Pathway to Japanese Literature

Author: Hori Tatsuo

Because the woman smiled at me with such familiar warmth, I couldn’t help but follow her. Everything had already fallen asleep. Only the wind remained awake. But even that wind lacked strength to stir the scraps of paper littering the town. It would be better called a flow of air. This flow pushed me from behind. Closing my eyes and yielding to its pressure, I felt violent fatigue. The woman walked ten paces ahead—might she too feel this exhaustion? Might her closed eyelids likewise surrender to the air’s current? She and I passed endlessly through streets darker than night. I no longer knew where I walked. Only this nocturnal airflow seemed to grant us direction. The houses stood tightly shuttered. Occasional window lights vanished as we approached, extinguished like creatures fearing our presence. Thus we walked alone together, yet whether she recognized my pursuit remained utterly unclear. So profound was her indifference that she moved with glacial slowness. More disturbingly, moments came when even I forgot the woman I trailed. Sleep periodically passed through us. Each time it came, I slept while walking. Yet this sleep moved so quietly through me I scarcely noticed. We emerged into a square.

Suddenly, an automobile sounded its siren to overtake us. It awakened me. Then I suddenly began to feel a sleepiness I had hardly noticed until that moment. Sleep clung obstinately to my hands and feet. And once again, before I knew it, my eyes began to close. This time, the cold air forced them open. We were crossing a long bridge. The water beneath the bridge was not moving at all. Dead waves, waves with stiffened limbs, mummified waves—the riverside trees cast shadows far larger than our own. Our shadows would sometimes enter into them and be erased. A single feeble word slipped from my mouth. Where are we going? But to me, despite my intense fatigue, more air and more walking seemed necessary. I entered the town darker than night once again following the woman. Then suddenly, a white dog came darting out from a street corner. It must have known her. It circled around her, sniffing at her with apparent delight. She continued onward, indulging it as it freely bit at the hem of her kimono. Then she suddenly came to a stop in front of a small, shabby house. And leaving the dog there without even glancing back she entered the small house. Then the dog obediently crouched into the house’s ominous-shaped shadow.

As if believing she would emerge again at any moment. That sight gave me—who had been about to lose direction once more—a glimmer of hope. I too stopped there, a short distance away from the small house. And I decided to wait for Jasmine to come out. At that moment, the dog seemed to recognize me for the first time and tentatively approached. And then it sniffed me. I sighed while exchanging gazes with the dog. Before long, even the dog suddenly grew increasingly comfortable with me and lay down at my feet. And it no longer tried to leave that spot. As for me—speaking of myself—I felt as though I could no longer continue walking by my own strength alone. Moreover, the flow of air that had been pushing from behind me until just now also seemed to have somehow come to a stop. I felt a new fatigue. I was extremely drowsy. I sometimes slept while standing there. I dreamed. However, that dream soon spilled out from my brief sleep. And I collided with reality as if tripping over a pebble. Yet no matter how brief the dream, to me it only seemed like an eternal dream. I dreamed every moment of the entire day. I even dreamed the present.

And there dream and reality overlapped. I could no longer distinguish where dream ended and reality began. At times I would hear a small bird chirping somewhere, then catch the pulsing of my own heart.

Everything was thus.

The transformation of dreams is not due to chance. It changes according to the posture I take while sleeping. Could it be that all these things have been transforming in such a manner? Could it be that everything exists for me—this self who sleeps standing with eyes open even in daylight?

Everything exists…

It was a baseball stadium. Here could be seen every manner of people—those clapping hands in delight, others cursing with crimson faces, some fallen silent as if in despair, women smiling ceaselessly while watching them—and there I was amidst it all, dozing with my back bathed in sunlight. Suddenly a fresh commotion overtook the previous din. This roused me. The crack of a bat, a ball soaring away, players giving chase, blue sky, sun. Then again I closed my eyes without feeling. The surrounding clamor only pleasantly stirred my dreamlike state. Someone seemed to be calling my name. I half-opened my eyes and turned toward the voice. It was Jasmine. She chattered beside me with endless words I couldn’t catch. Then abruptly she brought her face close and said, “Just come to Café Ritz in three hours.” I checked my wristwatch—3:15. I knew of her pathological obsession with punctuality. “Six fifteen, then?” Before I could even finish speaking, she’d already left my side as though angered. I watched her retreating figure briefly. Then looking around at the many men likewise watching her retreat, I felt belated surprise.

How astonishing that so many men were seized by a shared emotion merely at the sight of her! I enumerated one by one the things people had told me about her. She was bewitching. She was wealthy. She engaged in pleasant conversation. She had never once made a sullen expression. She was athletic. She swam skillfully. However—she could not love men. A single phrase that people invariably appended in the end. Could that be true? Or could that be nothing more than people’s slander? Before I knew it, I found myself unable to think of that as anything but true. That was because Kita had been floating in my mind ever since earlier.

