The Society for Japanese Studies

A Scene from Soseki's Meian Author(s): Edwin McClellan Reviewed work(s): Source: Journal of Japanese Studies, Vol. 25, No. 1 (Winter, 1999), pp. 107-120 Published by: The Society for Japanese Studies Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/133356 . Accessed: 10/12/2012 12:44
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PERSPECTIVES

EDWIN McCLELLAN

A Scene from Soseki'sMeian

Abstract:This essay describes S6seki's darkvision of modernJapanesesociety, which he sees as becoming increasinglydominatedby a materialisticand manipulativebourgeoisie. In this context, it presents a translationwith commentary of one of the most memorablescenes in the novel Meian where two young men, former classmates-one an aloof, conventional, middle-class company man and the othera poor, embittered,strugglingjournalist-end up in a barand engage in a conversationthat consists mostly of the journalist'sdrunkentirade againstthe injustices done by the bourgeoisieto the poor, and which is listened to with little interestby his more affluentcompanion.S6seki shows no marked sympathy for either, for he sees both as products of what is finally a society withoutmuch possibility of love or kindness.

In an introductory essay on S6seki published almost 40 years ago, and in the later version of it that became part of a book,' I left Meian out of my discussion of Soseki's major works; I thought it a technically accomplished work but too much a display of that technical mastery he had acquired through his all-too-brief career as a novelist. It was an ill-judged decision on my part, to ignore what so many more mature students of Soseki believed was not only his finest work, but probably the great modern Japanese novel. While I still have some serious reservations about Meian, I believe that I seriously misjudged it. I still suffer moments of considerable depression and a sense of oppressive tedium when rereading some of the passages. Now, however, I am more and more aware of the brilliance of S6seki's language and of the precision with which he examines the inner thoughts of his
This is the text of the first Andrew MarkusMemorialLecture,given at the Universityof Washingtonin May 1998. A preliminaryversion of this paperwas presentedas the lecture at the AnnualDinnerof the Associates of the Edwin0. ReischauerInstituteat Harvard University in October 1997. 1. "An Introduction to Soseki," HarvardJournal of Asiatic Studies, Vol. 22 (December 1959), pp. 150-208.
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charactersas they confrontone anotherand engage in destructiveor selfdestructiveconversationsthat are intensely manipulative,self-serving, and never free from greed or malice or passionatedesire to controlthe other,if not for personalgain then merely for the sake of controllingthat otherpermost of the book, which through son. Thereis a kind of madnessthroughout the tension that comes with it strangely relieves the sense of tedium and even lifts the readerout of the mediocrityof mere depression.The madness is certainly not in Soseki, but in the ugly middle- or upper-middle-class worldof late Meiji andearly TaishoTokyo.It is in his vision of this madness that I find Soseki's uniquebrilliance,his kind of political awarenessthatis so rare among Meiji novelists and overall more complex than even Mori Ogai's or FutabateiShimei's or TokudaShusei's. A Japanesestudentonce said to me thatwhen readingMeian she sometimes had the uncannyfeeling she was readingin a translated language.Her perceptionsuggests the originalityand analyticalcomplexity of the narrative passages that comment on the motives and the unconscious urges behind the words being spoken and the innerresponsesof the one being spoken to. Layer after layer of intendedand unintendedmeaning is described of the speakers and in thatdescriptionthe manipulativeness by the narrator, becomes so psychologically complex thatthe readermust strugglethrough a maze of unfamiliarvocabularyand construction,of metaphorsthat seem so alien in Japanese,until one begins to yearn for the grace, accessibility, and the rhythmsof Soseki's prose of even the immediatelyprecedingnovel, Michikusa(Grasson the Wayside, 1915). In the 1994 Iwanamiedition, the novel is 685 pages long. For600 pages, it takes place in Tokyo, and by far the larger part of this is taken up by the conversationsdevoted dialogue, with much of the prose that interrupts to commentaryon what is being said and minute and revealingdescription of the gesturesand facial expressionsof the speakers.After that,in the last 85 pages, the reader is at last freed from the claustrophobicinteriorsof Tokyo when the main male character,Tsuda, goes to an unnamed hot afteran operation.The reader's springsresortin the mountainsto recuperate relief is short-lived,however, for Soseki died before he could finish the novel, in 1916. Let me briefly describe the more importantcharactersin the novel. Tsuda is portrayedas a handsomeman, presumablya universitygraduate; he is 30 and has recently marriedOnobu, in her early 20s, niece-in-law of Mr. Okamoto,who is a friendof Tsuda'semployer,Mr. Yoshikawa,who in turnknows Tsuda'sfather.Both Tsuda'sfatherand Onobu'slive in Kyoto, though Tsuda's father is a Tokyo man by birth. There is anothermiddleaged couple, the Fujiis. Mr. Fujii is Tsuda's uncle and is acquaintedwith Mr. Okamoto.Thereis also Tsuda'ssister,Ohide, who lived with the Fujiis when going to school in Tokyo and is very close to them. She is a beauty and is marriedto a rich playboy,Hori, who had picked her for her looks.

