The second volume is full of glory and splendor in the capital, and the spirit is full of vitality in the foggy city. Chapter 223: The Third Part (Part 3)
The subtitle of this chapter: Natsume of Meiji, Yanshu of Taisho.
"Japan had many outstanding writers during the Meiji era, with realism, romanticism, and naturalism emerging one after another. However, it should also be noted that these writers all had a common problem: they placed too much emphasis on theoretical research and lacked practical works.
The few novels that were created mostly served the purpose of theory. Due to their technical and artistic limitations, their influence was limited to the literary world itself and they were less likely to be recognized by the general public.
In the Japanese literary world of that era, due to the influx of advanced Western theories and various schools in a short period of time, more writers focused on theoretical and technical research. Few writers considered their own practical creation, let alone using their works to influence the nation.
This may also be related to the national character of our Japanese people, who are good at learning but a little rigid.
Natsume Soseki was one of the very few practitioners in the Meiji period. His reputation for novels was far higher than his literary criticism. The language style of his most famous novels had a strong common flavor and had a great influence among the people. This established his reputation as a "national great writer."
During the period when his works were serialized in newspapers and magazines, Japanese kimono shops and jewelry stores even sold merchandise related to his novels, demonstrating the profound influence of his works among the Japanese people. This popular influence may also be one of the reasons that prompted Natsume Soseki to write for the people.
The critical realism embodied in Natsume Soseki's works is also worth mentioning. His works reflect the profound contradictions and conflicts between material and spiritual life during Japan's modernization. He expresses the characteristics and shortcomings of different social classes through unique artistic conception. Critical realism is highly regarded worldwide.
The Taisho era, from 1912 to 1926, followed the Meiji era. This golden age of modern Japanese history was marked by the prosperity of Japanese industry and commerce following the European war. Politically, it was known as "Taisho Democracy," and in literature and art, as "Taisho Romanticism."
How romantic is it?
Look at the authors of this era: Takarazuka, Akutagawa Ryunosuke, Tanizaki Junichiro, young Dazai Osamu, Mushakoji Saneatsu, Takehisa Yumeji, Izumi Kyoka, Sato Haruo, Muro Sei-sei...
Amidst the clash of Eastern and Western cultures, their works are not only delicate and sensitive, but even a bit neurotic. Obviously, their works inevitably deviate from the tastes of the general public.
Natsume Soseki died in 1916. Therefore, readers at that time had a question: would the next Natsume Soseki appear in the Taisho era?
However, what none of us Japanese could have imagined was that the person who succeeded Natsume Soseki as the "national great author" of the Taisho era was not Japanese. Even more incredible, he was a Chinese person whose mother tongue was Chinese rather than Japanese: Yuan Yanshu.
By the way, Natsume Soseki was a famous handsome man in the Meiji era, and Yuan Yanshu was an epoch-making handsome man..
Both are literary figures, but Yuan Yanshu is a more pure writer than Natsume Soseki. He rarely touches on literary theory and only uses his own works to verify his "literary way".
So what was his approach to literature? According to Yuan Yanshu himself, it was "the victory of the common people."
He was extremely disdainful of so-called intellectual literature.
He once said that people who can write novels and hum poems in this world are simply ridiculous even if they are intellectuals. Their works are nothing but the moaning of idle men and women who have eaten their fill and can still read a few words.
When Yuan Yanshu was a professor at the Shanghai Chinese Public School, he taught a literary creation course. In his first year, he gave the course a topic called "Farming."
He actually opened up a piece of farmland next to the Chinese Public School and asked his students to work with the old farmers. Only after the harvest was completed did the students start writing.
The only student work he gave full marks consisted of only seven words and a punctuation mark: Farming is really too tiring!
Yuan Yanshu also gave the student fifty silver dollars per word, a total of four hundred silver dollars as remuneration. The student's name was Xie Wanying.
Precisely because he adopts such a simple, unpretentious and down-to-earth attitude in his literary creation, his works are almost all popular literature, covering science fiction, horror, detective, romance, fantasy and other popular fiction categories.
Probably due to language limitations, he focuses on different categories when creating in different languages.
His English novels are mainly fantasy and science fiction, while his Chinese novels are historical novels with the theme of time travel.
Besides his most acclaimed detective novels, his Japanese novels also include his own "light novels" and "erotic novels." However, Yuan Yanshu was not very interested in the latter two and only dabbled in them.
However, these two works were very popular with Japanese readers, and many authors began to write these two types of novels. Later, the advent made the social atmosphere more serious, and the government stepped in to ban this literary trend, which calmed down a little.
In fact, Emperor Hirohito was a loyal reader of Yuan Yanshu, and he especially liked his erotic novels.
It is said that the most famous erotic novel in the late Taisho era, "The Lady White Lotus", was written by Crown Prince Hirohito himself and then secretly written by another author.
It's also said that the prototype of the protagonist of this book is Yanagihara Hakuren, one of the three beauties of the Taisho era. She was the cousin of Emperor Taisho and the aunt of Hirohito. She was also a famous female poet known as the "Queen of Chikushi." This Queen of Chikushi also had an intersection with Yuan Yanshu in the early 1920s ...
Another major achievement of Yuan Yanshu in the field of Japanese literature is his writing of scripts for various anime works. It can be said that he elevated anime to a level that is difficult for his predecessors and even later generations to reach.
Until the 21st century, we Japanese have not created many works that can surpass his works from a hundred years ago.
It must be pointed out that his talent and achievements in pure literature and poetry are beyond the reach of ordinary people.
When Yuan Yanshu learned Japanese from a Japanese businessman named Hattori Heiji in 1921, the first poem he created was the popular poem "Not Afraid of Wind and Rain" today.
Please remember that many people, including three historical figures, Nomura Kichisaburo, Yamamoto Isoroku and Inoue Narumi, have personally testified that before this, Yuan Yanshu could only say hello in Japanese, and was not even a beginner.
But after just a few months of study, he could not only speak fluent Japanese, but also write literary works in Japanese. Such a language talent is really beyond words.
We can only say that genius is not only beyond the times, but also omnipotent..."
—Excerpt from A Brief History of Modern Japanese Literature by Shuji Kato》
