著者

Key Margaret

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.25, pp.39-48, 2002-03-01

---

Critics have frequently noted Abe Kôbô's technique of building a story around a single concrete object, such as a mask or a map, used metaphorically. What is often overlooked, however, is that in many of Abe's novels the object functions not merely as a concrete representation of a certain theme within the novel, but also as a meta-fictional representation of the text itself, in particular, of the relationship between the reader and the text. The central object in Hako otoko is a cardboard box with a peephole, whose formal characteristics give rise to the novel's central thematic of seeing and being seen and of concealing and revealing. At the meta-fictional level, the box is manifested as a three-dimensional puzzle box, or "Chinese box," reflecting the complex narrative structure of multiple, overlapping plots. By focusing on the figure of the box as puzzle or mystery, this paper will consider Hako otoko as an anti-detective novel: a novel that frustrates the reader's desire to solve the mystery of the text. I will discuss the mysteries hidden within the box at the textual and meta-fictional levels and their ultimate indeterminability.In Hako otoko the reader's desire is directed at uncovering the identity of the box man who writes, “Inside my box, I am writing a record of a box man.” As the narrative progresses, however, the reader realizes not only that the box man is a murderer, but also that he is writing the text that the reader is reading in order to conceal evidence of the murder. Consequently, the mystery of the man inside the box becomes, at the meta-fictional level, the mystery of the man outside the box, that is, the author of the text. By examining Abe's use of elements of detective fiction, such as the search for the solution to a mystery and the revelation of hidden truths, both within the narrative and in the interaction between the reader and the text, this paper will bring attention to the meta-fictional nature of Abe's literary project.

著者

Vincent Keith

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.35, pp.137-155, 2012-03-31

---

This presentation is drawn from a book I am about to publish on what I call “homosocial narratives” in modern Japanese literature. In these texts (such as Natsume Soseki’s Kokoro and Mori Ogai’s Gan), desire between men was not so much rendered “taboo” (as it was in the West) but rather relegated to and contained within the past, both on an individual level-within the period of adolescence, and on the collective level-as something that belonged in the museum of “history.” In the book’s last chapter I discuss Mishima’s Confessions of A Mask as both a late-perhaps even the last-example of such a “homosocial narrative” and as an early example of what would later be known as “homosexual literature.” Mishima’s novel is thus a text that straddles two distinct moments in the history of sexuality in Japan, while also reminding us of what Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick has called the “unrationalized co-existence” (合理的な説明のつかない共存) within many literary texts of otherwise historically distinct understandings of sexuality. In this presentation I discuss how Mishima’s surprisingly paradoxical narrative strategy of writing an “I-novel in the first person” serves simultaneously to contain his narrator’s desire for other men within the past, while also keeping it alive in the present.

著者

斉藤 愛

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.24, pp.105-122, 2001-03-01

---

The view of race is the conceptualization of eyes to a body different from his own. In Japan, the oldest map of human race of the world is one attached to the world map of Nanban sekaizu byôbu. It was produced by the first contact with European culture, and the interests in the different races and the world were kept by creating blockprinted Bankoku Jimbutsu-zu pictures or books, for example, Bankoku Jimbutsu-zu, even during the Edo era when people had the very limited information because of Japan's policy of isolation. And, apart from European culture, the form of knowledge originated from Shanhai-jing of China bore fruit of encyclopedias such as Wakan Sansai Zue (Encyclopedia of Japan and China).What greatly changed the genealogy was a series of political changes starting with the arrival of American ships in the late period of the feudal government. In the meantime the demand for international information burst and enlightening texts on foreign countries, the world maps and the pictorial books of the race in the world were published along with the changes above. The opening of a port in Yokohama in this situation and setting the residential area attracted incredible attention, and Yokohama ukiyo-e in which foreigners were drawn became a widespread fad.Meiji government was established afterward and Japan's modern times which followed Western culture had begun. The first opportunity to lead the era was the campaign for enlightenment by Fukuzawa Yukichi and others. The enlightening books released in succession made the far more precise knowledge about the world's civilization, region and race than one in the previous age popular and the gap between them which is the concept of cultural hierarchy also became well known. Because of this the outlook on the world was rearranged to be a vertical ladder of evolution with western culture on top, Asia at middle, Africa at bottom and Japan was directed to desperately climb up the ladder checking on its position all the time.I would like to follow the changes continuously happened until the birth of modern Japanese view of the race referring to Nanban sekaizu byôbu, Yokohama ukiyo-e, enlightening books in Meiji and the pictures in Kanagaki Robun's book.

