A student project focusing on Oe's story "Seventeen"
OE KENZABURO:
THE STRUGGLE FOR SELF
http://students.haverford.edu/east/east260/projects/seventeen.html
OE'S COMMAND
"I appreciate the darkness, and it is important for me and my work. I
feel I must always go to the next stage in me, deeper and deeper and darker,
and then I must write about it. I feel I must conquer the darkness by perusing
the very dark things in me, through writing about them. Always I am writing
myself, always." This quote is from an interview Oe Kenzaburo had in 1995
after receiving the prestigious Nobel Prize for Literature in 1994. The sentiments
above are the reasons that Oe is such a deep and emotional writer to experience.
You can feel yourself plunging into the depths with him as he "peruses
the very dark things." He is filled with undeniable emotion and as a reader,
so are you. (http://www.boston.com/globe/search/stories/nobel/1995/1995r.html)
This acclaimed Japanese writer was born in 1935 and was raised in the Japanese
countryside. He has come to be regarded as one of the preeminent literary figures
in our post World War II era as a sensitive and prolific writer. He has over
fifteen books to his name. He began his writing career with Nip the Buds, Shoot
the Kids and has moved on to write such works as A Personal Matter (for which
he won the 1994 Nobel Prize for Literature), The Silent Cry, Hiroshima Notes,
Seventeen, and many others including novellas, short stories and novels. You
can find a list of his books at http://www.imsa.edu/~ender/books/html. Among
his awards, he also received the Akutagawa Prize when he was only twenty-three.
Oe is a personal writer. While most writers write from experience on some
level, Oe has no distinction between what he is living and what he is expressing
on paper. Some key events shaped Oe's life and are repeated themes in his texts.
His son who was born with a brain hernia, the loss of naiveté regarding
the infallibility of Japan and his explorations of existential thought seem
to be the areas where Oe expresses himself as if attempting to grasp, create,
and explore the reasons for his own existence as well as life around him. A
broad summation? -Yes. But this is indeed the sentiment Oe presents. We are
all human beings trying to etch out a comfortable way of existing. However,
so much goes into our being that finding that "authentic voice" is
difficult. Oe is so powerful because he doesn't try to run from this exploration
and as readers, we can not help but be greatly affected by this.
Oe is a vocal speaker who raises the questions about our socializations and
the social standards that we hold ourselves and others to. (He can be heard
to address the issue of nuclear testing at http://www.asahi.com/paper/hope/english/5th/oe.html)
He plays with the lines between "tradition," "culture,"
and "rebellion." In all, Oe taps the recesses of our hearts where
questions exist but the answers are often painful and confusing. He doesn't
seem to cower from these insights and instead does his best to challenge head
on.
other links:
http://www.smn.co.jp/topics/0009pole.html -- a poll of Japanese readers' favorit
authorss bad link???
http://virtual.chattanooga.net/baylor/wallace/oe.html -- photo and writing
about Oe
http://www.imsa.edu/~ender/kbio.html -- some extra biographical information
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BACKGROUND: The climate of Seventeen
Oe's writing has been shaped by some key events in his life, one being what
I described above as the dismantling of his naiveté regarding Japan's
infallibility during and following World War II. Oe's generation is the one
that lived through the dropping of the atomic bomb, a most significant event
in much post war Japanese writing. Perhaps equally as devastating for Oe was
the revelation that the Japanese Emperor was human which was acknowledged by
a radio report he gave announcing Japan's surrender to the allied forces. For
many people this was a moment of realizing their country's vulnerability. The
emperor, who they weren't even supposed to look at, was a human who sounded
just like everyone else and could be demeaned to communicate through mass broadcasting
just like, well, like a human. All of a sudden, the "emperor had no clothes
on." This is the feeling that Oe seems to have over that event, and this
was one of his first losses of innocence.
In this light, we turn to Seventeen, written by Oe in 1961 at the age of twenty-six.
Political turbulence rocked Japan after World War II. Since the emperor was
no longer invincible and the atomic bomb had knocked assuredies out of place,
clashing parties arose to question authority and demand rights. An extreme right
who supported the emperor and the government arose as did an extreme left who
fought for the "rights of the people." Protests became the voice of
the early 1960s (as we have seen in other works such as Oshima Nagisa's, Cruel
Story of Youth, released in 1960) and hundreds of thousands of activists centered
in Tokyo to demand safety, security and human rights in light of the brutal
imperial militarism that existed throughout the war. This, coupled with a fear
that Japan would give itself over to the United States intensified the exchanges
between opposing parties. And, as usual, young people took an active role on
both sides.
