sirena
08-Jul-2010, 16:55
Naoya Shiga (1883-1971) was a Japanese writer of the Taishō period.
It?s a story about a young, sensitive writer, Kensaku Tokito, who spends majority of his time in tea houses with his friends and geishas, visiting the secluded Shinto temples in mountains and searching for a wife. Kensaku isn?t happy with his life style and imagines that everything will improve when he finally gets married.
As an adult, he finds out that his grandfather, on his father side, who he never liked, isn?t his grandfather at all, but his real father, because Kensaku?s mother had had a brief affair with ?grandpa? when the alleged father had been away on business. When ?father? had found out, he had forgiven the mother everything. However, when the mother had died, Kensaku, at age of 6, was ?shipped? to live with his ?grandfather?...
Another interesting character is Kensaku?s half-brother Nobojuki, who leaves his job to be a student of Zen, because he doesn?t want to be somebody?s clerk to the rest of his life.
The most interesting part of the novel is Kensaku?s thoughts of (in)mortality according to which we all know that the humankind would vanish, however, that understanding doesn?t bring desperation in our everyday lives. Although we recognize the inevitability of human end, we choose to ignore it. Instead we rabidly fight for progress, because, maybe, we have a hope that a human, somewhere, somehow, will find a way to avoid his destiny.
It?s a story about a young, sensitive writer, Kensaku Tokito, who spends majority of his time in tea houses with his friends and geishas, visiting the secluded Shinto temples in mountains and searching for a wife. Kensaku isn?t happy with his life style and imagines that everything will improve when he finally gets married.
As an adult, he finds out that his grandfather, on his father side, who he never liked, isn?t his grandfather at all, but his real father, because Kensaku?s mother had had a brief affair with ?grandpa? when the alleged father had been away on business. When ?father? had found out, he had forgiven the mother everything. However, when the mother had died, Kensaku, at age of 6, was ?shipped? to live with his ?grandfather?...
Another interesting character is Kensaku?s half-brother Nobojuki, who leaves his job to be a student of Zen, because he doesn?t want to be somebody?s clerk to the rest of his life.
The most interesting part of the novel is Kensaku?s thoughts of (in)mortality according to which we all know that the humankind would vanish, however, that understanding doesn?t bring desperation in our everyday lives. Although we recognize the inevitability of human end, we choose to ignore it. Instead we rabidly fight for progress, because, maybe, we have a hope that a human, somewhere, somehow, will find a way to avoid his destiny.