortège in Hyde Park. Letters from this time express anger at Kyōko for writing infrequently, and desire to teach at the First National College in Tokyo upon his return to Japan instead of continuing to teach in Kumamoto. May/June: His informative letters to Shiki are published in Hototogisu as “Letters from London” and signed, haiku-style, “Sōseki.”

5 May–26 June: Chemist Ikeda Kikunae (1864–1936), later inventor of MSG, introduced to Sōseki by a Fifth National College colleague, takes temporary lodging in Sōseki’s rooming house on his way back to Japan after a period of study in Leipzig; Sōseki is so impressed by Ikeda’s erudition and cultivated intelligence that their long, intense conversations stir him to engage in more substantial, systematic research.

July: Changes rooming houses one last time, and for final year and a half in London, spends practically all his time in his room, reading and taking notes for what will be his Bungakuron (“Theory of Literature”, 1907). The strain and isolation take a toll on his mental stability.

1902 (35) 30 January: Anglo-Japanese Alliance signed, clearing the way for Japan to fight Russia over control of Korea; war fever builds slowly. The first “equal” military treaty between Japan and a Western power (in force until 1922), it causes great elation in Japan, but Sōseki derides it, comparing it to a poor man running around the village ringing bells and beating drums because he’s bagged a rich wife (see Sanshirō, Chapter 6).

Autumn: Rumors of a mental breakdown reach Japan, putting University plans to hire him to work with Lafcadio Hearn on hold. Tries to calm his nerves by taking up cycling. Late November: Receives word that Shiki has died. 5 December: Leaves London for return to Japan.

1903 (36) 24 January: Arrives in Tokyo, finds father-in-law has lost his political appointment, and Kyōko and children living with him in near-poverty. Moves Kyōko and children into new rental house; must now partially support father-in-law. Friends have arranged part-time teaching positions for him: twenty hours of English at First National College (¥700/year) and six hours of literature at Tokyo Imperial University (¥800/year). Manages to resign from Kumamoto with doctor’s certificate of mental problems. April: lectures begin. University students complain about his dry, analytical lectures after the more flamboyant style of predecessor Lafcadio Hearn (see Translator’s Note). Disappointed with students’ limited abilities, considers resigning. June: Publishes sardonic London memoir, “Bicycle Diary” (“Jitensha nikki”), in Hototogisu, signed “Sōseki.” Nervous strain leads to over two months’ separation from pregnant Kyōko. Fall lectures on literary theory and English literature well attended.

3 November: Third daughter, Eiko, born. He seeks diversion in painting and calligraphy. Newspapers calling for war against Russia.

1904 (37) February: Lectures to University faculty in the hilltop “Mansion” (see Sanshirō, Chapter 2) on his London theatre-going. Scholarly publications appear under “Natsume Kinnosuke.” War fever leads to outbreak of Russo-Japanese War, inspires Sōseki (writing as “Natsume Sōseki”) to publish jingoistic “new style” poem (shintaishi), “Jūgun-kō” (“Onward With the Troops”), extolling “swords that thirst for blood.” April: Adds a third part-time teaching job, at Meiji University (¥30/month). Much creative writing toward the end of the year. Others publish anti-war sentiments toward end of year and are accused of harboring “dangerous thoughts.”

1905 (38) New Year’s issues of three magazines carry his work: the story “Wagahai wa neko de aru” (“I Am a Cat”), signed “Sōseki,” essays “Rondon-tō” (“The Tower of London”) and “Kārairu hakubutsukan” (“Carlyle Museum”), signed “Natsume Kinnosuke”. Soon begins using “Natsume Sōseki” regularly. Sequels of “I Am a Cat” continue through August 1906, humor rising from high jinks and wordplay to genuine satire, scathing critique of war fever, darkening portrait of mustachioed, heavy-smoking depressive scholar protagonist.

May: Japan destroys Russia’s Baltic fleet. Sōseki’s explosive productivity continues. Torn between academic career and full-time writing. Short pieces from this time draw on Arthurian legends and London experience. A dozen young “disciples” begin to frequent the Natsume home.

September: New University student from Kyushu, German literature major Komiya Toyotaka (1884–1966), the model for Sanshirō, visits. Portsmouth Treaty seals Japan’s victory in Russo-Japanese War.

