Evening Clouds: A Novel

By Junzo Shono and Wayne P. Lammers

The most celebrated work by one of Japan's master literary stylists, Evening Clouds is a book filled with delicate images of ordinary life, richly and precisely observed. A family moves into a new home on a windswept hilltop in western Tokyo. Around them are forests and farms. But the developers are coming, and the children are growing up. There are meals, quandaries, conversations...Life appears comfortable and serene, yet Shōno's portrayal has a strange and evocative undercurrent, as the most minute details slowly resonate out through a universe that is changing and unforgiving. Evening Clouds combines the crafted naturalism of haiku with the Ozu-like clarity of film to produce a story that is wistful and real. Read Shōno slowly, a luxuriate in his vision.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stone Bridge Press
• Release date: Jun 1, 2000
• ISBN: 9780893469719

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THE ROCK SPRING COLLECTION OF JAPANESE LITERATURE

eVENING cLOUDS

Junzō Shōno

Translated from the Japanese

by Wayne P. Lammers

flowerbreak.tif

Stone Bridge Press • Berkeley, California

Published by

Stone Bridge Press, P. O. Box 8208, Berkeley, CA 94707

tel [phone] • [e-mail] • www.stonebridge.com

This translation was supported in part by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.

Originally published in Japanese in 1964–65 as Yūbe no Kumo.

Japanese edition © 1964, 1965 Junzō Shōno.

English text and translation © 2000 Wayne P. Lammers.

The Coyote’s Lament.

Music by George Bruns.

Lyrics by Charles Nichols.

© 1960 Walt Disney Music Company.

All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission.

Cover artwork from a painting by Grace Yam Tsukiyama.

Cover and book design by Peter Goodman.

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher.

ISBN 1-880656-48-5

INTRODUCTION

WHEN EVENING CLOUDS BY Japanese author Junzō Shōno (1921–) first appeared as Yūbe no Kumo in 1964–65, it created quite a stir in Japanese literary circles, and one critic later noted that the ensuing literary discussions had redrawn the map of postwar literature. As occurs with almost every such literary work, the novel has re­ceded more into the background over the intervening decades as critics have turned to the new sensations of each new era. But Eve­ning Clouds remains a quiet masterpiece, destined, I believe, to outlive numerous other works that have gained more attention in recent years.

Those who have read my earlier translation of selected short works by Shōno, Still Life and Other Stories (Stone Bridge Press, 1992), will find a great deal that is familiar here. There is, for example, the elegant simplicity of Shōno’s trademark style, as well as the makeup of the family Shōno portrays—father, mother, daughter, and two sons—and the constant interplay between the events of the present and the father’s memories, observations, and musings about events from the past. But the novel-length Evening Clouds is on a scale that makes possible the development of more complex and intricately connected themes, and while Shōno still focuses on small fragments, or snapshots, of everyday life, each of the fragments in Evening Clouds is more sustained and is closely integrated with the others to form a unified whole.

Despite this greater unity, the story Shōno tells in Evening Clouds is not laid out in a conventional plot involving conflict, development, and climactic resolution; it is not a story in which the author leads the reader by the hand, playing on his or her emotions to create suspense and a headlong rush to the finish. The story emerges instead from the interplay between the events of the present and the often meandering ruminations of the main character, Ōura, as he observes those events or takes part in them, and it very much requires the participation of the reader in piecing the story together out of suggestion, metaphor, and a succession of episodes that carry the force of parables.

Such techniques are of course included in the bag of tricks of most any writer, but with Shōno they are everything, and this means that the simplicity of his prose is quite deceptive. For best results, as they say, I do not recommend trying to read this book when you are feeling harried and rushed—unless the purpose is for the book to help you slow down and restore an inner calm—nor do I recommend reading it through in a single sitting. The first readers of the story, in fact, were forced to wait a full day between each brief episode as it appeared in one of Japan’s national dailies (with only a couple of exceptions, the episode breaks have been preserved in this text). Though it would be extreme to urge the same regimen on readers of this book, there is something to be said for proceeding at such a pace. Shōno’s story is one that repays a leisurely reading, with many pauses and breaks to reflect not only on the past and present events described in the narrative but on one’s own experiences, and also to ponder the deeper significances Shōno is constantly hinting at beneath the surface of his narrative.

