I. Longing [c.1917] by Jun’ichirō Tanizaki (trans. Paul McCarthy) – ★★★★
That is one dreamy, evocative and progressively eerie narrative of a seven-year-old boy on a journey by the darkish countryside surrounded by “white, fluttering issues”. He spots a home within the distance and thinks it’s his residence, solely to be confronted with one nasty, unwelcoming model of his “mom”. Then, he hears the sound of a shamisen coming from someplace deep inside the encircling pine forest.
Although the top strongly means that it is a story of a boy/man who tries to return phrases with a trauma surrounding his mom or her (new) angle in the direction of him, it could even be a narrative of a boy who tries to make sense of his new scenario (his household obtained poorer and migrated to the countryside), or a parable of a kid who first glimpses the scary prospect of existence independently from his mom. Both approach, there’s actually there a metaphor of a battle one undergoes to search out moments of hope and happiness in a life that presently seems filled with heartache, confusion or despair. I learn this brief story in Longing and Different Tales by Jun’ichirō Tanizaki [translated by Anthony Chambers and Paul McCarthy, Columbia University Press 2022].
II. Rain Frogs [1923] by Naoya Shiga (trans. Lane Dunlop) – ★★★1/2
Translated considerably crudely by Lane Dunlop, it is a story of a husband and spouse pair. The husband, Sanjiro, a graduate of an agricultural faculty, and in control of a sake brewery in his small village, falls beneath the affect of his shut pal and poet Takeno, and begins to be concerned about literature. Sanjiro’s spouse Seki is uneducated and doesn’t a lot share his ardour for all issues literary. Sooner or later, when an essential literary seminar is about to happen close by, and Sanjiro and Seki are set to attend, Sanjiro’s grandmother feels abruptly unwell, and Sanjiro sends Seki alone to the lecture.
Playwright S and novelist G are there to speak, and after the discuss, Seki innocently and naively accepts an invite to spend the night time with one other feminine acquaintance at Cloud-Viewing Pavilion, the place novelist G additionally decides to remain. At first, Shiga’s narrative could be very factual, however the writer quickly builds a lot stress as we have now to guess what transpired that night time with Seki. The easy plot slowly unveils to us one horrifying realisation, as Shiga condemns that “intellectualism” that, in actuality, can be linked with predatory behaviour and exploitation. I learn this brief story in The Paper Door & Different Tales by Naoya Shiga [translated by Lane Dunlop, North Point Press 1987].
III. Bugs [2005] by Yūichi Seirai (trans. Paul Warham) – ★★★★1/2
“The human world was over, I assumed, and the world of bugs was about to take its place.” This quietly highly effective story is about aged lady Michiko who receives a postcard from one other lady Reiko, who as soon as “stole” Michiko’s man and “love of her life” from her. Consumed by jealousy and damage, Michiko doesn’t let go of the previous, and her psychological state is made worse by her survivor’s guilt of being the one nurse in her office to outlive a bombing in the course of the World Struggle II: “My life has been a clean, unthinking stretch of time“. Her recollections of the person she nonetheless loves, however who’s irreversibly misplaced, mingles together with her horrific battle expertise: “There have been two sorts of individuals now: these whose lives had been affected by the bomb and those that hadn’t suffered.” Can Michiko discover some aid earlier than the top of the story as she reveals her ultimate secret?
The metaphor of bugs works effectively on this story of 1 tormented want, many “what ifs”, and coming to phrases with battle, betrayal, and the passage of time. I learn this brief story in Floor Zero, Nagasaki: Tales by Yūichi Seirai [translated by Paul Warham, Columbia University Press 2006].
IV. The Story of the Home of Physics [2010] by Yōko Ogawa (trans. Ted Goossen) – ★★★★★
“Those that stay by the pen, a fragile instrument that may simply be snapped in two, are themselves equally susceptible…“. On this story, a guide editor (our narrator) sits and recollects all of the books that she had helped to deliver to the market in her thirty-two-year profession in publishing. She typically needed to steadiness her private preferences with work calls for, attempting to not overshadow any writer’s distinctive persona or intent. Her first edited guide was The Story of the Home of Physics. Recalling that guide, the editor tells us of 1 derelict Home of Physics and her childhood spent taking part in close to it. The only occupant of this home was one eccentric, seemingly vagabond, lady with “ludicrous” writing aspirations. Her childhood self’s connection to that lady and the story she wished to inform to the world are most likely what additionally dictated our current narrator’s selection of career.
This story jogged my memory why Ogawa (The Reminiscence Police) is my favorite Japanese up to date writer. It is rather straightforward to start out feeling cosy in her narrative, following her narrator’s practice of thought. That is one lovely story of kindness, remembrance, and buried writing ambitions. I learn this brief story in The Penguin Ebook of Japanese Quick Tales [edited by Jay Rubin, Penguin Classics 2018].
V. Kirara’s Paper Aircraft [2017] by Kyōko Nakajima (trans. Ian Mccullough MacDonald) – ★★★1/2
On this fantastical story by Kyōko Nakajima (The Little Home), boy Kenta is a ghost who nonetheless can not wrap his head round as to why he retains reappearing on this world when he’s purported to be lifeless (he was hit by a automobile close to Ueno station and died). To his shock, he discovers that there’s one one who can nonetheless see him – a bit woman by the title of Kirara. The 2 are quickly pals, particularly since Kirara’s mom is a intercourse employee who leaves the little woman alone for extended durations of time. Kenta is a ghost, however he nonetheless craves meals that by no means sates him, and makes use of his invisibility to burglarise shops, sharing his bounty with Kirara. When he begins educating Kirara methods to fold a paper airplane and fly it, his recklessness and apathy about danger and demise imply that Kirara’s life can be quickly at risk.
There’s a sense of irreversible passage of time and post-war trauma hanging over this story, as Kenta tries to make sense of his new, modified atmosphere, and there are themes right here of kid neglect and homelessness. Nakajima’s “light-hearted” prose vis-à-vis the story’s disturbing implications didn’t sit effectively with me, however it’s nonetheless one intriguing brief story. I learn it in Issues Remembered and Issues Forgotten by Kyōko Nakajima [translated by Ian Mccullough MacDonald and Ginny Tapley Takemori, Sort of Books 2021].
This record was within the order of publication (earliest first), and see additionally my different submit on Japanese Quick Tales, the place I talked about brief works of authors Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Fumiko Enchi, Shūsaku Endō, Yasunari Kawabata, and Yasushi Inoue, and from such anthologies as This Type of Lady: Ten Tales by Japanese Girls Writers and Japan: A Traveller’s Literary Companion.