That happened last night. Kita said he would walk me home and followed along. He seemed to be terribly afraid of being alone. And when we were finally about to part, he at last revealed his "dark thoughts" to me. “But isn’t Jasmine in love with you?” I said. “That woman doesn’t care about me one bit—not even if I die.” As I listened to him speak with such despair, I recalled my own crisis from a year prior—how an inner chaos beyond remedy could render a youth utterly powerless, if only temporarily. He resolved to commit suicide. However, before taking the chemicals, he burned the photographs and letters that had tormented him by their inescapable grip. At the same time, he noticed the chaos within him had abruptly begun to organize itself. And gradually, he began to feel that suicide was no longer necessary. He attempted to live again. ――There were several young men around me. I was there. And now there before me was Kita, appearing utterly consumed by despair. So, averting my eyes from his despairing expression at that moment so as not to feel unnecessary worry, I simply said, “Excuse me.” That was still only last night.

But what was he doing now? Even so, Jasmine—heartless Jasmine! Could what people said about her be true? ……I gazed at her from afar. From where I stood, I couldn’t make out her eyes, mouth, or nose. They were all burning together like flames.

Evening finally arrived. And then the game ended. People stood up and began walking. I waited for the field to empty completely before rising last. In that interval, I lost sight of Jasmine. Head hanging low from exhaustion, I trailed behind the crowd. Yet to me, even those ahead seemed unaware of their own destination. Still I followed them. There was no alternative. My sole task was to wait quietly for nightfall. When darkness finally came, I found the people around me vanishing into it one by one - like motes of dust dissolving into blackness.

6:15 PM.

I entered a small restaurant. Right after me, Jasmine also entered. We ate.

“I’m hungry.” While saying that, she noisily slurped her soup. She roughly clattered her fork and knife. And she frantically chewed. She only stopped chewing to talk, striving to keep me from boredom. I kept watching her, listening to her, all the while laughing vacantly. As one waiter tried to clear away the dishes she had scattered, Jasmine said something to tease him. Then that waiter, grinning creepily, looked back at her with a nasty glare. As I watched that, I grew slightly uncomfortable. To the point that I recalled the words with which one of my friends had once unjustly slandered her.

That friend went on to say. She was a flirt. She was an idiot. She could only manage vulgar conversation. She slept with anyone. That the only ones not sleeping with her were probably you and me. I waited for that waiter to leave, then asked with a slightly serious expression. “Have you met Kita since then?” “No, I haven’t met him.” “…………”

“…………”

The conversation tried to rise like smoke from us and slip away. I must not let it escape.

“He was really badmouthing you.”

“That’s correct.” “You…” “You don’t have to say such things.” “I know.” “He must have said that.” “That I was impertinent.” “And that they look down on that person.” “But it’s not just him.” “They all say that.” “I’m mocking myself for being told such things by people.”

Within the chattering woman was something unfamiliar. Then she fell silent. And so she did not attempt to speak again until the meal was over. At times there was something unfamiliar within women. That was what captivated me. However, it did not last as long as I desired. Everything became clear immediately. And just as through a magnifying glass, I could see women’s hearts with perfect clarity. Jasmine took out a small mirror from her handbag and began staring at it. I knew that it was not to fix her makeup but to tell the time. She could discern the time that had passed by using her own face like a clock. We left the restaurant. Then Jasmine suddenly burst into liveliness. But now that we had started walking side by side, I couldn’t make out what expression she wore. She said.

“I’m going on a trip tonight.” “Hmph.” “I’m going alone.” “Hmph.”

“I haven’t decided where to go yet.” “But first I’ll try going to Kobe.” “I’ll wander around that town while thinking about where to go.” “You should’ve kept quiet about that.” “I might come after you, you know.” “If you want, you can come.”

No sooner had she uttered her last words than she quickly hailed a taxi and jumped inside. And with a sharp clack, she shut the door. As if fearing I would get in after her. Then she bid me farewell from the other side of the glass. She was smiling, but that smile seemed to me somehow both mean-spirited and terribly timid.

Jasmine, you—a single unknown woman!

The more I moved away from you now, the more I walked while thinking of you. Night and the town—the town at night. The many women who passed me by. All those women resembled one another. To my eyes at least, they looked exactly alike. But you alone were different from them all. Within you lay something unknown. You captivated me like plants from unexplored lands captivate a traveler. He caught a whiff of their fragrance. He glimpsed phantom foliage before him. He reached out to touch it—then it withdrew like the horizon. Jasmine! How near you were to me. And yet how far away you stood. Were you already aboard the train? Did you imagine me pressing my forehead against the windowpane while thinking of you? Or had you already fallen asleep? Ah—had I begun to love you? No—I did not love you as men love women, nor as Kita had loved you.