Let me offer some examples of what I mean here. Figuring most prominently in Ōura’s reflections is the family’s move to a new house perched atop a ridge on the far southwestern outskirts of Tokyo a little more than three years before. It is a move not unlike that of American pioneers moving west in search of more elbowroom—though of course with none of the Wild West trappings.

When Ōura focuses early in the story on planting trees and shrubs in the yard of the family’s new home, Shōno is not merely hav­ing his alter ego recount a series of gardening decisions that need­ed to be made; to read it as such and skip ahead looking for where the real story starts would in fact be to miss the story altogether.

Rather, Shōno is using the metaphor of transplanted trees and shrubs to probe the nature of the family’s own transplantation: the disruption involved in picking up roots, the loss of countless ties that had helped sustain the family in its former community, the unanticipated surprises of the new locale, the feelings of vulnerability that reign so powerfully during the period of uprootedness, the instinctive drive to create a safe haven for oneself and one’s own, the difficulties of putting down new roots in alien ground, the secondary place of ornamental concerns, how the family both shapes and is reshaped by its new surroundings, and so forth. At the same time, he addresses a variety of more universal themes, such as humankind’s constant battle against as well as affinity to nature, and the role of time as both ravager and healer.

These themes are then reprised and expanded or gently echoed and reiterated in countless different images and events as the narrative proceeds, and new themes are added as well. An account of the family’s TV habits and, more particularly, of watching a Disney feature entitled The Coyote’s Lament may at first seem merely to detail more of the family’s day-to-day activities, but the coyotes’ story turns out to be a mirror image of what is happening to the Ōuras and their surroundings. Besides offering new dimension to the earlier themes, it brings to the fore another overarching focus of Shōno’s narrative: the powerful, unstoppable forces of change that constantly reshape the landscape around us whether we are prepared for change or not.

An account of how a great saké vat came to reside in the Ōura household becomes Shōno’s opportunity to probe chains of cause and effect, along with the role that accident or fate may play in events that we normally see as being under human control—themes that are subsequently reprised, among others, in the folktale about Sawayomudon catching a giant eel and the events that brought it to Ōura’s mind.

Still later, memories of the flower Ōura dug up behind the family home in Osaka as his mother lay dying amplify the theme of transplantation and extend the metaphor to the nature of family, linking it to other motifs in the story that evoke the ties that bind us to our loved ones and to the past—including the means by which we try to maintain those ties as well as the inevitable loss of them.

I have of course barely scratched the surface of the countless associations Shōno interweaves between the events that make up the present time frame of the story and Ōura’s reflections inspired by them. Although matters relating to the family’s move represent the most prominent thread in the narrative, when all is taken together, the story that emerges is not merely of one family, but of all humankind. It is a timeless, archetypal story of how we find a place in this world; of how we not only shape that place but are shaped by it as we try to make it our own; of how, in any event, the world around us keeps on changing in ways none of us can anticipate; and of where the possibility of carving out our own fragile happiness lies within this constantly shifting reality.

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Even without being told, the nature of what Shōno describes and his manner of describing it would, I believe, lead most experienced readers to suspect he is writing autobiographically. The family of five in Evening Clouds (as well as in a career-long series of other stories about the same family under different names) is in fact modeled on Shōno’s own, and the events he describes are based closely on his family’s real-life experiences. While we cannot know how often he may tailor details—i.e., fictionalize them—to fit his thematic purpose, every detail he provides has the ring of authenticity; everything about his narrative suggests that Shōno is faithfully recording events exactly as he experienced them, and that the exceptions to this rule, if any, are extremely few. Shōno has spoken of all literature as being a human document, using the English term. Although he does not mean by this that all literature should be of a documentary nature, that has indeed been an enduring characteristic of his own writing.

It is interesting to note in this connection how Shōno manages to tell the reader—indirectly, as always, but with remarkable clarity—some of the thinking behind his stance as a writer, and perhaps a little bit about its origin as well. He does this in an episode that describes the family working together to make yam soup, which reminds Ōura of a rather tall story about a yam contained in an Edo period (1603–1867) travel diary by Tachibana Nankei, a Kyoto physician, which had made a strong impression on him when he first read it as a student. Shōno’s narrator proceeds to tell us a little more about Nankei and the record he made of his travels to Eastern Japan:

Nankei writes, I undertook my tour of the East primarily for the sake of medical study, so anything having to do with medicine, even if it came up only in passing conversation, I intend to record for the benefit of my colleagues. He did not expressly seek out stories that would amuse or astonish for his journal; rather, he simply recorded any and all things that touched on his own personal interests in some way.