October: First volume of I Am a Cat published.

15 December: Fourth daughter, Aiko, born.

1906 (39) January: Publishes “Shumi no iden” (“The Heredity of Taste”), harsh critique of Russo-Japanese war fever, horrific sacrifices of over 100,000 Japanese fighting men under “heroic” General Nogi Maresuke (1849–1912). February: Refuses academic committee work.

March: Shimazaki Tōson (1872–1943) publishes novel Hakai (The Broken Commandment), beginning the rise of Japanese naturalism, the mainstream literary movement discussed in Sanshirō (Chapter 9); enthusiastically praised by Sōseki.

April: Simultaneously publishes tenth chapter of “Cat” and short novel Botchan (“Little Master”), based on Sōseki’s year in Matsuyama but set against the Russo-Japanese War and ending in a rush of “righteous” violence. May: Suffering with chronic gastric catarrh; asks “disciple” to organize theoretical lectures for book publication. August: Eleventh and final chapter of I Am a Cat appears. September: Publishes “haiku novel,” Kusamakura (“Pillow of Grass”, or The Three-Cornered World) on the tension between modern life and poetic detachment. Father-in-law dies, reducing the number of relatives Sōseki must support. This and income from writing enable him to resign third job, at Meiji University, in October. Begins custom of welcoming visitors every Thursday after 3 p.m., initiating the Thursday Group. November: Middle volume of I Am a Cat published. Turns down invitation to join the Yomiuri Shinbun newspaper staff in charge of literature. Family moves into rental house in the University neighborhood: Nishikatamachi ten, block B, number 7 (cf. Professor Hirota’s Nishikatamachi ten, block F, number three).

1907 (40) January: Publishes short novel, Nowaki (“Autumn Wind”) in Hototogisu, much ranting against the rich, called by some the best novel of 1907. 24 February: Asahi Shinbun newspaper inquires if he might consider becoming a staff novelist. Negotiations continue until 15 March (government sponsorship of foreign study obligates him to teach until this month). ¥200 monthly salary higher than editor-in-chief’s, book royalties are his to keep, all fiction to be serialized in the Asahi. Submits resignations to University and College, joins the newspaper officially in April. The news causes a sensation, but Sōseki insists that working for a newspaper is neither more nor less a trade than working for a university. May: Advertisement for his first professional novel, Gubijinsō (“The Poppy”), appears, inspires feverish marketing of “Poppy” robes and “Poppy” rings. Volume of University lectures, Bungakuron (“Theory of Literature”) appears under the name “Natsume Kinnosuke.”

5 June: First son, Jun’ichi, born. Government becoming concerned about corrupting effects of individualistic literature on compliant populace, Prime Minister invites writers to a gathering, but Sōseki declines. Serialization of The Poppy begins in Asahi Shinbun, continues through October. Warmly received by public, less so by critics. Overwritten and moralistic, it disappointed even Sōseki, who soon wanted to kill off his overwrought heroine. Final volume of I Am a Cat published.

September: Angrily moves out of Nishikatamachi house when landlord raises the rent.

November/December: writing next novel.

1908 (41) 1 January: Naturalist movement coalescing in all the major journals, prompts government to increase censorship of “dangerous thoughts” in literature. Serialization of Kōfu (The Miner) begins, continues until 6 April to universally negative reviews. Abstract, phantasmagorical, written in a simple style in contrast with The Poppy’s jewel-encrusted language, too radically modernist for most readers. General disappointment with Sōseki; 1906 was “his year,” but 1907 showed his decline, his lack of seriousness as compared with the naturalists, say critics. July: Linked stories, “Yume jūya” (Ten Nights of Dream), serialized. 1 September: serialization of Sanshirō begins, continues until 9 December; it is warmly received, and has significant element of humor.

October: Government announces a “campaign of national mobilization” to stem the tide of “dangerous thought” such as socialism, naturalism, anarchism, individualism, etc.