The actual effects of these movements may have been minimal overall, but in
light of the fact that protesting had never occurred in Japan before, these
people left their mark. The conservative Liberal Democratic Party (the right)
remained in power for thirty years, but their power and authority was not without
challenge.
Seventeen was written in response to the October 1960 stabbing of the chairman
of the socialist party. This murder shocked the nation because the culprit was
caught on film. He was a seventeen year old terrorist named Otoya Yamaguchi,
who's life goal was to kill the leftist "traitors." In jail three
weeks later, Yamaguchi committed suicide with the message etched on the wall:
"Service for my country seven lives over. Long live his Majesty the Emperor." This violent act along with other violent acts by seventeen year olds who were
defending the ideology at any cost influenced Oe to enter the scene, to write
and examine the culture he was living in.
(information in the Introduction of Two Novels: Seventeen and J. by Kenzaburo
Oe, Introduction by Masao Miyoshi. Translated by Luk Van Haute. Blue Moon Books,
1996: New York. p.v-xvii)
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SYNOPSIS OF SEVENTEEN
Seventeen is a novella in size. Its seventy-three pages may not be tedious
to read, but the concepts are overwhelming. Simply, the narrative consists of
a first person narrator taking the reader with him through a few months of his
life. The events can be broken into two phases: phase one is before he enters
the right wing party, and phase two consists of his life after he joins. Phase
one begins (and thus the entire narrative begins) with the narrator announcing, "Today is my birthday." (1) And in this empty statement, the entire
novel is hashed out. "Seventeen," as is the only name for the speaker
throughout, has little interaction with anyone on an emotional level except
for the reader. We become a type of confidant as we witness his ritual masturbations,
his anger against his indifferent family and the alienation he feels from his
peers. His most intimate externally generated experience is with a cat named
Gangster who comes to visit him in the "ship" he has made in the shed,
a place where Seventeen can sleep, think and experience fear in private. Gangster
licks saliva from Seventeen's lips, but once he is done taking what he needs,
he'll dart off.
The second day of the narrative begins as Seventeen is late for school. When
he arrives, he finds that he is late for exams. He feels he has done poorly
on the morning ones and winds up feeling defeated for the afternoon physical
exam portion as well. He is required to run eight hundred meters and upon completion,
urinates all over himself.
The second phase of the narrative begins when a classmate, Shintoho, invites
him to go to a right wing rally. He agrees to go, and winds up standing up to
dissenting party opinions vocalized by some bystanders. This throws him into
the world of the right and thus begins a new course of his life. Seventeen takes
on the party identity, and while at first we see him as being fairly similar
to his original characterization, over time a metamorphosis takes place. Seventeen
becomes a confident, yet brutally violent young man. One decisive event in this
transformation is his outing to a bathhouse where a young woman masturbates
him, he ejaculates in her face and thereby feels power over her. From here,
he beats down party antagonists without shame, guilt or weakness. To him, he
has become a strong individual. The narrator finally tells us that he is, "...the
one and only blissful Seventeen." (73)
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CRITICAL ANALYSIS
In many ways, this piece is a search. It's a search for identity, for answers,
for comfort. The emptiness that Seventeen feels throughout most of the text
is so human. And, his search for a party to identify with, while perhaps representing
the horrible right wing, is very human too. Wouldn't we all like to join a group
who would hand us a purpose and meaning so that we won't have to question and
wonder and form our own constructions of truth? Seventeen, even at his most
self deprecating moments is at his most human as well sending our own fears
over the top. By handing us a work of extremes, we see how isolating the unknown
life is, and how the desire to belong may be an understandable comfort.
Voice is an important attribute of this text. Interestingly , we never know
the name of the voice as he refers to himself as "a Seventeen," throughout
the text, and the scenes where he is with another person go unidentified too.
"A Seventeen" becomes the way the speaker identifies. In a sense,
this chronological number which seems pretty objective, is really a very critical
examination. By labeling himself as "a Seventeen," the speaker sums
up everything he is, and everything he is not but what he feels he is supposed
to be. He classifies himself, only to be alienated from that very group that
he so eagerly attaches himself to. In a sense, he seems to make his alienation
a self-fulfilling prophesy for he has expectations of what he "should"
be like and yet, he feels completely separate from these ideals. "I'm not
like anybody else in my class. I'm more frightened then anyone," (40) sums
up Seventeen's relationship with the external world. However, why then would
he choose to become a member of this group and then examine all the ways in
which he does not belong? He seems to desire inclusion and yet, cannot let himself
relate. He must place himself in the position to "not belong," while
acknowledging the group that he feels he should be a part of. This feels reminiscent
of Morita Yoshimitsu's Family Game. Both the boy in that film and Seventeen
are not a part of his peer group. They stand alone, on the outside circle being
picked on or looking in to the inner circle longingly and yet seem to be choosing
the unrelated life.