著者

寺田 澄江

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.27, pp.69-80, 2004-03-01

---

From the Ancient to the Middle age, the fundamental poetical structure progressively shifts from a linear discourse, represented by “pillow word (makura kotoba)” or “introductive word (jo-kotoba)”, to a “compositive” one, illustrated by “associated words (engo)”. This evolution in the discourse strategy takes form, in terms of waka’s versification, the establishment of a very clear double structure―splitten into kami no ku (l7syllables) and shimo no ku (14syllables)―which is related itself with the development of the short linked poetry (tan renga) in the later Heian period. This marginal poetical category, generally treated as a simple transitive form between the waka and the linked poetry, has its part in the important changes in the organization principle of the waka.Minamoto no Toshiyori, to whom the originality in the composition was his great concern, devoted himself to the short linked poetry, considering it as a sole poetical form which one can be proud of among the literary works of his time. According to Kenshô, he difined himself as follows:“I’m not a poem teller (or poem singer: uta yomi) but a poem maker (uta tsukuri). I mean, what I do is, rather than regarding fine effects (fuzei), combining exquisite words and structuring them.”I will try to clarify in what way Toshiyori’s keen concern to the originality is related with this manifesto-- a very expression of the “compositive” discourse-- and with his interest to the short linked poetry.

著者

Williams Mark

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.29, pp.163-171, 2006-03-01

---

During the course of the past century, Japan confronted the whole gamut of historical, political and economic experience - and this has made the question of what makes a person ‘Japanese’ an important area of intellectual endeavor. In this paper, I shall be examining the various ways in which Japanese authors of the twentieth century have approached the task of defining the ‘Self’ - through an examination of the various ‘Others’ they have established for this purpose. Broadly speaking, these can be divided into three categories : ‘external Others’ (i.e. those established by authors confronting the world beyond Japan’s boundaries: e.g. Nagai Kafû, Endô Shûsaku, Yokomitsu Riichi, etc. ); ‘internal Others’ (i.e. those whose identities are often constructed in terms of being Other to some Japanese ‘norm’: e.g. the burakumin, those of ambivalent sexualities, those left behind by the ‘economic miracle’, the deracinated postwar population, zainichi-Kankokujin writers, and women writers). Finally, I shall consider the possibility of some liminal, middle ground-by examining those who are not ethnically Japanese but who have at some time assumed or been forced to assume a Japanese identity due to historical circumstance (e.g. Okinawan literature, zainichi literature, Taiwanese literature written in Japanese). By exploring the nature of the Japanese identity these authors have assumed, we are returned, whether consciously or not, to a consideration of the cultural identity of Japan.

著者

中村 哲郎

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.3, pp.55-64, 1980-02-01

---

The contact of kabuki and Westerners started long ago at the end of the sixteenth century. And then after the opening of Japan to the West towards the end of the nineteenth century, the art form that the average Westerner first knew as “the theater of Japan“ was kabuki―not noh, a formalized art form with a limited audience, one for the ruling classes.However, the Western intellectuals who visited Japan in the mid-Meiji period and saw both kabuki and noh and then evaluated their quality as art forms leaned overwhelmingly towards noh, and in the twentieth century this tendency became ever more pronounced. Even within Japan, in the late Meiji periud opinions such as N atsume Soseki’s famous pro-noh and anti-kabuki stand were heard. He wrote,“I don’t hesitate to declare a performance vulgar. In contrast to this, noh can be thought of as creating a pure world separate from this everyday mundane one; it is played honestly and straightforwardly.”Thus East and West displayed a united front in this matter.In this paper the author has examined why this should have been so. In their first encounter with modern Westerners neither kabuki ―emblematic of the Edo popular arts― nor the bunraku puppet theater nor Japanes traditional music and dance gave rise to such fervent and devoted admirers as those for noh like Fenollosa or Perry. It is safe to say that, in comparison with the case of noh, there was not even one single Western intellectual in the modern age who truly loved kabuki wholeheartedly. We can probably attribute this to modern Western man, with his yardstick of individualism for judging art , finding it difficult to grasp the essence of many aspects of a riotous popular theater form like Kabuki and thereby being unable to have a genuine spiritual response to it. In this way, a substantial enconter between kabuki and modern Westerners has had to wait until recent times. It is only very recently that some Western recearchers in the dramatic arts have come to realize the fundamental character of noh and kabuki: if noh is Grecian and Apollonian , then kabuki is Roman and Dionysian.Even today a fixed attitude of disdain towards kabuki remains among a minority of intellectuals in the West, and this can be considered as one cause of the disparity that can be seen in both quality and quantity between noh research and that into kabuki in the West today and of the scanty numbers of speciali sts in Edo literature as well.