17 December: Birth of second son, Shinroku.

1909 (42) 1 January: Literary journals discuss rumors of impending establishment of a government-sponsored literary academy. 19 January: Attends Minister of Education’s party for literary men, opposes idea of an official academy of literature as a form of control. March: Publishes Bungaku hyōron (“Criticism of Literature”), a compendium of University lecture notes on topics in English literature, signed “Natsume Sōseki.” Former foster father, Shiohara, begins pressuring him for money; unpleasant negotiations continue through November. May: Sanshirō published in book form. Readers of Taiyō magazine choose Sōseki as the best writer to serve on a government literary academy, if established; he rejects the award. National Diet issues first Press Law, strengthening government’s control of literature. Censorship and protests increase. 27 June: Serialization of Sore kara (And Then) begins, continuing until 14 October. Protagonist more intelligent and internalized than Sanshirō, much darker view of human and international relations, awareness of police as ominous presence: the first of Sōseki’s late novels. August: Attack of acute gastric catarrh. 2 September: Leaves for tour of Manchuria and Korea until 17 October. 21 October–30 December: Serializes “Man-Kan tokoro-dokoro” (“Travels in Manchuria and Korea”), a victor’s eye view of the land wrested from Russian control, cut short at year’s end (nothing on Korea). 25 November: Inaugurates weekly “Bungei-ran” (Literary Column) in Asahi Shinbun, featuring wide variety of writers. 28 November: Pays Shiohara ¥100 to end their relationship.

1910 (43) 1 March–12 June: Serialization of Mon (‘The Gate’), dark culmination of trilogy that began with Sanshirō; protagonist fails to find comfort in religion.

2 March: Fifth daughter, Hinako, born. June–February: Suffering with stomach ulcers, nearly dies at Shuzenji Hot Spring on 24–25 August, hospitalized until February 1911.

June–January: Government crushes leftist political and literary activity in trumped-up “High Treason Incident,” execution of prominent socialists; decade-long “winter years” of socialism begin.

September–December: Writing poetry and memoirs; painting.

1911 (44) February–April: Spars publicly with Ministry of Education over honorary Doctorate of Letters; Sōseki refuses to accept it, Ministry refuses to take it back. 18–20 May: Publishes three-part critique of Ministry of Education’s new “academy,” the Committee on Literature, and its goal to encourage the production of “wholesome” literature. 11 August: Leaves Tokyo on four-lecture tour for Osaka Asahi Shinbun (includes “Gendai Nihon no kaika” (“The Civilization of Modern-day Japan”)) but hospitalized for ulcers after final lecture on 18th, unable to return to Tokyo until 14 September. Hemorrhoid surgery; treatment into following year. 12 October: Personnel problems lead to end of Asahi Literary Column. 1 November: Sōseki tenders pro-forma resignation but remains on Asahi staff.

29 November: Sudden death of daughter Hinako (at twenty months). Memorializes his sorrow in next novel.

1912 (45) 1 January: Begins serializing Higan-sugi made (To the Spring Equinox and Beyond), until 29 April; episodic parody of detective story notable for “Rainy Day” chapter on sudden death of small daughter. Stomach ailments, nervous tension.

30 July: Meiji emperor dies; name of period changed from Meiji to Taishō. 13 September: Cannon fire in imperial palace signals massive funeral of Emperor Meiji; General Nogi Maresuke commits ritual disembowelment, following the emperor in death.

26 September–2 October: Hospitalized for second hemorrhoid surgery. 6 December: Begins serialization of Kōjin (The Wayfarer); unfocused, interrupted by health problems.

1913 (46) January–June: Period of intense depression. March–May: flare-up of ulcers. 7 April: Last installment of Kōjin until September. In bed at home until late May. Summer: Unsuccessful attempt at oil painting. 16 September: Serialization of Kōjin resumes, completed 15 November with intense portrait of intellectual who sees only possible release from breakdown in human communication in faith, madness or death. Watercolor painting.

1914 (47) 20 April: Serialization of masterpiece Kokoro begins, until 11 August; set against end of Meiji period, protagonist’s struggle with ego ends in death. June: Transfers official domicile from Hokkaidō to Tokyo.

15 July: Dines with Raphael von Koeber, who plans to return to Germany. 28 July: Outbreak of First World War, Koeber trapped in Japan. Enjoying calligraphy and ink painting.

