I recently re-read Kawabata Yasunari’s The Old Capital so that I could participate in an on-line book club hosted at In the Spring it is the Dawn. The following blog post was meant to be a short comment for the discussion hosted there, but as you can see, I got a little out of control once I started thinking about what two key images in the novel symbolized. . .
Kawabata introduces two striking images at the beginning of the novel that foreshadow two of its main concerns. The first is the two violets on the maple tree that are separated vertically on the tree, representing Chieko and Naeko, the twins separated at birth who will soon discover that they have been separated by social class as well. When the narrator asks “What could it mean for two violets to ‘meet’ and ‘know’ each other?”, it foreshadows the problem of whether or not two siblings separated at birth can meaningfully reconnect.
The second image is the bell crickets living their entire lives in the confines of a glass jar. Although Chieko thinks of herself in comparison to the violets and the bell crickets, we are not privy to her thoughts, and are left to draw our own conclusions. On one level, she seems to live such a sheltered life in Kyoto that she seems like one of the crickets in the jar. On a metafictional level, Chieko the character only lives in the glass jar of the novel for us to view and think about. In that sense, she lives in “a separate realm, an enchanted land,” just like the generations of crickets she has raised.
These images are revisited throughout the novel, adding other possibilities of interpretation to those mentioned above. In the second last chapter, Deep Autumn Sisters, Chieko’s childhood friend, Shinichi, reveals that she once compared the violets to two lovers: “Though they are close to one another, they’ve never met.” The story echoes the famous tale of the lovers celebrated in the Tanabata festival, Orihime (Vega) and Hikoboshi (Altair), who are only allowed to meet once a year. It is hard not to think of the violets as now representing Hideo and Naeko, who will likely not marry for Naeko’s fear that it could affect Chieko’s social standing.
Near the end of The Color of Autumn chapter, Chieko reveals to her adoptive mother that she has met her twin sister. This brief, but emotional scene closes with a single line, “The bell crickets in the Tamba jar had begun to chirp.” I found this sentence as unlikely to be accidental as it was difficult to explain. Could it be a simple restatement of the fact that Chieko and her mother were having a conversation in their own bell jar? I am more partial to the idea that the crickets have become aware of the glass enclosing them, and a change is coming. Since it becomes increasingly clear that Chieko will marry Shinichi’s brother, one could argue that she is leaving the safety of her home and the old world of Kyoto for the modern world where “Portable radios or silk--a dollar is a dollar. It’s all the same.” In this new reality, Chieko seems to be better off with Ryusuke and his brusque pragmatism than “the festival boy” Shinichi or the hardworking traditional craftsman, Hideo. Leaving the bell jar may seem like a good thing in itself, but the ambivalent feelings about what is being sacrificed to achieve this freedom permeates the entire novel.
Related: Scenes from The Old Capital
Kawabata introduces two striking images at the beginning of the novel that foreshadow two of its main concerns. The first is the two violets on the maple tree that are separated vertically on the tree, representing Chieko and Naeko, the twins separated at birth who will soon discover that they have been separated by social class as well. When the narrator asks “What could it mean for two violets to ‘meet’ and ‘know’ each other?”, it foreshadows the problem of whether or not two siblings separated at birth can meaningfully reconnect.
The second image is the bell crickets living their entire lives in the confines of a glass jar. Although Chieko thinks of herself in comparison to the violets and the bell crickets, we are not privy to her thoughts, and are left to draw our own conclusions. On one level, she seems to live such a sheltered life in Kyoto that she seems like one of the crickets in the jar. On a metafictional level, Chieko the character only lives in the glass jar of the novel for us to view and think about. In that sense, she lives in “a separate realm, an enchanted land,” just like the generations of crickets she has raised.
These images are revisited throughout the novel, adding other possibilities of interpretation to those mentioned above. In the second last chapter, Deep Autumn Sisters, Chieko’s childhood friend, Shinichi, reveals that she once compared the violets to two lovers: “Though they are close to one another, they’ve never met.” The story echoes the famous tale of the lovers celebrated in the Tanabata festival, Orihime (Vega) and Hikoboshi (Altair), who are only allowed to meet once a year. It is hard not to think of the violets as now representing Hideo and Naeko, who will likely not marry for Naeko’s fear that it could affect Chieko’s social standing.
Near the end of The Color of Autumn chapter, Chieko reveals to her adoptive mother that she has met her twin sister. This brief, but emotional scene closes with a single line, “The bell crickets in the Tamba jar had begun to chirp.” I found this sentence as unlikely to be accidental as it was difficult to explain. Could it be a simple restatement of the fact that Chieko and her mother were having a conversation in their own bell jar? I am more partial to the idea that the crickets have become aware of the glass enclosing them, and a change is coming. Since it becomes increasingly clear that Chieko will marry Shinichi’s brother, one could argue that she is leaving the safety of her home and the old world of Kyoto for the modern world where “Portable radios or silk--a dollar is a dollar. It’s all the same.” In this new reality, Chieko seems to be better off with Ryusuke and his brusque pragmatism than “the festival boy” Shinichi or the hardworking traditional craftsman, Hideo. Leaving the bell jar may seem like a good thing in itself, but the ambivalent feelings about what is being sacrificed to achieve this freedom permeates the entire novel.
Related: Scenes from The Old Capital
Interesting stuff. I'd been meaning to read the Old Capital for some time. Don't have it in English though, and left it at home. So it'll be a while before I have a chance to read it. But still, hypothetically high on my list ^_^
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