Review: The Lake, by Yasunari Kawabata

Review: The Lake, by Yasunari Kawabata

a review by Rich Horton

Yasunari Kawabata (1899-1972) was the first Japanese winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature. I have previously read a few of his novels, including his most famous one, Snow Country, which I think is a remarkable novel indeed. (My review of Snow Country and Thousand Cranes is here.) I happened across a paperback edition of the English translation of The Lake, a 1954 novel translated in 1974 by Reiko Tsukimora. (This edition was published by Kodansha International, in a series called Japan's Modern Writers.) I had not heard of this novel, which I think is generally ranked as a lesser Kawabata work. It was made into a movie called Woman of the Lake by Yoshishige Yoshida in 1966, but the plot of the movie diverges in quite significant ways from that of the novel.

As with many of Kawabata's novels, the story revolves around the failure of a lonely man to establish a true relationship with any woman. Kawabata's male characters tend to be almost listless, drifters through life. And his women tend to be rather sad, perhaps unhappy with the men they encounter, perhaps themselves too listless, drifters in their own ways. The Lake is like that with a key difference -- the main character, Gimpei Momoi, is darker and creepier than other characters in the Kawabata novels I've read.

We meet Gimpei at a bathhouse in a rural town -- with him wondering if he is a wanted man. He is washed and massaged by the young and pretty attendant -- routine treatment in Japan at that time (a few years after the Second World War) -- but we get a sense right away of Gimpei's awkwardness. He's obsessed with his ugly feet, and he makes mildly inappropriate comments to the attendant, though nothing terrible happens. We also realize he has stolen 200,000 yen from a woman in Tokyo who threw her purse at him because he was following her.

Gimpei, apparently, was a high school teacher who had been fired for having a relationship with one of his students. Throughout the novel we learn somewhat more about that relationship, and also about Gimpei's youth, his father's accidental death (or murder?), and his attraction to his slightly older cousin. We also learn about the woman, Miyako, who lost the purse -- she is the mistress of a wealthy older man, and she is convinced that she is throwing her life away, but ... can't help herself. There are other threads, all eventually cohering and building up Gimpei's sad life story -- his treatment of a prostitute during the War, the late resolution of his affair with the high school girl, and his obsession with another young girl, perhaps 15, who is seeing a friend of Miyako's brother. The story drifts -- on purpose -- as Gimpei drifts, and it's clear that his life is going to remain what it is, unless he is driven to another criminal act. But he doesn't have, say, Humbert Humbert's murderous drive ... (The book was written at more or less the same time as Lolita.)

I enjoyed reading the novel -- Kawabata's writing is elegant and affecting, though I didn't think this translation as well done as the Edward Seidensticker translations of earlier books I read. (There are some odd bumps, and some odd word usages, such as (multiple times) using the word "scaring" where "scary" was wanted.) The state of postwar Japan is acutely portrayed (a common Kawabata theme, I think) and the lost characters are believable. It is a bit difficult to fully engage with a character as lumpen and creepy as Gimpei -- but surely that's entirely Kawabata's intention. 

Kawabata was a truly great writer, and I strong recommend his work. But I wouldn't start here.