Page:Modern Japanese Stories.pdf/24

 indirectly in the incipient trade union, socialist and communist activities.

The Proletarian School of writing was formed in 1920 (the year in which fierce riots broke out to protest against soaring rice prices) and it attracted to its ranks a considerable number of vocal writers. Despite severe government repression, which started at the time of the great earthquake in 1923 and became intensified after the passing of the draconian Peace Preservation Law in 1925, Proletarian writers continued to be active during the 1920’s1920s [sic] and the early part of the 1930’s1930s [sic], exerting an extremely important influence on Japanese literature between the wars.

Most of these Proletarian writers took an active part in political and labour activities; indeed, their writing was often done in prison cells where many of them spent a considerable portion of their lives. The characteristic work of the Proletarian School was concerned with the sufferings of the exploited urban workers and seamen (also to a lesser extent of the peasantry) and with the supposed iniquities of the capitalists and of the repressive government that supported them. In many cases the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics hovers in the background as an adumbration of better days to come.

Despite the many differences in approach between the Proletarians and the Naturalists, the two schools may be regarded as occupying analogous positions in the development of modern Japanese literature. In both cases literary style was considered to be secondary to content, and emotions were rejected in favour of a ‘scientific’ treatment of reality. In both cases, also, this seemingly hard-headed, realistic approach frequently masked a fundamentally sentimental outlook. Many writers who did not actually belong to the Proletarian School