In any case, there can be little doubt that he was a man of remarkable curiosity. For one thing, he surely would not otherwise have set out on such a lengthy journey with no concern for the hardships he was certain to encounter along the way. He apparently wished simply to document what he saw and heard, exactly as he experienced it. He declares, Although there is a great deal more I could say about the matters I have set down in this book, I am purposely refraining from offering my own foolish opinions about them, so that the reader can deliberate and discard as he sees fit.

Even without knowing that Ōura is Shōno, attentive readers will note that the author of the book they are reading also seems to be documenting what he has seen and heard exactly as he experienced it, recording not stories that amuse or astonish but any and all things that capture his interest in some way, and presenting his description of events, at least much of the time, without explicit interpretations—allowing the reader to deliberate and discard as he sees fit. Within the confines of his story, Shōno cannot overtly tell us that these are his own principles of writing. But he is able to suggest it to the reader indirectly by having the narrator describe Nankei’s writing and what he says about it.

In a subsequent passage, when Ōura reflects on the gap between what actually occurred to him in naval officers’ training camp and what he wrote home to his parents, he pointedly notes that he never lied but merely avoided saying anything that might distress them. Given the way Shōno works, it is not unreasonable to view this, at least in part, as his way of telling the reader that he is shaping his narrative through selection, but not through outright fabrication. By reminding us that we can never get the whole truth and suggesting that the distressing parts have been left out, Shōno brings back a hint (found also in a few other fleeting references) of the dark shadow of foreboding that hung so heavily over the earlier stories he wrote about this family, including many of those in the Still Life collection. But in keeping with Ōura’s stance elsewhere in the novel, Shōno has deliberately chosen not to dwell on such things here, for the fragility of the family itself is no longer his theme.

It is a tribute to the authenticity of Shōno’s record, and to the lightness of his touch in remolding events to his own design, that the result is both a vivid and true picture of a single Japanese family in early 1960s Japan and a timeless, placeless tale of Everyman and Everywoman that can resonate for readers of any generation the world over. Evening Clouds is not a closed book, but an open one. Different readers, especially those of different cultures, will find themselves deliberating on different passages and discovering different truths as they watch the members of this Japanese family putting down new roots, growing up, being buffeted by relentless winds and violent thunderstorms, slowly losing their sylvan landscape to the inexorable sweep of human progress, and transplanting a small portion of what is being displaced into their own back yard as a memento of what they once had.

According to one of his literary friends, Shōno hit on the title for this work as he was lying on the grass gazing up at the sky one evening, watching a succession of beautiful colors transform the clouds overhead in a continuously changing display. Indeed, this is a story about gazing at the changing sky and watching the trees grow; about experiencing each day to the fullest, not as a series of mechanical routines but as a work of wonder that merges the past with the present and with the future. Read it in that spirit, and it may be just the antidote you need for the high-stress, hyperdrive pace of the age we live in.

Acknowledgments

This translation was supported in part by a generous grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. It was only with this support that I was finally able to dedicate regular blocks of work time to the translation so that it could emerge from its almost constant state of suspension. I am deeply grateful to all those who made the grant possible.

My thanks go also to Mr. Shōno, for his patience during the long periods when I had to suspend work on the translation, as well as for freely giving of his time to answer questions that I had about his work; to the subscribers of the Internet mailing list honyaku, for providing me with invaluable help in determining how best to render a number of plant and animal names as well as cultural terms; to my publisher, Peter Goodman, for his enthusiasm and expert advice; and to my wife, Cheryl, and son, Michael, for their interest, encouragement, and support over the many years this translation has been in the making.

Finally, I would like to dedicate this translation to the memory of the late Robert Lyons Danly, who first introduced me to Shōno’s writings and who must be credited more than anyone else with teaching me the art of literary translation. I hope I have produced a translation that would have made him proud.

Wayne P. Lammers

one BUSH CLOVER

JUST LOOK AT THE SIZE of these things! Ōura exclaimed in surprise, standing alone in the yard.

Three vigorous clumps of bush clover grew in a neat row directly in front of the sitting-room veranda, nearly brushing the sliding glass doors. The branches of the tall one on the right stretched all the way up to within a foot of the eaves.