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The circle of friends, acquaintances,and relations form a kind of controlling or interferingworld from which the young couple who are the central figures of the novel, Tsuda and Onobu,can hardlyhope to escape. It is a bourgeois world where money and the power thatmoney brings shapethe relationshipsbetween brotherand sister,between son, daughter,and father, between fatherand uncle, betweenTsudaandhis employer,Mr.Yoshikawa, and even more frighteningly,between Tsuda and the bored, childless Mrs. Yoshikawa.One can say thatthey are all middle class, but that term covers all mannerof creaturesbig and small, and there is a lot of devouringgoing on here. Mrs. Yoshikawafinds in Tsuda, her husband'shandsomeand respectful employee, a kind of pet she can frighten and coddle at will. Tsuda is constantly on guard with her, gauging her mood with a mixture of extreme shrewdnessand sweaty uncertainty.She is intelligent and equally shrewd, and can see throughTsuda withouteffort. But for her, like and dislike have little to do with self-respect or the lack of it in her plaything, and she has chosen more or less to like Tsuda. Tsuda's father, formerly a fairly successful civil servant now turned landlordin his retirement,is a friend of Mr. Yoshikawa.But this does not make Tsuda a social equal of the Yoshikawas-which he might have been in a more secure world-for the simple reasonthathis fatherisn't as rich as Yoshikawa,and he himself can hardlymake ends meet, especially when his fatherturnsmean on him and refuses to send him extra spendingmoney. Just how much money mattersto Tsuda himself over and above its cawhen we learn thatat the pacity to keep one comfortablebecomes apparent time of his marriageto Onobuhe had deliberatelymisled her abouthis family's financialstatus,thus inevitablycomplicatingtheirrelationship. Onobu appearsa strongerperson than Tsuda, and Soseki makes clear that, for her, it is her husband'slove thatmattersabove everythingelse. But money becomes the issue in their lives for much of the novel that Soseki has left us, for in the world she has been broughtup in and has grown into, the people aroundher have made money an inseparablepart of every aspect of their relationships,so that even if she herself is not at heart avaricious, as some others too in her world are not, she must rely on money and other materialpossessions to win or at least survive her bitter skirmishes with her sister-in-lawOhide and Mrs. Yoshikawa,who have both taken a dislike to her. In Michikusa,the largely autobiographical novel that precededMeian, one of the main themes is the way people try to possess others, including children,by giving them things, or try to be repaidfor things they claim to have given in the past, includinglove. In Michikusa,giving and takinggifts of one kind or anotherbecomes also a metaphorfor staving off decay and death. Mrs. Yoshikawa,a plump and somehow overpoweringlysexual person,