September–October: Fourth flare-up of ulcers. Painting to pass the time. Creates original binding design for Kokoro, which becomes maiden publication of Iwanami Shoten, Japan’s soon-to-be premier publisher and authoritative publisher of Sōseki’s posthumous Complete Works. 25 November: Lecture, “Watakushi no kojinshugi” (“My Individualism”).

1915 (48) January–February: Serializes memoir “Garasudo no uchi” (Inside My Glass Doors). March–April: Fifth flare-up of ulcers while traveling to Kyoto with friends; Fusa dies in March. 3 June–10 September: Serializes Michikusa (Grass on the Wayside), overtly autobiographical novel on childhood adoption, aftermath, becoming a writer. November: Resting at hot springs. Begins reading Dostoevsky with mounting interest.

December: First visit to Sōseki’s home by budding writer Akutagawa Ryūnosuke (1892–1927), author of Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories (Penguin, 2006), who joins the Thursday Group and becomes one of Sōseki’s “disciples.” Apparent rheumatism making writing painful.

1916 (49) January: Serializes “Tentōroku” (“A Record of Affirmation”), reflections on the current war in Europe as a battle between German militarism and British individual freedom, declaring his gratitude for life and his determination to use the time he has left as well as he can. 19 February: Lavishly praises Akutagawa’s maiden work, “Hana” (“The Nose”). Mid-April: New diagnosis reveals that his “rheumatism” is actually diabetes; treatment continues until July. 7–16 May: Bedridden with stomach pain, begins writing last novel, Meian (Light and Darkness), serialization begins 26 May: modern life and marriage as a battlefield of egos. By August he is writing one unpleasant installment of Meian in the morning, and spending afternoons on comforting traditional pastimes (watercolor painting, calligraphy, Chinese poetry).

Early November: Speaks to Thursday Group about phrase sokuten kyoshi (“follow heaven, abandon the self”), possibly just a slogan for successful calligraphy, sincerity of expression in writing, or the ultimate answer to the pain of modern life, as seen in works as early as I Am a Cat.

22 November: Final ulcer flare-up begins, ending on 9 December with death. A national event. Funeral services presided over by Zen priest friend who failed to guide him to enlightenment in 1894. Ashes buried in Zōshigaya Cemetery.

14 December: Final installment of unfinished Meian appears.

1918–19 Iwanami Shoten publishes first of many Sōseki zenshū (Complete Works of Sōseki), in 14 volumes, with colorful binding Sōseki designed for Kokoro. Disciple Komiya Toyotaka, the model for Sanshirō, participates in editing, becomes major editor of later editions and Sōseki biographer.

1984–2004 Sōseki replaces Itō Hirobumi (1841–1909), the Restoration leader and autocrat he mocked in I Am a Cat, on the face of the ¥1000 bill.

NOTE

1. Meiji Period: On Japanese era names, see the article headed “nengō” in Japan: An Illustrated Encyclopedia, 2 vols (Tokyo: Kodansha Ltd., 1993) vol. 2, p. 1073.

Introduction

The (Generally) Sweet Smell of Youth

I confess, I became seriously interested in the works of Natsume Sōseki only after I had reached adulthood. Between my university graduation and the time of my marriage, I hardly looked at anything of his—which is not exactly accurate, come to think of it, because I was already married before I graduated from the university. But the main thing about that time in my life is that I was poor.

Why didn’t I bother to read Sōseki before then? I really can’t remember, but perhaps the biggest reason is that, from my early teens, I was obsessed with foreign fiction and simply never bothered to read Japanese novels. Another reason might be that I had not been much moved by the Sōseki novels we read in school (the problem there being with the choice of works, perhaps). Then again, during the turbulent 1960s, when I was in my teens, the reading of Sōseki was not fashionable: it won you no admiration or praise. That was the age of revolution and counter-culture, the time of Che Guevara and Jimi Hendrix. Nowadays, of course, Natsume Sōseki is the representative modern Japanese novelist, a figure of truly national stature, but his works were not all that warmly received back then, I think—at least not amongst the younger generation.

I got married in 1972 to a university classmate of mine (who remains my wife to this day). She graduated before I did and went to work as a proofreader under contract to a publishing company. I took a series of part-time jobs while attending the university a few days a week to earn the remaining credits I needed to graduate—clerking in a record store, waiting on tables, that sort of thing. And when I had time, I did housework—laundry, cooking, cleaning, shopping, taking care of the cats. I was a kind of house-husband. It was a hard way to live, but I didn’t mind it too much, except for the fact that we didn’t have enough money to buy books.

