“Though August had
only begun, autumn insects were already singing.
He thought he could
detect a dripping of dew from leaf to leaf.
Then he heard the
sound of the mountain.”
This poetic novel by one of Japan’s truly great writers,
Yasunari Kawabata, reflects on the life of an old man named Shingo who lives in
Tokyo with his family. Shingo is old, his world is changing and it seems
increasingly out of his control. One night Shingo wakes and hears the sound of
the mountain, as described here.
“It was like wind, far
away, but with a depth like a rumbling of the earth. Thinking that it might be
in himself, a ringing in the ears, Shingo shook his head.
The sound stopped, and
he was suddenly afraid. A chill passed over him, as if he had been notified
that death is approaching. He wanted to question himself, calmly and
deliberately, to ask whether it had been the sound of the wind, the sound of
the sea, or a sound in his ears. But he had heard no such sound, he was sure.
He had heard the mountain.
It was as if a demon
had passed, making the mountain sound out.”
Shingo lives with his wife Yasuko, his son Suichi and his
son’s wife Kikuko. Yasuko and Shingo have another daughter, Fusako, whose
marriage is in trouble. But concerning Shingo more is the trouble in the
marriage between Shuichi and Kikuko. Shuichi is having an affair with another
woman, a matter which causes Kikuko much pain and humiliation. Shingo is
extremely fond of Kikuko and in a sense this fondness is the pivot around which
the story unwinds. From his gentle interactions with Kikuko we learn of a man
who is paralysed by age, by a dwindling memory, by a failure to understand the
world around him including his children, by choices he had made which it seems
he wishes he could unmake. Though not unhappy in his own marriage, Shingo’s
mind still lingers on Yasuko’s beautiful sister, a woman with whom he had a
relationship before his marriage to Yasuko. In fact it was only after the
sister had died that Shingo married Yasuko, albeit that the sister had been
married to another man. The difficulties in the relationships between Shuichi
and Kikuko, as well as the failure of Fusako’s marriage, bring this all into
Shingo’s mind.
The Sound of the Mountain is a delicate and complex novel.
Though apparently ‘light’ on story, there is a depth to it and a strength of
character which comes through more on reflection. Each chapter is based around
a small event or observation: The Cherry in Winter, The Bell in Spring, The
Voice in the Night; and each chapter brings out something of Shingo’s life or
surrounding relationships. Supporting each observation or event is a memory or
dream; dreams figure extremely heavily in this novel and serve to draw out a
particular aspect of Shingo’s character – his inaction, his failing memory, his
desires for Kikuko who may, it seems, serve as a metaphor for Yasuko’s sister
for whom Shingo has never ceased to care. There is a haiku-esque quality to the
book, both in style and in substance, like in this passage here:
“The moon was in a
blaze. Or so, just then, it seemed to Shingo.
The clouds around the
moon made him think of flames behind Acala in a painting, or a painting of a
fox-spirit. They were coiling, twisting clouds.
But the clouds, and
the moon too, were cold and faintly white. Shingo felt autumn coming over him.
The moon, high in the
east, was almost full. It lay in a blaze of clouds, it was dimmed by them.
There were no other
clouds near the blaze in which the moon lay. In a single night after the storm
the sky had turned a deep black.
The shops were
shuttered. The town too had taken on a melancholy aspect in the course of the
night. People were on their way home from the movie through silent, deserted
streets.
‘I couldn’t sleep last
night. I’m going to be early.’ Shingo felt a lonely chill pass over him, and a
yearning for human warmth.
And it was as if a
crucial moment had come, as if a decision were forcing itself upon him.”
It is quite beautiful, made more so by there being so much
left unsaid. I got the impression that Shingo, here, serves to represent
pre-war Japan, whereas Shuichi, with his apparent cruelty and disregard for his
kind and beautiful wife, represents post-war Japan. Between the old and the new
there is a failure of understanding. There is a suggestion that the new is
somehow soulless, lacking something. But then there is also the sense of
something degraded in the old. In between this, Shingo feels himself powerless
to act, to fulfil the role that is expected of him which, perhaps, no longer
really exists.
The Sound of the Mountain is the kind of novel that reminds
me of all the things I’ve loved about Japanese literature: its delicacy, its
beauty and frailty, its unflinching gaze which still manages to be, somehow,
just a little bit oblique like watching a scene through a fine gauze curtain.
In this novel Kawabata confronts the complexities of human relationships, the
difficulties of aging and attaining fulfilment, guilt and degradation, all with
a level of refinement and delicacy that you almost don’t realize that’s what
you’re reading about. It’s powerful stuff, beautifully written. A haiku of a
novel, puzzling and rewarding all at the same time.
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