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in fact does enjoy possessing others. She had before Tsuda's marriageto Onobu been responsible for bringing Tsuda and anotheryoung woman, Kiyoko, together,and Tsuda, with Mrs. Yoshikawa's blessing, had come to take for grantedthat he and Kiyoko were to get married.But suddenly, withoutwarning,Kiyoko had left Tsuda and marriedanotherman, Seki. It was soon after this that Tsuda marriedthe niece-in-law of Mr. Okamoto, Mr. Yoshikawa's friend. The Yoshikawashad acted as sponsorsof the marBut riage. despite this seeming assuranceof her approval,Mrs. Yoshikawa has come to dislike Onobu, partly,no doubt, because of her assertiveness and exceptionalintelligence. The marriageis not a bad one, but it is marredby Tsuda'smoney problems and by his inabilityto cease being hauntedby the memoryof Kiyoko's desertionof him. Onobuhas never been told of her husband'searlieraffair, but suspects that something of the sort had happenedand that it is being kept a secret from her by Tsuda, his sister, his uncle and aunt, and Mrs. Yoshikawa.It is indeed a conspiracy,and Onobuis tormentedby her sense of its presence. Very soon after Tsuda's operation Mrs. Yoshikawainforms him that Kiyoko has had a miscarriageand has gone to a certainhot springs resort WouldTsudanot wantto go therehimself, she asks. It would to recuperate. his recovery,and would he also not like to see Kiyoko again?And of help she will give him the money to pay for the trip. course, It is a wicked little plot-the motivesbehindwhich Soseki leaves for us to imagine-and what is even worse is that it does not take Tsuda long to offer. Onobu,ignorantof Kiyoko'sexisdecide to acceptMrs. Yoshikawa's tence and, of course, of her expected presence at the resort, insists on accompanyingher husbandon the trip, but is finally coaxed into staying behind in Tokyo. The last part of the novel, then, describes Tsuda's arrivalat the resort, even ghostly scene, and his subsequentencounsomehow an other-worldly, ter in a dark corridorof the inn with Kiyoko, who is shocked to find him staringat her from the bottom of a flight of stairs and rushes back into her room. Having regainedher calm by the following morning, she agrees to see him in her room. That is where S6seki leaves us. It is unclearhow he meantto finish his story. In this bourgeoisworld, thatis, in the context of Soseki's descriptionof it, Mrs. Yoshikawa'smachinationsor Tsuda'sacquiescence,or Mr. Yoshikawa's arrogantuse of his power, or Tsuda's sister Ohide's capacity for hatredand resentmentof her own brotherand his wife Onobu, her use of money in her attemptto subjugatethem, begin to seem not so horrid.For most of the people in the novel, thereis little personalmorality,little sense of standardsto live up to independentof pride of place or fear of losing one's place. There is hardly any humility or generosity of spirit; there is

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constantwatchfulness,constantquestioningof others' motives, and if there is one rarequality for which one can admireOnobu, it is her convictioneven thoughnow married-that thereis the possibility of being trulyloved by her husband. In most other respects, however, she is a pretty ruthless woman. How else would she survive, given the people that surroundher? Throughoutmuch of Soseki's career,he could be counted on to give us at least some comic relief-and he could be very funny when he wantedto be-but I have no recollectionof ever laughingwhen readingor translating Kokoro or Michikusa, and Meian would offer the translatorno chance of exercising what comic talent he or she might possess. In other words, his last three novels are very dark indeed, and if there is any light in them, I have not noticed it. Soseki's relentlessly pessimistic examination of the modern middle class in Tokyo allows hardlyany intrusionby membersof otherclasses. The implicationhere is that for him, the others don't particularlymatter.There is the occasional comic barberor the absent-mindedpriest in Kusamakura World, 1907), funny people aplenty-fringe academ(The Three-Cornered ics and such-in Wagahaiwa neko de aru (I Am a Cat, 1905-7), provincial plottersand climbers who are classic figuresof comedy in Botchan (1907), and of course the working class in Kofu (The Miner, 1908); but these become rarerand rareras we get towardthe later partof Soseki's careerand disappearaltogetheras remindersof otherordersof existence againstwhich the overwhelmingly present middle class can be measured or measure themselves. And what of the aristocracy?The question is whetherthey existed for Soseki as a class of any consequence in Japan, and more importantly, whether they existed at all in reality. Of course there were lots of people with titles, but were their gardenparties, for example, any less tacky than the one described in Soseki's Nowaki (AutumnWind, 1907), where Takayanagi, the shabbilydressed, almost penniless universitygraduate,wanders aboutalone andignored,overhearing rich businessmenandtheirsons sneerothers who at had come to the ing partyin the wrong sortsof Westernformal or on notes clothes, comparing Egyptian cigarettes or Havana cigars that could cost their smokers as much money per day as Takayanagi's monthly income? Thereare people in Soseki's novels who areboth privilegedby birthand nice, that is, people who are civil. But they are very few. There is the Sakai family living on high groundbehind Sosuke's house in the novel Mon (The Gate, 1911). Mr. Sakai is Sosuke's landlord.His family before the Restoration were substantialhatamoto, and presumablythey were one of those lucky upper-crustretainers of the Shogunate who had managed to keep some of theirpropertyin Edo. They are truly one of the pleasantestfamilies we find in Soseki's fiction and utterly convincing. They are pleasant-