We were, as I said, poor, or perhaps I should say that we were trying hard not to spend money. We were planning to open a little jazz club. For us, leading secure lives by taking respectable jobs with respectable companies was simply not an option. It didn’t interest us. And so the two of us worked hard and saved our money. If we couldn’t afford a gas stove, we made it through the cold nights by sleeping with our cats, all huddled together. If the alarm clock broke, we couldn’t buy a new one. But we were young and healthy and eager, and we had a goal.

Not being able to buy books, though: that was hard. Far from buying them, we often found ourselves having to sell some of the books we owned just to make ends meet. In those days (not so much anymore), I absolutely devoured books. I would hurry from one book to the next as if in a race with time. I felt it was the only way I could go on living, which is why not being able to buy new books was as painful and constricting to me as not being able to breathe fresh air.

Soon I found myself having to reread my books. And when I had no more books left to read a second time, I started reading the books that remained in my wife’s bookcase. She had majored in Japanese literature, so she owned quite a number of books I had never read. Among them were two sets of “Complete Works” that piqued my curiosity: one belonging to the poet Miyazawa Kenji (1896–1933) and the other the Complete Works of Natsume Sōseki. My wife had originally planned to write her graduation thesis on Miyazawa Kenji. She saved her money and bought the complete works, but somewhere along the way she gave up on writing about Miyazawa (I’m not sure why) and switched to Sōseki. A friend of hers had used the Sōseki set to write a graduation thesis and no longer needed the books, so my wife was able to buy them cheaply. It was the height of practicality. She also owned a number of books by the novelist Tanizaki Jun’ichirō (1886–1965), the eleventh-century classic The Tale of Genji, and the publisher Iwanami’s World Literature for Boys and Girls. These were all very different from my own literary tastes, but at least there was no overlap—none at all.

Since I had nothing else to read, I turned to these books in my spare time, though without much enthusiasm. Miyazawa Kenji, I have to say in all honesty, did not do much for me, nor could I see—in those days, at least—anything to like about The Tale of Genji. Sōseki and Tanizaki, though, were not so bad. And so it came about that the novels of Sōseki and Tanizaki always bring back to me scenes from my life as a poverty-stricken newly-wed at the age of twenty-two. Our place was cold indoors, and the water in the kitchen sink was usually frozen on winter mornings. The alarm clock was broken, so if I wanted to know the time I had to go peek at the clock out in front of the tobacco shop at the bottom of the hill (I still smoked back then). We had a large window facing south, so at least there was plenty of sunshine coming in, but the National Railways’ Chūō Line ran by just below the window, which made it horribly noisy (on a par with Dan Aykroyd’s apartment next to the elevated railway in the movie Blues Brothers). When there was a strike and the National Railways stopped running for twenty-four hours, most people were greatly inconvenienced, but it gave us pure relief. We used to have long freight trains running by until the sun came up.

This, then, was the setting in which I read Sōseki’s works, which is why, for me, they are permeated with memories of reading while stretched out in the sunshine and hearing the roar of passing express trains. Of course the sun wasn’t always pouring in, but that is the impression that remains the strongest. The cats would lie next to me, sleeping. I didn’t read all of Sōseki’s works at the time but chose the most important ones, some of which I liked better than others. My favorite novels were the three that compose his so-called “first trilogy,” Sanshirō, Sore kara (And Then), and Mon (“The Gate”). I especially remember the strong sense of identification I felt with Mon, the story of a young married couple living in far-from-ideal circumstances.

For me, Sōseki’s apparently most popular novel, Kokoro, left something to be desired, and while I did enjoy the late works so widely praised for their psychological insight, I could never fully identify with the deep anguish of the modern intellectual depicted in them. “What’s the point of going on and on about this?” I would often feel. In that sense, I’m probably a bit removed from the “mainstream” Sōseki reader. There is no doubt, however, that the “Sōseki experience” I had at that time, belated though it was, remains firmly rooted within me to this day, and that, whenever I have a chance to reread Sōseki’s novels, I am always struck by how fine they are. Sōseki is always the name that first comes to mind when someone asks me who my favorite Japanese author is.

