Between Reality and Fabrication: Ishimure and Hyakuta

• In Event: Japanese Literature Brushing History against the Grain

Abstract

Ishimure Michiko (Paradise in the Sea of Sorrow) and Hyakuta Naoki (The Eternal Zero) actively engage in social issues through their texts. Ideologically speaking, they are opposites—Ishimure advocates against the state by writing narratives depicting Minamata disease victims while Hyakuta notoriously supports neoliberalist rightwing politics, represented by the current Abe administration. However, both authors intriguingly confront the conventional challenges implicit in addressing political issues with a literary (“fictional”) response. In constructing their narratives, they stray from a “faithful” retelling of historical events in favor of a more creative approach. Ishimure imaginatively reconstructs the voices of Minamata victims. Hyakuta reuses previously circulated narratives on the kamikaze attacks and revises them to make them more appealing to contemporary readers. In either case, their works are far more complex and diversified than the authors’ public ideological stances would indicate. As a result, we should question both the impact and legitimacy of their work: What effects might these works have on a contemporary mass audience and can they be judged by the same ethical standards? More specifically, can we justify Ishimure’s “revision” while denouncing Hyakuta’s “manipulative modification” using the same standards? Can Hyakuta escape criticism only because he is an author of popular literature? Can Ishimure be appraised as ethical—although her methodology is essentially aesthetic? Using examples from these texts, I will discuss the discrepancies and contradictions between the affective nature of reception and authorial intention.

Author

• Hisaaki Wake, Bates College