"The Human Condition": Centering the Emotional Dimension in War History through Literature

• In Event: Crafting Affirmation from "Negation and Despair" in Japan's Lost War

Abstract

"The Human Condition" [Ningen no jouken], based on author Gomikawa Junpei (1916—1995)’s experience in Manchuria, is one of postwar Japan's most popular novels, selling thirteen million copies when published in six volumes 1956—1958 and soon an epic film trilogy directed by Kobayashi Masaki starring Nakadai Tatsuya as the hero Kaji. The Human Condition seemed to capture the whole nation's war experience, relating how the young idealist tries to remain true to humanitarian and pacifist beliefs under political and military pressure, fails to protect the Chinese labors entrusted to him in Manchuria, comes to kill Chinese to save himself, is forced into the army then combat when Soviet forces overrun his unit, surviving only to becomes a Russian prisoner, nearly succumbs to depredations from his captors and Japanese alike, before escaping into the snow to face final judgment, long after "the war" has officially ended. Yet, Gomikawa's novel has been treated by Japanese scholars of literature as "popular literature" or "nonfiction," not meriting academic study. Nor have scholars of history embraced it, weighing documents more heavily than reflections by a novelist. This paper explores "The Controversy of Showa History" that pitted literary critics and historians against each other--the former criticizing the lack of "humans" in war history written by the latter through this work, testing whether the novel's popularity demonstrates that "the war" Japan launched is most often recalled, remembered, or imagined by Japanese only through feeling, emotion, visualization, and a sense of regret with only distant guilt.

Author

• Nanyan Guo, International Research Center for Japanese Studies (Nichibunken