By the time I had my “Sōseki experience,” the student movement was already past its most ferocious peak, and the mood was heading swiftly toward something more tranquil. The university campuses were still full of huge signboards scrawled with political slogans, but the possibility of revolution had simply evaporated (not that it was there to begin with, of course), and hopes for reform were swiftly fading. The banners of idealism had mostly been furled. Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, and Jim Morrison were dead. In this somewhat listless, dead-end atmosphere, the worlds of writers like Sōseki and Tanizaki may have been taking on a new meaning once again. We could almost feel it in the skin. Or at least, that is how it seems to me looking back from my current vantage point. In any case, this was my first genuine encounter with Sōseki.

In terms of my own feeling, Sanshirō was the right novel to be reading on a sunny veranda. Confused though he may be, the protagonist generally has his eyes trained on the future. His face is tilted slightly upward, and broad skies open up before him. This is the kind of impression the book gives. And in fact, the novel’s characters are constantly looking at the sky, descriptions of which figure prominently in the narrative.

Novels like this are rare among Sōseki’s works—or perhaps I should say they are virtually non-existent. Most of his protagonists face real-life contradictions. They experience anguish over how they ought to live, and are confronted with real-life decisions that are being forced upon them. They struggle earnestly to find where they stand amid the competing demands of the pre-modern and the modern, between love and morality, between the West and Japan. They don’t seem to have the freedom to spend time gazing up at the sky. Instead, the characters who appear in Sōseki’s other novels all seem to be looking at the ground as they walk. The protagonists of the late novels, especially, appear to the reader to be suffering with severe stomach pains just as the author himself actually did (though, strangely enough, Sōseki’s pen never lost its natural quality of humor).

The protagonist of Sanshirō, however, is different. He, too, is unable to find his proper place amid dislocated circumstances, but he never fully confronts those circumstances as a problem within himself. Instead, he accepts them in a relatively natural way, with a young man’s particular kind of nonchalant resignation, as something entirely external to himself. “Oh, well, that’s how it goes,” he seems to say. Stomach pain has not yet entered his world. I think that Sanshirō is a personal favorite of mine because it depicts this natural functioning of the young protagonist’s psyche in an utterly mellifluous style. Sanshirō watches life sweeping him along the same way he looks at clouds sailing through the sky. The free movement of his gaze draws us in almost before we know it, and we forget to view him critically.

Of course, such a carefree, detached style of life cannot go on forever. The person may stand back and declare “I have decided nothing,” but this only remains possible during one short—and possibly happy—stage of life. Eventually, like it or not, one must bear the burdens of responsibility, and once that happens, the cloud-gazing must come to an end. This is what happens to Daisuke, the protagonist of Sōseki’s next novel, And Then, and with even greater severity to Sōsuke, the protagonist of the following work, “The Gate”. Together, the books comprise a trilogy, which Sōseki completed as serialized newspaper novels in the short space of three years, depicting with absolute mastery the youth—and the end of youth—of young intellectuals living in the Meiji era. We could probably call the three novels “The Growing Up Trilogy.” Sōseki’s own growth as a writer during those three years was almost shockingly swift, like a movie on fast-forward.

But let me get back to Sanshirō. The protagonist of this novel is still in the pre-dawn of life. He is unaware of the burdens he will eventually have to bear, and this lack of awareness is precisely what makes him Sanshirō: a young man who still has the time to look up at the sky and gaze at the clouds in all innocence. We see here not anguish but omens of anguish to come, of suffering that still has no concrete form. Sōseki is in no hurry in this novel. He is not pushing Sanshirō from behind, urging him to move ahead, forcing him toward anguish or defeat before his time. He neither criticizes him nor praises him. Sōseki merely allows Sanshirō to be Sanshirō, and he paints him as he is, with free and leisurely strokes, and here is where we see the author Sōseki in all his greatness.

When I first read Sanshirō at the age of twenty-two, I, too, had little sense of the burdens to come. I was newly married, still a student. However poor my daily existence might be, however noisy the trains rushing by, I was still sprawling in the sunshine with two soft, warm cats sleeping nearby.

The Music School