One idea that Oe expresses by calling the narrator "Seventeen" is
the difference between being covered as opposed to being exposed. Being "Seventeen"
is a much desired cover which will allow him to be absorbed in a world that
can protect him. He constantly reminisces about his child, "The bicycle
of my happy childhood," (29) where he felt that security. Of course, that
is the security of childhood innocence before the questions start to fly, before
he fears death and infiniteness. He makes a point of saying how life was "then,"
compared to "now." Now he is different, he feels exposed, for "I
know what they really see is the naked me...me who's a coward and liar."
(49) Seventeen feels that his entire being is on the line, he is in the public
eye. He is filled with self generated insecurities which seem to creep in to
any relationship that he could possible have. Midway through the book, an interesting
juxtaposition comes to light through the image of, "a public secret."
(40) This line is in regards to female menstruation, but indeed, what seems
to be a contradiction is in fact a clear image. A public secret is what most
of our experiences tend to be, acts of "privacy" that embarrass, concern
or make us uncomfortable. Yet, we all do them. We are all a part of this mass
desire to be "private," and yet in truth, we are all humans and as
a member of this group, we own up to certain similar experiences. The use of
privacy is not unfamiliar as many of the texts studied this semester have strains
of this desire for privacy. Whether this privacy is cultural, as in A Personal
Matter or the privacy is how we all seem to fear each other knowing the truth,
we cannot help but feel privy to Seventeen's thoughts, yet comprehend his need
for privacy. While Seventeen seems to realize the essence of this, he still
feels that somehow he is the different one, he is the alien to other people
and more so, he is the alien to himself.
The contrast to this sentiment is described after Seventeen joins the party.
Then, we see the "armor" he develops. He no longer feels exposed or
vulnerable to the world. He becomes safe, covered by "the armor of the
right." (67) When he goes to the bath house, he feels that he is "covered
with a coat of mail, thick as the walls of an armored car." (67) The party
not only gives him a purpose, but it legitimizes his existence. He becomes a
son of the emperor, loses the need to search for himself, he becomes shaped
by the group. "The individual I is dead," (71) he tells us for he
is not his own. He has lost his "I" being, and is now protected by
the masses. With this dies the quest to understand the questions. Down goes
outward fear, down goes inward openness. He takes on another sense of who he
can be so that he is strong. But by being strength he loses his humanity and
his sensitivity. In many ways, his loss of self reminds me of the technological
dogma that overwhelmed me at the end of the semester. He is a human machine,
perhaps like the characters in Ghost in the Shell; he is being controlled but
feels that he is in control because he has gained a sense of security, however
false it may be.
Interestingly, while this time in his life may simply be one of confusion,
the security that should be generated from family does not happen for Seventeen.
He goes on at length about his father's "American Liberalism," the
way he has stepped out of his son's life so that Seventeen can make his own
choices. His mother plays the silent role as does his brother, the brother who
was so filled with promise but is now constructing model cars. His brother has
fallen away from performative standards which are nestled into much of the Japanese
literature. His sister is the only one who he seems to have any sort of relationship
with, and she is the only one that acknowledges his birthday in the beginning.
However, even in this relationship, Seventeen winds up having so much anger
while relating to her that during a discussion he kicks her in the face. Lashing
out exaggerates his distance and his unhappiness. He is frustrated with himself,
his inability to win the argument, and his means of working this anger out causes
violence. In one sense, his acts of violence may be a foreshadow to the behavior
he develops as a party member but in another, we see that Seventeen is pent
up without a proper way to release all of his feelings. To the reader, this
may be difficult to understand because we hear an uncensored voice and come
to feel Seventeen is a rational character with a sensitive ear. However, we
are given a completely different view for his exposure is, to us, a depth unparalleled.
We are privy to the inner voice as opposed to his family and peers who get defecation
and anger.
Within this contrast between exposure and being covered is the issue of being
alone versus feeling accepted. Seventeen continually repeats his feelings of
isolation during the first half of the text. Beginning on page two, "loneliness,"
"the lonely self," "I'm completely alone at home," and a
"pit of loneliness" are some of the images he creates for us. He tells
us he has no good friends whom he can open up his heart to as he goes along
without a way to identify. I felt this isolation in many of the texts we read,
where the characters are all seemingly solitude. Even in the early post war
pieces such as Burmese Harp, Tokyo Story, and Sound of the Mountain, the characters
seem to have trouble opening up to the world. Perhaps each person's role is
a personal one. However, as we move into more modern texts, this sentiment becomes
more of angst. The loneliness that Seventeen feels is in part self pity, and
in part utterly compelling isolation. The difference between the older texts
is that being alone seemed to propel these characters to a better understanding,
such as Mizushima's independent quest to find his true calling as a monk. In
Seventeen, we do not get this sense of fulfillment. He does not create a space
for himself in the end and instead gets absorbed into something which will dominate
his being.