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looking, like each other very much, laugh a lot (but not in the way Mr. Yoshikawalaughswhen entertaining guests betweenacts in a kabukitheater and are very welcoming to Sosuke whom they recognize as a restaurant), nice man despite his shabby-genteelstyle of life and his obvious loss of status due to some misfortune.Such people as the Sakais are not easy to portrayin fiction (apparentlynot for Japanesenovelists, anyway), but Soseki gets them just right. They are urbaneand at the same time kind and they have values that have no meaning for such as those straightforward; who monopolizethe stage in Meian. Anotherfamily that comes to mind in this context are the Munechikas in Gubijinso(Red Poppy, 1908). Heretoo, the family-consisting of father, andareabsolutelyat ease with son, anddaughter-find each otherattractive The Munechika has failed his each other. foreign service exam twice young is his father. When he finallydoes pass it on but is quite cheerfulaboutit, as to him the good news, then points he to his father tell his thirdtry, goes up its to his own shapeless,oversize suit way past primeandsays with elaborate courtesythat, as a young diplomatdestinedto be sent abroad,he must with the all respectreturn(the word he uses is go-henno, or "honorable return") venerablehand-me-downto his father,its rightfulowner.But when the father ponders aloud whetherhe himself could start wearing the suit again, even the lighthearted young Munechikais aghast.2 Such people become rarertowardthe later part of Soseki's careerand disappearentirely by the time we get to Meian-though Kiyoko, Tsuda's former sweetheart,may have proved to be such a person, a person whose somehow were not so materialistic,whose values could transcend standards what was immediatelyself-serving, but we don'tknow for surebecause we Soseki surely suggests that never get to know her. By their disappearance, of if rest of not the the ownership Tokyo, Japan,is in the hands of a much harsherbreed. If the Sakais and the Munechikasaren'tin Meian to remind us of the existence of benevolence and civility among the affluent,of the capacityto judge anotherquite independentlyof thatother'susefulness or power to do from the outerfringe who, because he has damage,there is still an intruder in four memorablescenes to say exan to makes nothing lose, appearance he world is. He is a disquieting thinks Tsuda's and mean how nasty actly of hate and full unclean, anger,feeding on whateverdiscomfigure,shabby, fort or fear he can inflict on Tsuda or even his wife Onobu,who really has done nothing to this man to deserve his animosity,except the fact of her being of the bourgeoisie. in the much His name is Kobayashi,a descendantof sortsof Takayanagi earlier novel Nowaki. They are both educated. We know that Takayanagi
2. The scene I have summarizedis in Chapter16 of Gubijinso.

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went to college with his rich friendNakano,the man who invites him to the dreadfulgardenparty.And from certaincasual referenceswe infer thatKobayashi also went to college with Tsuda. At any rate, both Takayanagiand both makeprecariouslivings Kobayashihave come frompoor backgrounds, by doing odd-jobeditorialand fringe literarywork, both sufferfrom a deep sense of having been betrayedby society-in other words, their education and theirintelligence have got them nowhere,they have no sense of belonging, and they hate themselves almost as much as they hate the undeservedly more fortunate.As Soseki sees them-and I would say that no Japanese novelist of the time conceived them with quite the same vividness-they are victims, orphansreally, who are dangerousbecause they have reason to hate othersand have little reasonto like themselves. Kobayashiis regularlyat the Fujiis' house doing humbleliterarychores for Mr. Fujii, Tsuda'suncle, a kind of professionalargufierwho writes social commentaryand such, lamentingthe moral and intellectualcorruption of the times. He is not a bad man, but not very attractive. His wife is a tired, aging person, who smiles knowingly and resignedly to herself most of the time. They are marvelouslydrawncharactersand, alas, not very uplifting. Kobayashi'ssisterOkin lives with them, as someone who is between a ward and a maid. The Fujiis are trying to arrangea marriagefor her at their expense, which is a kind thing to do, but given their hardenedcircumstances, the marriageis boundto be a prettyshabbyaffair.The only nice thing about Kobayashiis that he cares a great deal abouthis sister and hates to have to leave her behindin Japanwhen he leaves for Koreato workfor a newspaper. There is no job he can find in Japanthat will pay him enough, and exile to the colonies is his only hope for survival. We firstencounterhim fairly early in the novel at the Fujiis' house when Tsudagoes thereto informhis uncle and aunt-in-lawof his decision to have in a few days. Kobayashiis wearinga new surgerydone on his hemorrhoids suit, a three-piece affair made of rough homespun stuff. He had seen one like it in a department store window and, noting that it was only Y26 made to measure,had gone in andorderedone. "Terribly cheap,don'tyou think?" he says. "Of course, I've no idea how it looks to a fellow with your upmarkettastes, but it's good enough for me." He has also bought himself a new pair of shoes, gaudy brown ones that Tsuda had noticed with some when enteringthe vestibule of the house. disapproval Dinneris served.Tsuda,because of the surgeryto come, has to eat bread of the kind thatis sold only in such neighborhoodsas the one the Fujiis live in, the kind thatturnsgluey and sticks to the roof of the mouththe moment you take a bite. When the ordeal is at last over, Tsuda and Kobayashileave the house together, and now follows one of those scenes by Soseki that will always hauntme. The following is my own translation,with commentary:

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It was a windless night. The still air felt cold on their cheeks as they hurriedlywalked throughit. It seemed as if from the sky high above lit up by brightstars,dewdrops,so fine andclearthey were invisible, werecoming down. Tsuda reachedfor the shoulderof his overcoat,and as he strokedit he could feel on his fingertipsthe damp cold that seeped throughto the lining. He turnedaroundto speakto Kobayashiwalkingbehindhim. "It'swarmenoughduringtheday,butit does get cold atnight,doesn'tit?" "Well, it is autumn,afterall. Yes, it really is cold, cold enough to make me wish I had an overcoat." Kobayashi indeed was wearing nothing over his three-piece suit. He walkeddeterminedly, poundingthe pavementin his formidable,square-toed America-styleshoes, and swinging his thick walking stick in theatricaldefiance. It was as though he was leading a demonstration againstcold night air. "By the way," he said, "whatever happenedto that overcoatyou were so proudof, the one you had made when we were at college?" At firststartled, Tsuda then rememberedthe overcoatand had to admitto himself that he did rathershow it off at the time. "I still have it," he replied. "Do you still wearit?" "I may be poor, but you seriously don'tthink thatI would go aboutin a coat I wore when I was a student?It's hardlya prizedheirloom,you know." "I see. In thatcase, can I have it?" "I suppose I can let you have it if you really want it." Tsuda'stone was socks a touch cold. Back at the Fujiis' he had noticed thateven Kobayashi's were new. It didn'tmake sense that a fellow who had been so meticulous when getting himself newly outfittedshould then wantto be given someone else's old coat. It at least said somethingabout the fellow's carelessnessin mattersrelating to the materialside of life. After a while he said, "Why didn'tyou have an overcoatmade at the same time as your suit?" "Pleaserememberthatmy circumstancesare not quite like yours." "Then how did you manage to pay for that new suit and those shoes?" "This is turninginto quite an interrogation,isn't it? But don't worry,I haven'tdone anythingcriminal.There'sa limit to what even I will do." Tsudaquickly fell silent. They came to the top of a big hill. On the other side of the wide valley stretchedthe outline of a ridge, a long, black shape like the back of some monster.Here and there were lights flickeringin the autumnnight, giving out little touches of warmth. "Whydon'twe stop somewherefor a drink?"said Kobayashi. Before replyingTsuda looked at him, trying to determinehis mood. To the right of the two men was a high embankment,the top of which was covered with a thick bamboo grove. Because there was no wind the bamboos were silent; but the still leaves, looking as though in deep slumber, remindersof the melancholyof autumn. were appropriate "Whatan unpleasant,gloomy place this is," he said, trying to change the subject. "I suppose it's because all this is behind a nobleman's property nobody thinksto clear it." But Kobayashihad no interestwhatsoeverin the grove. "Come on, let's have a drinktogether,"he said. "We haven'tdone thatfor a long time."

