He is the master of modern Japanese literature more important than Natsume Soseki, his works present the world of obscenity,
vulgarity, filled with brutal sex which becomes the destructive addiction. To contrast
the world of depression he also writes mildly about family, the structure of
the family that is changing, the archetype of Japanese family is forced to
ease. The society of XX century is dynamic, family acts out the same. The
frequent theme is fame-fatal. His personal life was far from happy one, he
married relatively early, the marriage ended quickly, shortly the first child
was born, he left the family, depressed and with an emotional breakdown he
started writing again, he books become dull – the only thing that juices out is
sadomasochistic description leading to darkness, time after time his characters
‘torment and torture” themselves in self-destruction. Surprisingly, reading
Japanese literature we do not perceive his books as much autobiographical as
Natsume Soseki, Kunikida Doppo or Endo Shusaku. Second World War made a great
impact on his writing, he lost his self-identity, prioritization of values got
lost. The post war period is marked by his novel “The Key”. The novel is having
a form of a diary, a pervasive diary, the
sets of intrigues triggered into the intimacy and desires of a still relatively young
wife are about to chill the decaying marriage up. The novel is having only four
characters; The Husband, The Wife, Toshiko – daughter and her fiancé Mr. Kimura.
What is so interesting is the manipulation and the mischief, how the spouses describe the feelings, how
sometimes amusing it seems … satirical, ironical. The husband is the key who opens the
novel and Our eyes of perception, he is more than 10 years older than his wife,
horny, with very strong sex drive, all though, should end well … and the sexual
sensation and interaction between the husband and the wife thrive, sadly it is
quite opposite, the problem is in the sophistication, the sex is not perverse
and maybe for that reason the husband – pushes his wife into sets of
experiments, watches her, he realized his wife is no longer interested in his sexuality
– it hurts him but they decided to leave the problem aside, some may think that
it is his little revenge, he is jealous,
he deliberately hurts himself, he is angry, he wants his wife was “punished”,
he wants her being hurt as he is, and the thing he desires the most of all is
her body, her fragrance. In the diary the husband describes his wife, her
beauty, the beauty of her body and mind, he describes her sexuality, her irresistible
need for sex and pleasure, he likes it. The book portrays the marriage, its
problems and its sadness, namely, two people live together and are separated
under one roof, the desire of the husband arises, becomes dangerous, he wants
something he can not have but knows it changes, the waiting game pushes him to extremes. The diaries like a
film, piece by piece reveal the hidden motives, cross the boundaries of good
taste, of what is right… to trick, to tease… it is what matters, what sublimes.
Fetishes are the key to understand how much the trio is involved in …
sex game, the words of description are not enough, there is a Polaroid camera
to show, to enhance the senses, to recall what was already seen. The game goes on, the imagination is limitless, the clothes, the make-up become part
of a new sexual fetishes. All ends bad – for the husband, naturally, he died of a
stroke, the intensity of lovemaking killed him. “The Key” is the symbol, it is understood
as a tool which open the marriage to extreme experiments, a tool which
indicates the modern era of Japan
“Yet I do feel, after all, that I can
claim to have given him the kind of happiness he wanted.”
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