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211 pages, ebook
First published January 1, 1960
Politics meant pretending to step out to the men's room and then completely disappearing, forcing a man's back to the wall while cheerfully sharing the same fire, making a show of laughter when one is angry or flying into a rage when one is not in the least upset, sitting for a long time without saying a word, quietly flicking specks of dust off one's sleeve... in short, acting very much like a geisha.
Corruption in an election or the victory of moneyed power did not in the least surprise him; they seemed as natural as stones and horse dung along a road.
¡®It was during the course of her customary stroll the next morning that she discovered at the base of the sunlit ilex tree, the lumps of chewing gum looking for all the world like glistening white teeth.¡¯
¡°This marriage won¡¯t do either you or Noguchi any good. With your talents there¡¯s nothing you can¡¯t do, but instead you choose to shut off your whole future. Look, Kazu, getting married is like buying stocks. It¡¯s normal to buy when they¡¯re low¡ªwhy should you want to buy stocks with no prospects for improvement.¡±
¡®The past piece by piece crumbled away under her feet, and she was left with nothing to support her. If she went on in this way, there would probably not be a single person to mourn her when she died. Reflections on death convinced her that she must find someone she could depend on, have a family, lead a normal life. But the only way to do this was to go through with the formalities of love.¡¯
¡®Such a view did not, of course, suggest anything human to Kazu. She sensed the vast, beautiful, inorganic presence confronting her. Nature here bore no resemblance to the garden of the Setsugoan; it was not an exquisite, human miniature which she could hold in her hand. Yet, to gaze at this landscape was surely a political act. To gaze at it, sum it up, control it, was the work of politics.¡¯
¡®The leopard-like resilience of her comfortably plump flesh made Yamazaki stare in astonishment. Kazu kept her head obstinately averted, her eyes on the garden soaked by the spring rains. The garden was a green blur.¡¯
¡®The men in their conversation laid an entirely excessive emphasis on accuracy and minuteness of memory. Their conversation somehow reminded Kazu, listening without saying a word, of young men trying to outdo one another in boasting of their knowledge of women. These old men were at great pains to impart credibility to their remarks by insisting on a quite unnecessary precision, and by referring to meaningless details.
Kazu, suppressing her amusement, stared at the wrinkled bits of thin peel, the color of the harvest moon, still sticking to the fleshy fruit.¡¯
¡®Kazu wore on this occasion a small-patterned violet-gray kimono with an obi of dark purple dyed in a single band of chrysanthemum flowers in lozenges. A large black pearl was set in her carnelian obi clasp. She had chosen this particular attire with a view to holding in her ample body and giving it greater dignity.¡¯
¡®Here not an echo of the rumbling of streetcars or the blasts of klaxons could reach her. The world had become a still-life picture. How was it possible that emotions which once had flared so brightly could flicker out without a trace? The reasons escaped Kazu. She was at a loss to understand where sensations which had once definitely passed through her body could have gone. The conventional belief that people achieve maturity as they accumulate experiences of every kind seemed to her untrue. She thought it more likely that human beings were no more than blind ditches through which sundry objects flowed, or the stone pavement at a crossroads printed with the tracks of vehicles of every kind which have since passed on. Ditches rot and stone pavement wears away. But once they too were at a crossroads on a festival day.¡¯
¡®Kazu¡¯s frankness and honesty easily became exhibitionist before a man she did not especially love. She deliberately affected this mannerism in order to destroy any illusions people might have about her, but it was hardly likely that anyone would entertain illusions about Kazu. There was a plebeian warmth to her plump beauty; not having a single weak spot, it retained, regardless of the jewelry or splendid clothes with which it might be adorned, the fragrance of black loam, a heritage from her native soil. As a matter of fact, this impression of physical opulence saved her chatter from being annoying, and made it seem instead a complementary feature.¡¯
¡®¡the election cannot be said to have been a misfortune in a real sense, for it smashed every kind of counterfeit happiness and resulted in you and Mr. Noguchi showing each other your naked selves. I have been wallowing in the bog of politics for a long time, and I have in fact come to be quite fond of it. In it corruption cleanses people, hypocrisy reveals human character more than half-hearted honesty, and vice may, at least for a moment, revive a helpless trust . . . Just as when you throw laundry into a centrifugal dryer, it rotates so fast that the shirt or underwear you¡¯ve just thrown in vanishes before your eyes, what we normally call human nature instantly disappears in the whirlpool of politics. I like its fierce operation. It doesn¡¯t necessarily purify, but it makes you forget what should be forgotten, and overlook what should be overlooked. It works a kind of inorganic intoxication. That is why, no matter how badly I fail, no matter what disastrous experiences I encounter, I shall never leave politics as long as I live.¡¯
¡®They saw how the rays of the sun, slanting into a grove of tall cryptomerias to the left of the road, caused a mysterious, golden mist to coil between the trunks of the trees. A truck passed alongside, raising an immense cloud of dust. The dust remaining drifted among the cryptomerias, and again turned a peaceful gold.¡¯