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7/29/2019 Yasunari Kawabata 1899-1972
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Snow Country KawabataYasunari
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14 June, 1988- 16 April,
1972Born in Osaka
Loss of close relatives
Tokyo ImperialUniversity, major inEnglish
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first Japanese novelist towin the Nobel Prize forLiterature -1968
He killed himself bygassing himself. -1972
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The Dancing Girl of Izu -1927
Snow Country -1948
The Sound of the Mountain- 1954
Thousand Cranes -1958
Japan the Beauty and Myself -1969
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YasunariKawabata (1899-1972) Kawabata lived over three eras (Meiji, Taisho,
Showa) :meaning Japanese emperor had changedthree times in his life period
MEIJI ERA (1868-1912)
Meiji-Revolution which occurred in the latter
half of the 19th century- led Japan to bemodern country
TAISHO ERA (1912-1925)
World War I begins in 1914
SHOWA ERA (1925-1989) A period of suffering- Economic depressed
spread
World War II begin in 1939 and end in 1945
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National Seclusion (1639-1869)
Over 200 years of long seclusionmarginalized Japan from other countries
Japanese own culture has developed
Kawabata developed a unique stylecombining elements of traditional andmodern literature
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Modernism was one of the literary movement in20th century
Kawabata was involved with European
modernism Kawabata saw:
Literature as Style
The writer as Introvert
Life as a rupture of expected continues and allhuman relations = ultimately substantial
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movie http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-5vduERZAA
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Shimamura enjoys the affection withKomako, but never gets serious. Be attractedby Yoko somehow.
Komako Geisha. Hosts Shimamura, and fallsin love with him. Has a fiance, who dies in thestory.
Yoko a girl from Komakos town. A lover ofKomakos fiance.
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The Long Tunnel here is
metaphorically his life.
-if you keep going you will eventually get out ofthe tunnel, but how is he gonna face the worldafter the tunnel: the snow country.
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can be metaphorically
things he faces .
- The cold air(harsh world)
- A beautiful but slender and undependablegirls(Komako and Yoko) like snow
- Moments of momentary beauties
- His impassive and cold heart
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Here, it is white and laying under the night
sky.
It sounds like a lady sleeping in the darkness:Geisha, which is Komako.
Geisha always put Oshiroi on their face.
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Shimamura wants to enjoy his life in the Snow
Country. But there is always a signal stop.
-He has family back home
-Komako is Geisha
-He starts to like Yoko, too.
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Yokos face, bonfire in a mountain andsnowscape.
The fire of Komakos passion and the snow ofShimamuras lethargy.
Yoko falling down from the second floor of the
house caught on fire at the end of the story.
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Shimamura uses the word, Toro, which meansfools errand throughout the story.
Snow is like that. It melts and disappear. Veryhollow.
But there is something beautiful about it. Thisworld is a pile of fools errand. When the snow
piles it is beautiful, as the world is beautiful withthe pile of fools errand
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Shimamura apathetical, lethargy, leading anidle life, living out of his parents inheritance.Has wife and children. Minor writer.
*Identity issue Komako lost her husband, has a fiance who is
cheating on her and dies, and falls in love withShimamura when her fiance is still alive.
*Identity issue
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Love
-family friends partner
Toil for Shimamura and relief for Komako
-Shimamura is living out of his parentsinheritance. Never had hardship. -Komako
needs to sacrifice her body and soul to make aliving in her whole life. Never relieved.
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Trust
-betraying family and fiance
Self-Esteem
-Shimamura has nothing to boast. Komako has had the less-respected life.
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A lot of us suffer from the lack of testimonylike Shimamura(too ordinal life)
So many girls try to find their identity in arelationship with guys.
We are selfish, but never know how to loveourselves.
A lot of us do not know or even do not thinkabout why we are living.
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Lippit, Seiji M. Topographies of Japanese
modernism. Columbia University Press,2002. Rosenthal, Lucy.The world treasury of love
stories. Oxford University Press,1995.
Petersen, Gwenn Boardman.The Moon in thewater : understanding Tanizaki, Kawabata, andMishima. University Press of Hawaii,1992.
Hibbett, Howard. Contemporary Japanese
literature : an anthology of fiction, film, andother writing since 1945. Knopf :1977.
Norton Anthology of World Literature, 2nd,