著者

ツゥリト ジョン

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.4, pp.24-33, 1981-02-01

---

The tradition of diary literature, nikki bungaku, is a long and distinguished one within Japanese letters. Critical attention, however, has focused on classical diarists and not those of modern times. lbuse Masuji (bn. 1898) is one such present-day writer whose diaries, both his own and those kept by his fictional characters, are of interest not only for what they reveal about the author himself, but for what they may imply about the very nature of the genre.Ibuse’s own personal diaries frequently recall ―and in a sense, thus memorialize and revive― his unusually numerous friends and relatives who died premature deaths. lbuse’s diaries may be a means of expiating a kind of guilt he experiences as their survivor ; a guilt more fully explored in his fictional diaries, the most notable of which is Shigematsu's in Black Rain (Kuroi ame). Here, a survivor of the atomic holocaust in Hiroshima attempts to conceptualize, and thereby master, the trauma of the bomb by rewriting years later his brief diary of August, 1945.In conclusion, diaries, which by their periodic entries come to resemble a ritual, serve to bring a disorderly or even incomprehensible external world under the control of the writer's literary and recreative act.

著者

劉 穎

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.34, pp.141-153, 2011-03-31

---

“Zhinang (Chinou)” is a book of contriving schemes of the ancient compiled by Feng Menglong in late Chinese Ming dynasty. Although some things have been pointed out about acceptance of this book in early modern Japan, no systematic arrangement and general analysis have been made.In literature, kana-zoushi “CHIE-KAGAMI” (1660) by Tsujihara Genpo is based on this book. It is pointed out that “CHIE-KAGAMI” exerted more than a little influence on Ihara Saikaku and Ejima Kiseki’s ukiyo-zoushi, which, however, I must say was an indirect influence from “Zhinang”. In fact, this book and early modern Japanese literature have an intimate relation. For instance, excerpts from this book are confirmed in similar books published in Japan such as “Kunmou-koji-yougen” and “Yugu-zuihitsu”. Also, as to yomihon “Aoto-Fujitsuna-moryouan” by Kyokutei Bakin, several ideas in his works are considered to be based on this book and his works are deeply related to this book in terms of composition as well.On the other hand, until now, acceptance of “Zhinang” has been little mentioned in other areas except in literature. Now, I want to look at how this book has been accepted in the fields of education and academia in early modern Japan.National Diet Library houses a manuscript called “Chinou-kikigaki” copied by Confucian scholar Nakai Riken which is believed to be an explanatory booklet for this book. One fifth of “Choushou-ian” compiled by other Confucian scholar Tsusaka Touyou in the late Edo period was written based on this book. It shows the Confusion scholars’ high level of interest in this book. The reasons are not only the contents of the book, but also it seems to be affected by the fact that Feng Menglong was a Yangming Xue scholar.The publication of this book in Japan compiled by a Confucian scholar Ikai Keisho was a milestone in the history of its acceptance (1821). Then, the book became widely read and known than before. People began to acknowledge the value of the book gradually and the feudal government's school Shouhei-kou published the book as the government publication, and the Hiroshima Domain and the Yoshimi Domain followed suit. That shows the usefulness of this book as a textbook.Therefore, when we think about the history of acceptance, we must recognize the two sides of the book; one is the literary side providing materials and ideas to similar books in Japan, ukiyo-zoushi and yomihon, and the other is the educational side teaching knowledge and tenets to Confucian scholars.

