Kokoro by Natsume Soseki is a gentle and delicate book, filled with voices that are like rarified whispers in the air, that it is no wonder that Murakami cites Soseki as his biggest influence. It is a story of a young man who develops a strong admiration for an old man “sensei” (although the man is not a teacher in the most commonly understood sense). Set against the trappings of life in early 20th century Japan, the story is told in three acts: The life of a graduate student, a son tending to his sick father, and the backstory of the “sensei”.
The novel is a symbol of the conflict between tradition and modernity at the turn of 20th century Japan. But even now, in Japan, this conflict is ever-present as an often misunderstood culture explores its various dimensions.
Kokoro is a dedicated meditation of loneliness and purposelessness tied with strands of guilt and the lack of remedy. It is a paean to those people who derive no pleasure from life, and who continue living in a sense of duty and honor (reflected against the backstory of the seppuku of Nogi Marasuke when the Meiji emperor passed). Is the regret of mistakes in the life lived, or is it the failed sense of living up to one’s own code of morality? These ponderings are enmeshed in gentle lives in search of love and company among the beaches, sleepy temples, paper walls, oil lamps, and tatami mats of the turn of the century Tokyo.
I read the translation by Edwin McClellan.
Related Books:
Sanshiro by Natsume Soseki
Atonement by Ian McEwan.