The obsession with masturbation is an extension of this loneliness. His self
love, the only time when he is not criticizing or feeling afraid is when he
masturbates. The images that Oe uses really invokes two entirely different feelings
within the same experience. During the first masturbation scene, the boy goes
from feeling completely in control and in a state of ecstasy with his genitalia,
physique and power to a state of powerlessness and painful self scrutiny. "I'm
a seventeen with no love for anybody but myself." (3). While he is doing
this he feels beauty and pleasure and a sense of pride in himself; he is in
"an abyss of blissful dizziness." (4) He creates an image in his head
of being on a beach, being attractive, being warm and happy. We feel the pleasure
associated with these feelings. However, once he climaxes and looks around at
the messiness of the bathroom, he is brought back to "reality," and
he returns to his state of self pity and alienation. "When I come out of
the bathroom the happiness that came boiling up at the moment of orgasm...all
those feelings stay trapped in the steam, which has a slight tang of semen."
(5) He finds himself "disgusting" (5), as he moves from a state of
"bliss" to one of real pain. This experience is repeated numerous
times throughout the book; masturbation, doing "you-know-what" is
on one hand his savior and on the other fuels his feelings of alienation.
We can discern two phenomena with this. One, the way we become happy or sad
is merely the way we interpret the truth. Seventeen is "orgasmically"
happy during his masturbation because he has created a happy vision for himself.
His fantasies fulfill his dreams, desires, wishes. When he decides this fantasy
is not the "truth," he becomes unhappy again.
At the end of the text he feels immense pleasure in beating people up and
this becomes the way he has constructed a vision of fulfillment and "orgasmic"
release. He has found a place in society where he can act out his energy, and
his hostile feelings which were inwardly become outwardly focused. Without loving
himself or having anyone to love him, he forces his intensities in a framework
that is deemed acceptable by society. He can take ownership of the way he envisions
his "Seventeen" year old existence to be. He can be "blissful."
He has shaped his ideals of happiness along party lines and thus his fantasies
are realized. Seventeen is brutal and intense in the way he deals with people.
He stands up to his family, his class and becomes violent and aggressive. No
more is he the "weakling," defined by his isolation and needing to
love himself.
Seventeen in running from himself. He manifests a lot of fear and a lot of
truth in each of his statements. The use of repetition throughout the text really
drives home these points. We constantly hear Seventeen's self criticism. We
come to feel pity for him because he cannot let up on himself. "I abuse
myself," "Again I feel a masochistic pleasure. It's like I enjoy the
horrible things done to me by others," (32) "I'm the man who can't,"
(31), "Life is hell I think, and I'm a slave..." (43) are all sentiments
that are somewhat similar which drive home his self hatred. However, the party
allows him to absorb his "armor," and thereby be less vulnerable to
himself as well as to others.
This piece was written in a time of opposition, a time of fear and a time
of personal investigation. Seventeen is both empty and overwhelmed, self absorbed
and selfless, alone and among, covered and exposed, public and private. He is
all of those things because we, as humans are all of these things. They are
overlapping and fluid and opposites and sisters all at the same time. By creating
two faces of the Seventeen, we can see this dual and yet united being come to
life. He does not have a double face but he represents the two sides of humanity,
the individual's search for himself as well as a country's search for an identity
too.
Seventeen wound up taking, in my mind, the easy way out. For all of the questions
he poses in the beginning of the text, for all of his unknowing, in the end
he winds up creating an identity out of a mold that has been designed to trap
suckers into defending a cause. Seventeen does not defent his own cause but
someone else's that need people to devote their inward intensity. He loses his
individuality because he is so uncomfortable with it. The life he chooses is
one where someone else can sell the propaganda and he can merely obey. For,
isn't that what we are all looking for? Someone to tell us the answers, someone
to give us some direction with our lives, our fears, our goals. Instead of fearing
death, we want someone to tell us there's a heaven, a judgment day, a way to "save ourselves" for something better. This gives us assurance in
our own "sea of doubt." Better to have, "Seven lives in service
of the country, long live His Majesty the Emperor." (71)
But yet, life is not that easy. We must be individuals and not fear the ability
to fear. We must realize that struggle is ok, and that while we are alone in
many ways, we can also find someone who will accompany us on our search.
---Abby Baim-Lance
This page was created on May 2, 1998.