著者

Chironov Segey

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.25, pp.49-56, 2002-03-01

---

In order to describe the common points between Tarkovsky and Ôe we shall see Ôe's piece of short fiction, Stalker, where he deals directly with Tarkovsky's film by the same name. Stalker being based on an SF novel by Strugatskys, and also taking into account Ôe's own interest in science fiction, it is possible to draw a parallel between. both artists' preoccupation with problems modern science fiction poses, nuclear/environmental crisis of humanity foremost among those.Ôe's attention in Stalker is primarily drawn to the figure of the Stalker, or the Guide, himself. Messiah-viewed by the director, Stalker is related to the New Brother Gi, the Saviour in Ôe's Green Tree Aflame. Both are strongly conscious of the Way=Salvation motif. Now, Tarkovsky's typical Village, sought by Stalker in a postenvironmental- collapse Zone, is the same “place where to return to” or “the base” as the “little valley” of Ôe's works. There is also a parallelism between the wandering and quest by the heroes of Tarkovsky's films ― and “departure”, march in Ôe's fiction. Both artists pay special attention to the motif of mistaken departure/choice of the route, while in the discussions about the Way conducted by the heroes works by the artists of the world are widely referred to. The difficulties of the Way are also used to stress Stalker's and Gi's suffering and weakness which in turn are related to the eventual failure of Messiahs in both cases.In the focus of Ôe's attention in Stalker is also Stalker's mentally handicapped daughter. To both artists such people are “scales” where the struggling forces of Evil and Good are poised. Ôe, who had dealt with the question of whether a mentally disabled child is Christ or Antichrist as early as in his Personal Matter, accepts the apparition of the Stalker's daughter as the Second coming. Later, in Green Tree Aflame, he will revert to the phenomenon of psychic abnormalities in the example of Gi, endowed with healing ability and exercising power of will to prevent an environmental catastrophe.Ôe's interest in Stalker's family in general is connected to his preoccupation with problems of death and generation change. Both he and Tarkovsky are inclined to view these in the light of the cyclical history concept. In Green Tree Aflame Ôe is introducing his son, Hikari, and seeing him off to an independent existence―which can explain the cry of joy ("Rejoice!") the book closes upon. It is in the same way that Ôe approaches Stalker's daughter who, in his opinion, will grow into a still more powerful Guide―thus showing more optimism than Tarkovsky.The selfsame problem both artists deal with here is how to overcome death/crisis of humanity and break through into the future. Both treat this, to a certain extent, along the lines of Christianity, only it would have been impossible for Tarkovsky to follow too close in religion's steps for all the Soviet influence he had to go along with, and neither is Ôe a “believer in one specific god”. Both would rather search for the solution in the depths of the world culture, trying to bring up as much of it as possible. But then another problem arises―the inability of a modern man to fully accept culture he is vested with. Looking at what Ôe suggests in order to cope with that should be a topic for future studies.

著者

Lidin Olof G

出版者

国文学研究資料館

雑誌

国際日本文学研究集会会議録 = PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE (ISSN:ISSN0387)

巻号頁・発行日

no.6, pp.96-107, 1983-03-01

---

In 1706 Ogyū Sorai went for his lord, Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu, to Kai Province. During the journey he wrote a travel chronicle, together with his companion Tanaka Shōgo, which was presented to Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu upon return to Edo. Four years later (1710) Ogyū Sorai revised this chronicle, made it shorter, and gave it the title Kyōchūkikō. The title of the first version was Fūryūshishaki.The Fūryūshishaki and Kyōchūkikō were Ogyū Sorai's first literary works. Before 1706 we do not find much written by him. In a certain sense they were also his last literary works. Most of his later writings were in philosophy, political science, military matters, and other academic fields. At 40 years of age Ogyū Sorai began his literary career by writing a travelogue in which he showed his rich personality as in no later academic work. Unfortunately, he never again tried his hand at this sort of literature.In the study of Ogyū Sorai the Fūryūshishaki and the Kyōchūkikō are the natural starting-point. From there one can continue with his philosophical works and perhaps finish with his political work Seidan, which he wrote late in life.