This Outcast Generation and Luminous Moss. Taijun Takeda

      INTRODUCTION

      WHEN JAPAN was defeated in 1945, Taijun Takeda was still a comparatively unknown writer living in Shanghai. The thirty-three-year-old Takeda saw how Shanghai Japanese, proud and triumphant for almost a decade, were tumbled overnight into a world of fear, humiliation, and panic. In their desperation to survive in the postwar chaos, even at the barest level of existence, they abandoned whatever they believed had made them uniquely Japanese. Like the narrator in This Outcast Generation,^* they were surprised to discover how easy it was to put up with "loss of face," to "live shame down," though the process, like any therapeutic treatment, was slow and painful. There was no better place than Shanghai to give a Japanese the full realization of what it was like to be put to shame after the defeat of the homeland. With Taijun Takeda, however, the shock of recognition was particularly deep.

      Yet his country's defeat should not have taken Takeda by surprise, much less bewilderment. As a student of Chinese literature he was much too familiar with the long history of China, with the idea of destruction through decline and fall of her states and leaders. In fact, Takeda's first major book, published only two years before the surrender, was a lengthy critical essay on the famous Chinese classic Shi Chi (Historical Memories) by Ssu-ma Chien (145-86 B.C.), castrated for displeasing his emperor in defending a personal friend, an army general who had surrendered to the Huns. Ssu-ma Chien had endured more than twenty years of disgrace and solitude in order to "review the world in [his] own terms." Takeda presented a detailed account of this 130-volume history of destruction and change, his eye always focused on the unique life of the chronicler. From the vast and confusing world of Shi Chi which recorded the conflicts and passions and destinies of individuals and states, Takeda summarized Ssu-ma Chien's world view with axiomatic assurance: all nations are doomed, though the doom itself allows mankind to survive.

      As philosophy it was sufficiently pessimistic, but was there not some consolation in Takeda's discovery of a kind of "preordained harmony" in this cycle of destruction? When Japan surrendered, Takeda ought to have once more acknowledged this view of man and history and to have prepared himself for whatever lay ahead. But like the rest of his countrymen, he was totally dazed. At the moment of Japan's defeat he was to realize he was not as free or independent as he had led himself to believe. In spite of a vague though deep-rooted expectation that some day he would be able to separate himself from the militarism which had dominated Japan for so long, a militarism he loathed, he had actually been protected by his country's armies. Possibly this contradiction was typical of a youth brought up in a well-to-do family.

      Born in Tokyo in 1912, Takeda was the second son in a temple family of high rank. He was raised as happily as any middle-class youngster. Of his parents he preferred his father, a man of simple tastes from the country, yet a scholar who taught Buddhistic philosophy. In middle school Takeda perhaps thought of himself as a future academician or scientist and showed no inclination for creative writing. The newspaper account of the suicide of the famous novelist Ryunosuke Akutagawa in 1927 made Takeda wonder why the death of a mere writer had caused such a sensation. Takeda's interest in Chinese literature after he entered high school in 1928 was merely part of one's training, but so intensely did he devote himself to reading classical and contemporary Chinese literature in books he suddenly discovered in the school library that he seldom attended classes. His joining an anti-imperialist leftist group, an activity typical of students at that time, further separated him from his formal studies.

      Nevertheless, Takeda entered Tokyo University in 1931, where he was to major in Chinese literature, but in his first year he was arrested for distributing propaganda leaflets for his organization and was kept in confinement one month. When his father asked him to abandon this leftist movement, Takeda's acquiescence was typical of his obedience as a son. But the next year he also abandoned the university, having attended only a few lectures since matriculation. He had no need to worry about a livelihood: he was to succeed his father as temple priest. Yet the priesthood was not to his liking, especially at this time of religious decline. There was also the added stigma of living off contributions from others. Still, the obedient son proceeded to train for the priesthood and became a qualified bonze. Meanwhile, Takeda continued his study of Chinese language and literature, also participating in a circle of scholars with an anti-government bias as they devoted themselves to various studies on China. Among Takeda's friends were many Chinese students, and it was his association with a Chinese woman writer suspected of subversion that again led to his arrest and a month and a half confinement.

      In October, 1937, Takeda was called to military duty and sent immediately to the battlefield of China. His experiences again caused him to think seriously about Ssuma Chien. Discharged from the army after two years, Takeda returned home, his first task being the subject of his long essay on Shi Chi, at the same time translating Chinese novels and trying his hand at original stories. After publishing Ssu-ma Chien

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