Downfall and Other Stories Original Japanese text by Hayashi Fumiko (林 芙美子) as listed on Aozora Bunko. English translation copyright © 2020 J. D. Wisgo All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. For information, comments, or questions regarding this book, please see: https:/www.selftaughtjapanese.com/book-hayashifumiko-vol1 You may also contact the translator/publisher at: [email protected] Cover Design: J. D. Wisgo, with the help of a Canva template (the photograph employed is public domain) First Edition: March 2020 Table of Contents Translator’s Introduction About Currencies and Exchange Rates The Tale of the Seishukan Guest House Downfall Employment Consolation Beyond Happiness Acknowledgments Related Works Translator's Introduction It has been my mission to translate significant works of classic Japanese literature into English, thus allowing a wider audience to appreciate the merits of those works. Up until now, I’ve done this in three main areas: science fiction, dark fiction, and children’s stories. For my next book, I wanted to branch out into a new area unlike anything I’ve done before. After having the realization that every book project I have done so far was based on the works of a male author, I went on a search for an under-represented female Japanese author. It didn’t take very long until I came across Hayashi Fumiko, considered by some as twentieth-century Japan's most important woman writer. I found the vivid depictions of her character’s emotions and their realistic struggles particularly engrossing, giving at times the impression that I was reading a work of nonfiction. While a handful of her works have already been translated into English, I was happy to discover several untranslated works that I felt were particularly worthy of translation. For this book I’ve selected stories I’ve personally enjoyed reading, and I think the result showcases this author’s diversity of styles and themes. All things considered, this has been a very rewarding and eye-opening project, and I hope through this book many others can learn about Hayashi Fumiko and her unique brand of literature. — J. D. Wisgo (Mar 2020) About Currencies and Exchange Rates The term “sen” that appears a few times in this book is an older form of Japanese currency that represented 1/100th of a yen, issued in both coin and banknote form. Having been removed from circulation in 1953, it is no longer used in modern times. The stories in this collection were generally written in the 1930s and 1940s. In 1940 one US dollar was roughly equivalent to 4.27 yen, or 427 sen. For comparison, at the time of this book’s first publishing (March 2020), the exchange rate was around 110 yen to a single US dollar. The Tale of the Seishukan Guest House [清修館挿話] Chapter 1 Returning to Tokyo after a long summer break, Tanimura left his guest house on the outskirts of the city and moved to another one that he discovered on a backstreet near a school. Gone were the days of opening a window in the morning and looking out at an oak forest, or listening to the piano played by a beautiful girl in the bungalow next door; now when he opened his window in the evening, the dim lights of the city sparkled and the autumn scenery of Tokyo was an utterly refreshing sight for his eyes, filling his chest with great pride in being able to live in such a metropolis. Perhaps owing to being a son of Negayama Temple, Tanimura was not known to be one who complains about food. However, the long strand of woman’s hair in his mussel soup on the first morning in the house was enough to frustrate even the thick-skinned Tanimura. Lifting up thick glasses used to correct terrible nearsightedness, Tanimura gently plucked the hair out of his soup, chopsticks still in hand as he wondered whether it belonged to the chubby maid or the squint-eyed maid with a face like a dried salmon. Even though Tanimura was raised in a temple, he studied medicine with a great passion. However, because of his interest in surgery, he had an assortment of surgical knives arranged neatly on his bookcase, glittering like trophies. Cheeks stuffed full of rice, Tanimura carefully pulled out the long strand of hair and gazed at it silently under a microscope. There was a great deal of mineral oil present on it. A chain of cells flipped over like a caterpillar, as though declaring, “I am from the chubby maid!” Trying to suppress his disgust, Tanimura gulped down his diluted bancha tea, then hurriedly put on his hat and headed down the wide corridor towards the front door. At the entrance, the chubby maid happened to be polishing his shoes. Tanimura assumed this was a result of his gift of a fifty-sen coin to each of the maids when first arriving yesterday, but when he remembered the long strand of hair in his soup anxiety overcame him. “Good morning, sir. Were you able to sleep well last night?” “Why do you ask?” “Well…it seems that people new to this place have difficulty sleeping.” “Oh really? I slept wonderfully.” Concealing mounting feelings of unease, Tanimura slipped on the shoes that the chubby maid had polished for him. A moment later the unpleasant stench of several days of skipped baths wafted from the maid’s unkempt, apparently as yet uncombed hair. In a dream-like state, Tanimura nonchalantly held the cloth-wrapped package against his chest as he plucked a single hair from the maid’s head. “Oh my! Surely you jest…” Face flushed, the maid covered her chest with both hands and ran giggling towards the kitchen before disappearing. Just as Tanimura was standing there absent-mindedly, still holding the strand of hair he had removed, the landlady came in from the front desk. “Oh, good morning. Would you mind putting this on the board with the other nameplates? I’m terribly sorry for the trouble. By the way, do you like it? It’s