Page:Tayama Katai and His Novel Entitled Futon (Reece).pdf/115

 When Tokio opened a shutter of an east window as Yoshiko did on the day she departed for her home, light streamed into the room. . . . It seemed as if his dear one had, as usual, gone to school. Tokio opened a drawer in her desk. He found there an old discarded ribbon which was soiled. Tokio picked it up and sniffed its fragrance. After a while, he stood up and opened the sliding door. There were three big wicker trunks tied with rope and ready to be shipped to Yoshiko; piled beyond them were Yoshiko's daily used futons. . . . Tokio pulled them out. His heart throbbed with indescribable emotions on smelling the oily and sweaty fragrance of his beloved one. Pressing his face on the stained velvet neckband of the counterpane, he smelled his dear one's odor to his heart's content.

The mixed emotions of sexual desire, sadness, and despair suddenly attacked him. Tokio spread out the mattress and put the counterpane on top; he buried his face in the cold and soiled velvet neckband and cried.

The dimly lit room--outside the wind was blowing hard.

In the above passages Katai describes both the inner and outer observations of his character. Katai's minute description of Tokio reminds a reader of the similarity to Hauptmann's portrayal of Johannes' state of mind when he hears the noise of an approaching train on which his departing friend Anna is on board:

"[. . . John opens the verandah door and stands listening there. The sound grows louder, and then gradually dies away. The station bell is heard. It rings a second time--a third time. Shrill whistle of the departing train. John turns to go into his room, but breaks down on the way; sinks on to a chair, his body shaken by a convulsion of weeping and sobbing. Faint moonlight on the verandah.]"

The significance of appears to be manifested in these passages transcribing the feelings of a man in the full reality of his existence. For the purpose of further elucidating this point let us examine how Kōyō, who was the leading novelist of the Kenyūsha, describes a similar situation to that of Tokio. The following excerpt is selected from Kōyō's masterpiece, or , with the hope