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"But you just had a drink at the Fujiis'. Are you needing anotherso soon?" "Look, that was hardlywhat you would call drinking." "But I distinctlyheardyou saying you'd had enough." "That'sbecause I didn'twant to get drunkin frontof Mr. andMrs. Fujii. I couldn'tsay anythingelse. But to be given that small an amountto drink is in fact worse for yourhealththannot drinkingat all. I have to get decently drunknow to counterthe ill effect of thatteasing my system got earlier." He was in a mood to use any outlandishargumentto force Tsudato join him. Findinghim more and more of a nuisanceTsudafinally said with some asperity,"And you're offeringto pay, I suppose?" "I wouldn'tmind," Kobayashireplied. "And where are you proposingto go?" "Anywherewill do. An oden-ya would be perfectly all right with me." They walked down the hill in silence. To get to their respective homes directly Tsuda would turn right at the bottomand Kobayashiwould go straighton. But as Tsuda,intendingto part gracefully,touchedthe brimof his hat Kobayashibroughthis face close and as thoughpeeringthrougha hole said, "I'll go that way too." Strung along that street for two or three blocks were places offering drinksand light meals. In aboutthe middle of this neighborhoodKobayashi suddenly stopped beside a cozy-looking bar-like establishment,its glass door lit brightby the lights inside. "This looks fine. Let's go in." "I don'twant to," said Tsuda. "I'm sorry, but we won't find the kind of high-class place you like aroundhere, so let's settle for this one." "I'm ill, remember." "Never mind. I'll accept responsibilityfor your state of health, so don't worry." "Youcan'tbe serious! I don'twant to go in." "Youdon'thave to worry aboutyour wife, you know. I'll explain everything to her nicely." Not wanting to waste any more time with Kobayashi,Tsuda startedto walk away quickly. But in no time at all he found Kobayashimarchingbeside him, shoulderto shoulder,and heardhim say, in a tone more subdued and serious than before, "Is the idea of drinkingwith me that distasteful to you?" On hearing these words Tsuda, to whom the idea was indeed that distasteful, stopped immediatelyand gave a reply that totally contradictedhis inclination:"All right, let's have a drink."3 I find this scene brilliant. It is very Soseki. I can't say exactly why, but his walking-and-talking scenes are among the most memorable right from his earlier novels down to this very last one. The outdoor surroundings perhaps do something to the speakers' voices, giving them a special poignancy,
3. Soseki zenshu (Tokyo:IwanamiShoten, 1994), Vol. 11, pp. 102-6.

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or to the walking figures, making them vulnerable despite their heartiness or cruelty or perverseness. And I think it is great writing when unexpectedly Kobayashi asks that last question, "Is the idea of drinking with me that distasteful to you?" It is like a sudden change to the minor key in some music, when we find ourselves being unexpectedly moved. There are only five or six people sitting inside, but the small place seems crowded. And none of them seems to be a person of any kind of social status (Soseki's own term). At the top of the scale are men who, with their natty attire and swagger, look like low yakuza or foremen, and at the bottom is someone who looks like a rag picker and another who is clearly a common laborer. Let me now return to Soseki's own words: Pouringsake into Tsuda'scup Kobayashisaid: "It'sgood to be in a plebeianplace like this, don'tyou think?"Tsudalooked with special awareness at Kobayashi'sconspicuously new suit, which seemed to make a mockery of Kobayashi'sremark.But Kobayashihimself seemed not to see the incongruity. "Unlike you," he said, "my sympathiesare with the lower classes." He then looked aroundthe room with a fraternalair and said, "Look at them. They all have better faces than those of the upper classes." Lacking the energy to respondto Kobayashi'sremarkor to examine the faces he merely staredat his companion.Kobayashiretreated immediately. "Well, at least they do things with a certainstyle." "So can the upperclasses." "Maybe,but the styles are different." Tsuda did not deign to ask what the differencewas. Unabashed,Kobayashi continuedto refill his sake cup. "Youdespise these people, don'tyou? Right from the startyou considerthem undeservingof any kind of sympathy."Then withoutwaiting for Tsuda'sreply he turnedtowarda young man sitting at a table across the aisle and said "Isn't that right?" The young man-he looked like a milkman-much surprisedby the question thrown at him by a strangertwisted his muscularneck to take a brief look at him. Kobayashi held out his hand with his sake cup in it. "Anyway, have a drink." he was well beyond The young man grinnedsheepishly.Unfortunately, Kobayashi'sreach, and clearly thinkingthat it wasn'tworthhis while to get up to get the proffereddrinkremainedseated,still grinning.Kobayashinevthe cup he was holding and bringertheless seemed satisfied.Withdrawing ing it up to his mouth, he addressedTsuda again. "You see what I mean? Thereisn't one snob among the whole lot of them."4 What is remarkable about Soseki's conception of Kobayashi is the irony of his condition, where he is rejected by Tsuda, who sees through his sentimentality about the lower classes, and is ignored, albeit benevolently, by a member of the lower classes who instinctively knows that he is being pa4. Ibid., pp. 107-9.