The reason you captivated me was because there existed something unfamiliar within you. I wanted you solely to uncover that. I wanted you solely to detach myself from your allure. Did I want to follow you on a journey? Or was I thinking of you because I wanted to go on a trip? I could not answer that. Perhaps I should have stopped thinking about you altogether. To avoid thinking of you, I resolved to think of Kita—he who suffered for your sake. Come to think of it, I felt as though Kita might be waiting for me somewhere. I had to search for Kita. And how many times did I turn street corners with futile hopes, peering into bars?

I finally found several friends in a bar. I entered.

“Do you all know Kita?” Everyone turned toward me as if angry.

One of them said.

“You still don’t know? That he’s dead?”

“He died?” “He killed himself last night.” I stood there as though fossilized while convincing myself I was already sitting there. I dropped the hat from my hand. Yet didn’t even notice. Nevertheless found it strange how perfectly composed I remained—calm and undisturbed. Then after some time began feeling peculiar irritation toward Kita’s death. Couldn’t clearly grasp what manner of emotion this was. To me it seemed—likely born of my own egoism—that egoism which made me think Kita had died needlessly when survival was possible; that he’d died solely to parade his suffering before others (myself especially).

“Haven’t you seen Jasmine?”

One of them asked me a question. I answered frankly. (In such situations, I can only answer frankly.) That I had met her at the baseball stadium; that I had encountered her again at Café Ritz; that she had said she was going on a trip tonight; that she seemed to know about Kita’s death yet for some reason hadn’t told me of it. While saying this, I recognized that she had suddenly become the object of my friends’ curiosity. They seemed to begin taking an extraordinary interest in her. They began to argue about her. Words darted about. Then they plummeted rapidly. And it went nowhere. All the while, I ceaselessly heard the name "Jasmine" being pronounced with varying inflections. It sounded sometimes weightily, sometimes lightly, sometimes mournfully. To them, Jasmine was a mysterious entity. Time flowed over us. But to feel it with a certain weariness would likely be me alone. That is because, to me, Jasmine had already begun to become nothing more than a single woman. People say with surprise that she cannot love men. If that were true, then that would have led my friend to despair. But at the same time, that very thing would have driven him to leave. The reason he was unable to leave was undoubtedly because he was convinced that she, like other women, loved some one man. Who is that?

I did not know who that was. And I had no intention of knowing. Because I no longer desired her. The unknown thing that had been within her—that was now clear to me. That was the shadow of death. And now, it was not her, but death itself that enthralled me. It approached me with deliberate care. And seized my arm. It made me stand up. And took me away from there. I let it have its way. I inhaled something that wasn’t air along with the night air. It was as refreshing as drinking water. However, it was something that gradually began to make me feel like vomiting. I hit upon the idea of naming it “emptiness.”

That was when it happened. A woman smiled warmly at me as she passed by.……

The dog that had been crouching at my feet suddenly stood up and started running. It awakened me. I watched the dog dart into the shadow of that house of eerie shape. Then I saw it emerge from that shadow again, now accompanied by a woman. I could no longer discern whether this was the same woman from earlier. Yet mechanically, I began walking after her—following the dog’s lead. The dog noticed me and periodically paused to face my direction, as if waiting. But before I could reach it, the animal suddenly bolted toward the woman ahead, as though remembering urgent business. Despite these canine theatrics, the woman showed no sign of detecting my pursuit. She seemed utterly convinced of her invisibility to all. Yet not only did I see her—I even perceived her shaking off some sorrow as she walked. Side by side in this manner, the woman, the dog, and I wound through countless street corners. With each turn, I became more certain we were descending into a pitch-black town unknown to me. Every corner held mystery. Around each bend, I felt someone—or something—lurking. A robber? A corpse? Or myself? When I tried rounding one such corner—more sinister than the rest—after the woman and dog, clutching all my anxieties, I froze mid-step. They had vanished beyond that point. Those two had turned the corner mere seconds before me and disappeared without a trace.

I stood frozen there, no longer attempting to take a single step forward. To me, the darkness beyond seemed like some bottomless hole. I remained motionless there indefinitely. I could not know in what part of this city I was. Yet I understood only that I stood nearest to death. The wind had begun blowing again unbeknownst to me. It blew somewhat stronger than before. It snagged on tree branches like smoke and rolled scraps of paper from nowhere. It was like listening to ominous music. While hearing this, I gradually felt my sorrow growing satisfied. Was I spending the night like this for my dead friend’s sake? And so I—feeling on the verge of collapse from fatigue and drowsiness yet refusing to leave—continued staring fixedly into the ominous darkness beyond the street corner. As though beholding what night truly was for the first time.