finely made, don’t you think?” The landlady grinned strangely as she passed him a nameplate, a black background with Sanshiro Tanimura written in red letters. Relieved, Tanimura accepted the nameplate bearing his name and quickly hung it on the board before hurrying down the guest house’s stone steps. Chapter 2 The moon, high in the sky of Chang’an The sound of clothes beaten on a wooden block Ceaseless autumn winds These things all remind me of Yumen Pass I wonder when the northern barbarians will fall And my husband will return from his long trip Tanimura happily recited a Li Bai poem from a Tang-dynasty poetry collection he had avidly read over the summer. There was a distance of over 500 meters between the house and the school, but it made an excellent walk to help Tanimura’s digestion. On the way was a row of unimposing, sooty buildings: mahjong parlors, cheap cafes, fish markets, used book stores, and billiards halls, among other things. The weather that day was particularly good. In the sky an airplane buzzed by, a colorful advertisement trailing along behind it. “Excuse me, do you mind if I ask you something?” As Tanimura was walking beneath a row of trees on the street, reciting the poem to himself, he suddenly stopped and turned around in response to a young woman’s voice, refreshing like the crickets you hear often in old-fashioned kitchens in the country. “Would you…happen to know of a guest house named Seishukan with house number 61?” Seishukan, I feel like I’ve heard that name before…Tanimura thought self-consciously. The woman had a longish bob cut and was carrying two large crimson-colored packages. “Seishukan” “Yes!” “By Seishukan you mean…” “Well, I’ve heard that a post office and Hachimangu shrine are nearby…” Tanimura suddenly felt a warmth pulsing through his body. “Wait…oh, I remember now. That’s the…yes, I’m familiar with it.” “Oh really? I heard that it was a small guest house, and not being from around these parts I haven’t the slightest idea where it is.” “Let me take you there.” “Well, that would be nice, but…are you on your way there now?” “No, it’s the other direction, but I have some time so we can go back together.” “I’m terribly sorry to trouble you…” The leaves of the roadside sycamore trees rustled softly above Tanimura’s head. He casually removed his hat in the cool breeze, but the flat-topped straw hat had yellowed from being worn all summer and made him feel a little embarrassed. The woman with the bob cut looked like she might be a waitress. The powder on her neck had darkened, her face was bloated and pale. With well-defined eyes, eyebrows, and lips, she was extremely beautiful, and Tanimura had never walked side-by- side with such a young woman before, making it awkward to look directly at her. “I will carry one of those packages for you. Please give me one.” “It is all right, I am fine.” A blue vein visible on the surface of the woman’s beautiful finger looked uncomfortable, so Tanimura grabbed a package from the woman anyway. For some reason, this made him feel good. “Oh, is that it?” They climbed up the gentle slope of the Hachimangu road, and at the top of the hill was a white sign with the word “Seishukan”. Perhaps because he had just moved in last night, the wordless Tanimura had even forgotten the name of the guest house he was staying in. “That’s it.” Remembering the hair in his soup, Tanimura felt a pang of sadness. “Thank you very much, I truly appreciate your help…” It might have only been the sky reflecting in them, but the woman’s eyes shone beautifully, seducing Tanimura’s heart unlike anything he had felt before. After reaching the guest house, he turned around and parted ways with the woman. Chapter 3 In the city, Tanimura’s beloved evening lights were shining, casting a tint over everything. He was on his way back to the guest house, reciting a Li Bai poem even louder than before. A few lights glowed on the eaves of the house. At the bottom of the list of occupants posted on the building he saw his own name, Sanshiro Tanimura. He ran his eyes across the twelve or thirteen names, wondering which man the beautiful woman from earlier had come to visit, but not even a single one of the names seemed like the type of person she would have gone to see. The only one who seemed plausible was the kind-sounding name “Yuriko Komatsu”. “Yes! I suppose she must have come to visit a lady friend!” Tanimura laughed pleasantly, relieved. But when he looked over at his nameplate, he noticed a single hair stuck to the word “San” waving back and forth in the wind. Tanimura turned melancholy again, remembering that undeniable, disgusting feeling when he had plucked a strand of the chubby girl’s hair this morning. But then he realized he would surely be able to reprimand that chubby maid if he examined this newly discovered hair under the microscope, so Tanimura pulled off the hair stuck to his nameplate and went inside. “Welcome back sir.” It was the chubby maid again. Unlike this morning, her hair was now cleanly tied up, a thin layer of white powder on the back of her pig-plump neck, and lace surrounding the collar of her white cooking apron. “Sir, shall I bring some food to your room shortly?” Desiring to spend more time researching before dinner, Tanimura raised his voice in annoyance. “I’m not hungry now. Come back in around an hour.” When the chubby maid glanced at Tanimura, she did not giggle like she had this morning, but instead sighed wistfully and went to go check on the mailbox. The squint-eyed maid, just returned from the second floor with a tray in hand, looked at him and grinned covertly as she headed to the kitchen. Being extremely nearsighted, Tanimura failed to notice the second maid’s grin and went off to the bathroom to wash his hands, sandals flip-flopping on the ground as he walked.