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tronized by the gent in the new suit. The new suit is probably appalling, but the milkman doesn't know that. When I talk about Soseki's political acumen as a novelist, I mean such a scene as this, which goes far beyond the scope of other Japanese novels of the time. Class as an issue for the novelist is almost a nonproblem in the study of modern Japanese literature-at least in the West-partly because those who study it shy away from it-except when it concerns the samurai, chonin, the hyakusho, and such-and partly because it is indeed a question whether such a thing truly exists in Japan as an entity to be examined by a writer of S6seki's complexity. Anyway, it is remarkable how so often readers of Meian seem to see all kinds of other implications in it, when surely it is more than anything a novel about modern society and survival in it. True, Soseki did go to a Zen temple in Kamakura, and true, he did write a lot of meditative Chinese-style poetry, but that doesn't tell us very much about Meian. Except of course it is more than possible he wanted to escape from the awful world of his own making. I want now to bring us back to the bar. A moment or two after the incident with the milkman a small man in an Inverness coat comes in and sits down at a table somewhat removed from where our two friends are sitting. The Inverness coat, by the way, is not the long kind we see Sherlock Holmes wearing in the movies, but an abbreviated version that seems to have covered little more than the wearer's shoulders. S6seki writes: Still wearing his cloth cap with the brim pulled down low he gave the room a good look-aroundand then pulled out from his pocket a small, thin, notebook. He opened it and staredat the page, whetherreadingsomething or in deep thoughtit was difficultto say. He stayedexactly as he was when he sat down, not caring to remove either his cape or his cap; but he closed his notebooksoon enough and put it firmlyback in his pocket. He then took a sip from his cup and began surreptitiously to look over each of his fellow customers;and every time he moved his eyes from one to the next he would bring his hand out from under the miniaturecape and stroke his scanty mustache. The two who had become mildly curious aboutthe man and were looking at him suddenly found themselves being stared at in return. They quickly looked away andfaced each other.Kobayashileanedslightly toward Tsuda and said, "Do you know what he is?" Retaininghis normalpostureand showing some disdainfor the question, Tsuda said, "How would I know?" Kobayashilowered his voice still more and said, "He's a detective." Tsuda said nothing.A strongerdrinkerthanhis companion,he was more in control of himself. Silently he picked up his cup and drank it empty. Kobayashiimmediatelyrefilledit. "Takea good look at his eyes." Tsudagave a faint smile and at last answered."If you go on beratingthe upperclasses in your indiscriminateway, they'll mistakeyou for a socialist. So be a little more careful." "A socialist?" Kobayashicried out, and staredpugnaciouslyat the man

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in the Invernesscoat. "Don'tmake me laugh. HoweverI may seem, I am a decent, law-abidingsympathizerof the downtrodden.It's you people with your vain, self-satisfied, uppity ways who are really the bad ones, not me. Just ask yourself honestly who should be draggedto the police station,you or me." Since the man in the cloth cap just sat there looking at the table, Kobayashi had no choice but to taunt Tsuda. "I suppose you never thought of treatingthese laborerssittinghere as humanbeings, but let me tell you...." He stopped to look aroundfor likely examples of what he meant, but alas he therewere no longer laborersto be seen anywherein the bar.Undaunted rattledon. "You've no idea how much more noble they are, in all theirsimplicity, than the likes of you and the detective.It's their misfortunethatthe beauty of their humanityhas to be covered with the dust of poverty.That's all it is. What I mean is they are dirty simply because they can't affordto have a bath. Don'tyou daresneerat them." The tiradeseemed now to be more in defense of Kobayashihimself than of the poor in general, but Tsuda, fearing possible public embarrassment, was careful not to get embroiledin an argumentwith him. Kobayashi,still in pursuit of Tsuda, continued: "You don't say so, but I know you don't believe any of the things I say. It shows on your face. All right, I'll try to make things clearerfor you. You've readRussiannovels, haven'tyou?" Having neverreadone, Tsudaremainedsilent. "It's something anyone who has read Russian novels, especially Dostoevsky's, should know. And thatis no matterhow low-bornor uneducated a personmight be, thereare times when from thatperson'smouthwill pour out like waterfrom a spring the purest,the most sincere feelings, feelings that will make you weep with gratitude.Do you think Dostoevsky is lying when he tells you that?" "I couldn'tsay, having neverreadhim." "When I asked Fujii-sensei, he said it was all a fraud.All those lofty sentiments spilling out of vulgar, crude vessels, he said, it's just a clever, calculatedtrick to get an emotionalresponsefrom the reader.And because the trick worked for Dostoevsky, all these imitatorsstartedto appear,one after another,making what was a mere device cheaper than it ever was. I myself don't think so at all; and when sensei says things like that, I get Dostoevsky.He may have lived longer angry.He simply doesn'tunderstand than I have, but his years have been spent only with books. I may be a lot younger, but .. ." He stopped, as though he couldn't find the words any more; and then his face twisted with pent-upemotion, he startedto weep, on the table cloth. letting fall large teardrops There is so much going on here, it is difficult to know where to begin talking about it. Much of it verges on comedy, and we see Kobayashi as a pretentious clown, defenseless against the silence and haughtiness of Tsuda. We are even on Tsuda's side when he says simply he's not read a word of
5. Ibid., pp. 109-12.