Approaching that part of the yard had become like suddenly wandering into a dense thicket of wild bush clover.

Since the outdoor faucet was located in back of these plants, Ōura had to push the arching branches aside and duck in behind them whenever he needed to water the shrubs in the yard. He had actually been aware of the plants’ increasing size for some time now.

This’s getting to be a pain, he’d been grousing to himself every time he lifted the branches out of his way.

Yet just now, on this cloudless morning near the end of August, when he emerged from his study and came up to the thriving plants, he exclaimed in amazement as though he had noticed their lusty growth for the very first time.

It appeared no one inside the house had heard his sudden outburst, though, for it provoked no response. His wife was busy rinsing out some hand wash in the bath, and the three children had withdrawn to their rooms.

I wonder what made them shoot up like this?

Since he could not actually expect anyone to hear his question, Ōura was merely talking to himself. He edged backward a little, then to one side as he studied the plants’ dimensions.

The plants had never reached such proportions last year. And what was more, toward the end of autumn, after the leaves had turned completely brown, Mrs. Ōura had cut the branches back almost all the way to the ground, leaving barely a stubble.

Perhaps that treatment had been good for them, however, for this year they had prospered spectacularly. Branches sprang up where none had existed before, arching tall and sweeping gently against the windowpanes in the breeze.

Of a day, if you happened to be alone in the sitting room when this happened, it could give you quite a start. The branches would move across the other side of the shoji screen like the shadow of an intruder passing by, and since that intruder looked like a veritable giant of a man (assuming, of course, that the intruder was male), young and old alike would feel their hearts skip a beat.

Perhaps the men and women of this house were simply too jumpy. Since this shadowy movement had never occurred when someone other than the family was in the sitting room alone, it was hard to know for sure. But Ōura felt quite certain that the motion would startle almost anyone—all the more if that anyone did not know about the bush clover or the way its branches stirred in the breeze.

At night, the sound of the branches brushing against the window screen produced exactly the same effect. You’d be watching baseball on TV, say, and suddenly you’d be startled by a noise and turn to look. It wasn’t as if you’d been watching the ball game with feelings of foreboding, but you couldn’t help jumping a little, wondering what might be lurking outside.

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The Ōuras had transplanted the bush clover here from the nearby hillside two years ago. The plants had been puny little things then. The Ōuras’ older boy, Yasuo, had barely started fifth grade when he found them, yet none of the three plants even came up to his knees.

No one had imagined then that they would ever grow so tall.

That year, still only a year after the family had moved to their new home atop a ridge in the Tama Hills, Ōura’s foremost concern was to plant trees around the house for a windbreak as quickly as possible. Besides the bush clover, they had transplanted an occasional wild lily or oriental orchid they’d found on their mountain, but for the most part, smaller plants of that kind had had to remain a low priority.

By building their new home on the crest of a tall hill, they had gained spectacular views. But they had also placed themselves directly in the path of powerful winds. Being able to gaze out over a panorama of 360 degrees meant at the same time that their house took the full brunt of the wind no matter which way it blew—north, south, east, or west. There was simply no place to hide.

A single glance at the nearby farm houses, the oldest homes in the area, made it instantly clear what kind of place was best suited to human habitation. You could search far and wide and never find a single such house built on top of a ridge. Instead, their thatched roofs nestled placidly in the folds of the hills or among stands of trees set back from the road where they need never fear the wrath of the wind.

The builders of these farmhouses had probably selected such sites because their ancestors had been doing the same since time immemorial; they had drawn on a kind of instinctive wisdom the ancients had always possessed. Surely none of them had dithered for a second over whether to build on the summit of a hill or at its foot.

But these insights came to Ōura only after the house was completed, and after his family of five had moved in and lived there awhile. By that time, it was too late to pick up and go someplace else. They hadn’t come there on a camping trip; they couldn’t simply switch to a new spot when they discovered problems with the first site they had chosen.

Ōura felt sorely deflated to realize that he lacked the wisdom even the ancients had possessed. He knew less than the ancients had known. But it would do him no good to dwell on this humiliation. Somehow, he had to make certain that the house would not be blown away by a strong wind; he had to devise a means of self-defense.

Of course, when he said a strong wind here, what he actually meant was typhoon; he merely called it a strong wind to keep from picturing too vividly what could happen if a full-blown typhoon were to hit.

So long as it was only a "strong