Synthwave RadioThose Unforgettable People
15th May 07
Kunikida Doppo’s short story Those Unforgettable People, published in 1898, just previous to the turn of the 20th century, is a fine example of modern Japanese literature that harbors minor relics of the past, while marching forward into the modern era that Japan was rapidly approaching. While the style of writing is modern in its essence, Doppo tends to show flashes of an era gone by through mention of customs past and through the attitudes in some of his characters. Those Unforgettable People is a short, concise story that allows readers to easily recognize the changes in Japanese thought and artistic style around the end of the 19th century.
The main character of Doppo’s story, Otsu Benjiro, is a manifest example of how Japan was entering a more modern existence around the turn of the century. From his “western style clothing” to his loneliness and thoughts on isolation, Otsu is an overt instance of the young, changing personality in the newly modern era of Japan. The main premise that Those Unforgettable People revolves around is the book that Otsu is writing. His book is about people that he meets during his travels around Japan, but the quirky trait of his writings is that they revolve around people he has had little to no contact with.
In years past it may have been appropriate only to write about those people with whom he had had substantial contact with, but in the new modern era in Japan, Otsu instead chose to focus on those people with whom he met only briefly, or not at all. This focus on lack of contact issues to readers an image of the isolation and independent thought which the modern era had brought to the newly opened island nation of Japan.
The innkeeper that Otsu meets at the beginning of the story is one of the aforementioned examples of Doppo’s acknowledgement of an era now gone by. The innkeeper that Otsu would later write about in his book did not greet Otsu with the respect that one would expect from the proprietor of an inn. The innkeeper was immediately suspicious of Otsu simply because of the manner in which he was dressed, in “western clothing” as Doppo tells readers.
The innkeeper’s behavior towards Otsu is a magnificent example of the change in eras through generations. While Otsu is a man in his late twenties, and therefore more receptive to the changes going on in the nation, the innkeeper is considerably older, and therefore more likely to cling to traditions of the past. This dichotomy between the two generations displayed by Doppo exemplifies how rapidly changes in Japan were taking place around the turn of the 20th century.
The subject matter of Otsu’s writing is the most identifiable of the modern traits possessed by the character, but there are many more facets of Otsu’s being that lead readers to recognize how modern Doppo’s story is. The fact that Otsu and the man he met at the inn, Akiyama Matsunosuke, were able to stay up late into the night talking shows readers the change in climate from a livelihood standpoint in Japan at the time. During the pre-modern era situations such as this most probably would not have happened due to the fact that most people had their pre-determined position in life, and therefore would have had work to do the next day, regardless of their social status. In this story however, the two young men are merely traveling around Japan with no responsibilities that can be determined, certainly a departure from the pre-modern society of only a few decades previous.
The men talk about art, literature, religion, and more, well into the night, and these topics of conversation themselves show readers how modern these men both were to be educated in such diverse matters. At points during the conversation Otsu does not even hear what Akiyama is saying due to the fact that he is wrapped up in thoughts of his own, a reflection of modern thought and independence. At one point, while discussing his manuscript, Otsu even cries, an action that would surely have been unacceptable around strangers in the pre-modern era. Akiyama’s acknowledgement of these tears is followed by an even more modern revelation when he asks Otsu to read the manuscript to him. Akiyama says that, “I shall listen as the representative of the readers of the world”, a significant display of awareness of society outside of the borders of Japan, and something that would not have been said a few decades earlier when Japan’s borders were still sealed off from the global community.
Otsu’s concession that “thinking is a trait of the young” coupled with his recognition of “life as a miracle” lend credibility to not only his awareness of modernity, but to the idea that the generational gap presented through the innkeeper is a deliberate and pragmatic use of modernity by Doppo. The simple idea that Otsu is moved by the tragedy of the world and the voice of the monk in Mitsugahama shows readers once again how modern his thoughts and ideas are.
Doppo’s representation of Mitsugahama itself is another exemplary display of modernity in Those Unforgettable People. His descriptive prose of the environment, as well as his illustration of the town as a bustling market of economy rather than a village dependent on farming or fishing lend to the air of modernity that permeates the whole story. Even lines such as, “pungent smells assailed my nostrils fanned in the breeze made by sleeves and hems as people rushed hither and thither” exhibit Doppo’s keen sense of modern thinking; ideas that wind currents are created by man, rather than by nature are domineeringly modern.
Doppo has succeeded with Those Unforgettable People in crafting an early masterpiece of modern Japanese literature through not only his observations on landscape, but more importantly through his ability to convey his characters thoughts and emotions in a modern time. His locations such as the marketplace in Mitsugahama, his juxtaposition of characters such as the innkeeper and Otsu, and his revealing of modern concepts through independent thought helped to usher in a modern era of literature in Japan, and the importance of Those Unforgettable People should never be understated.