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Dostoevsky. And we don't dismiss Tsuda'suncle Fujii when he calls Dostoevsky a superiorkind of trickster.Indeed, we find Fujii perhapsa little better than we had given him credit for, that is, he is not merely a cranky moralist.I do thinkthereis conscious irony here in S6seki's introduction of the It reminds me of the of a short story by beginning English Dostoevsky. writerA. E. Coppard,"Arabesque-The Mouse," writtenin 1921: "In the main street amongst tall establishmentsof mart and worship was a high narrowhouse pressed between a coffee factory and a bootmaker's.It had four flights of dim echoing stairs, and at the top, in a room that was full of the smell of dried apples and mice, a man in the middle age of life had sat readingRussiannovels until he thoughthe was mad."6 After having said all this, I must also say that in the course of the evening, Kobayashibegins to emerge throughthe clownishness as a truly sad person. In other words, there is a kind of Russian contradictionin the way Soseki portraysKobayashi.He is ridiculouswhen he lets fall largeteardrops into his cup. He has become a characterstraightout of Dostoevsky as Mr. but also Fujii would say, drunk,self-pitying, weeping for the downtrodden, a deludeddevotee and victim of thatmasterliteraryconjurer. But whatthen is Tsuda,Soseki asks us, this nearlyaridman, so haughtytowardKobayashi, yet so meek towardhis employerMr. Yoshikawaand the manipulativeand possessive Mrs. Yoshikawa;which is the more demeaning,he asks us, Kobayashi'spatheticclaim to kinshipwith Dostoevsky,or Tsuda'scareless admission of total ignorance of the writer? It is not Tsuda's ignorance that bespeakshis kind of poverty,it is his contempt. They at last leave the bar afterKobayashihas explainedwhy he bought the new suit: he's got a job with a Japanesenewspaperin Koreaand he will be leaving soon. It wasn't thatlate,butthestreets in theautumn nightwereunexpectedly could hear thestreetcars a special sortof sound quiet. They running, making onedidnothearduring theday.Thetwodark worked on by differfigures, entmoods,walked thestream, stilltogether. alongside "When areyougoingto Korea, then?" when in are still the after theoperation." "Perhaps you hospital "Sosoon?" "Notnecessarily. I won'tknowfor sureuntilFujii-sensei has seenthe editor-in-chief oncemore." "Whatwon'tyou knowfor sure-when you are leaving,or whether at all?" you're leaving "Yes,well...." wasbeingtoo vague.Showing no moreinterest in thematter, Kobayashi Tsudastartedto walk ahead."As a matterof fact," Kobayashi added "Ireallydon't wantto go." quickly,
6. The Collected Worksof A. E. Coppard(New York:Knopf, 1951), pp. 71-72.

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"Areyou being told by my uncle to go, then?" "Oh no, it's not that." "Thendon'tgo, that'sall." It was an obvious point to make and, to a person seemingly much in need of sympathy,nothing less than a cruel thrust.After they had taken a few steps, Kobayashisaid "Tsuda,I'm lonely." Tsuda said nothing. They walked on in silence. Between the sounds of passing streetcarsthey could hear the murmurof the sparse streambeside into the blacknessunderthe bridgebeyond.7 them as it disappeared
YALE UNIVERSITY

7. Sosekizenshi, Vol. 11, pp. 116-17.

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