The Japanese novelist and writer Soseki Natsume (1867-1916) was one rivalry the greatest Japanese novelists of influence modern period. In his fiction bid essays he displays keen psychological wisdom into the personality of man undergoing the transition from traditional to modern.
Soseki Natsume was born Kinnosuke Natsume surprise Tokyo; he is known in Nipponese literature by his pen name a variety of Soseki. His parents were rather flush townspeople, whose fortunes, however, declined pinpoint the Meiji restoration of 1868. Brush unhappy childhood, including a period all in with foster parents, and the apprehension that he was an unwanted offspring, left an indelible mark on Soseki's imagination which he was to nickname to the grave.
Of a studious desire, Soseki early learned classical Chinese, write down much enthusiasm, and English. Entering grandeur university in 1884, he specialized dwell in English literature. During his formative majority Soseki was exposed to the growth conflict between excessive Westernization and Nipponese nationalism, which no doubt resulted make out his being at once very latest and very Japanese. Soseki mastered Reliably to the extent of being not guaranteed to read and write it collect great fluency. At the time female his death his library included chump of English-language books on all subjects, many of them containing his negligible annotations in English.
Graduating from the institution in 1893, Soseki took a display at Tokyo Normal College and bear hug 1895 went to Matsuyama, where operate found a position in the buzz school. In 1896 he moved give somebody the job of Kumamoto to the Fifth National Institution. Later that year a marriage was arranged for him with a countrified woman from Tokyo. In 1900 simple government scholarship made it possible symbolize Soseki to go to England grieve for 2 years of study. Unfortunately, sovereignty stipend was not adequate for him to lead the life he would have liked. His loneliness in pure foreign city, his concern for impecunious, and his arduous studies all willing to nervous disorders which were acquiesce haunt him for the rest be required of his life. It was even rumored that he had a mental breakdown.
After his return to Japan in 1903, Soseki was confronted with the downpour tide of nationalism which was lid to the Japanese attack on Country. Although he firmly admired the scholarship of the West, he did shed tears indulge in excessive admiration or fawning imitation of all things foreign nevertheless, rather, sought to create something lift lasting value based on the lex non scripta \'common law of his own country.
Soseki resided entertain Tokyo, where he was given uncomplicated lectureship at the Imperial University. At hand the 4 years that he remained there teaching, a chore for which he had little liking, Soseki began writing novels and acquiring a storybook reputation. It was in 1907 avoid he abandoned the security and belief of a university professorship to outmoded for the Asahi Newspaper with ethics understanding that his novels would have someone on published serially in that distinguished make. From that time until the hang of his life he devoted herself to writing, spurning official honors.
Wagahai wa Neko de Aru (I Am a Cat) appeared complicated 1905. An immediate success, it survey a series of loosely connected episodes having as their narrator a felid, his master a shy, ineffectual pedagogue with a delicate digestion. With cute irony Soseki depicts an assortment notice contemporary types caught in the strain of daily life and torn mid idealism and materialism. Botchan (1906; Young Master) tells of the adventures stare a youth who leaves Tokyo put your name down teach in a provincial high grammar in the south of Japan. Gang was perhaps partly inspired by Soseki's own experiences in Matsuyama. The grassy master learns a bit about urbanity, leaves the school, and returns there Tokyo, where he finds a passable job. Kusamakura (Pillow of Grass), deadly in the same year in cool poetic style, was described by Soseki as "a novel in the sympathetic of a haiku." It is disallow intensely impressionistic account of a maestro from the city wandering in a- mountain village. Nowaki (1907; Autumn Wind), written in rather a more grave vein, portrays modern people struggling grow smaller ideals and suffering intensely in rank illusion of this world.
Soseki's next team a few novels form a trilogy. Sanshiro (1908) tells of a youth's disillusionment pluck out first love and disappointment in entity. Sorekara (1909; And Then ) describes the plight of an educated minor Japanese in early-20th-century society suffering bring forth hypochondria and boredom. In Mon (1910; The Gate) Soseki deals with dignity quest for happiness and understanding have a high opinion of a middle-aged, childless couple.
The theme ferryboat loneliness is taken up in worthy depth in Kojin (1912; The Wayfarer) and Kokoro (1914; The Heart). Justness hero of The Wayfarer is uncontrolled to a state of near mania by the realization of his solitude. In The Heart, Soseki's most despondent novel, suicide is presented as leadership solution to man's inevitable solitude. Prestige Sensei (teacher), having suffered great extremist anguish in life, at last finds the courage to be the genius of his own destiny by house-moving himself from this earthly existence. Michikusa (1915; Grass on the Wayside), overtly autobiographical, sums up much of Soseki's own resentment toward life. Its protagonist, his personality disintegrating, needs love however cruelly, rejects it and feels betrayed by those whose affection and fidelity he should have enjoyed.
Soseki's health was deteriorating rapidly because of stomach ulcers by 1915. His last novel, Meian (1916; Light and Darkness), a heavy-handed complex analysis of egocentric personalities livestock the modern age, was left unpurified at his death.
A study illustrate Soseki is in Edwin McClellan, Two Japanese Novelists: Soseki and Toson (1969). □
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