later than Toshiko and slightly earlier than Noe. Since not only one but two excellent female writers who had attracted my interest had, during a period in their youth, secured positions on the staff of Seito, I took another look at the magazine itself.
As a result of this examination, I was strongly caught up in the blazing enthusiasm and dazzling way of life in which Noe Ito, the youngest member of Seito, spent her youth on the magazine, defended it longer than anyone else did, absorbed from it more than anyone else had, despaired over it more deeply than anyone else, and, finally, using Seito as a springboard, resolutely sundered herself from her past to fling herself against the bosom of her lover Sakae Osugi—all at the risk of her life and for the purpose of love and revolution.
Even when considered in the most favorable light, the literary talent of Noe, who wrote poetry like "Eastern Strand" at the age of seventeen, could hardly be called full of promise. Though she later earned her living quite well from her pen by managing to produce stories and reviews and even translations, she left behind works too poor for later generations to dub her a writer of the first rank.
What attracted me to Noe was neither her literary talent nor her remarkable growth as a human being, but the elaborate drama of the lives she was entangled in, the extraordinary intensity of each of the individuals who appeared upon her stage, and the bewitching power of the dissonant play of complexity and disharmony performed by all those caught up in these complicated relationships. My feelings intensified as I read about Noe in Fumiko Ide's herculean labor Seito, and Kureo Iwazaki's elaborately detailed biography of Noe Ito entitled Woman of Flame.
By standing on the beach at Imajuku, where Noe Ito was born; by listening to the cries of the grebes, which she had written about in her poem; and by watching the blue waters of Hakata Bay, in which she had swum, I thought I would attempt to get closer to the image of Noe that had so completely captivated me.
When the jet I was on landed at Itazuke Airport, I was greeted by a reporter from the Nishi Nippon newspaper office. As soon as I got into his car, the young man, whom I was meeting for the first time, said, "I've been in touch with Mako. I expect she'll see us at the office." At that moment I didn't understand what he meant. Two or three days before my departure for Hakata, I had casually mentioned to Shizuo Kito, an old newspaper journalist who happened to drop by to see me, my reasons for going to Hakata, and he was prompt enough that very same day to arrange for me to contact the Nishi Nippon.
Kito, who had been living a long while in northern Kyushu, had told me right off, "Quite a few of Noe's relatives are still living in Hakata. In any event, go meet them. I'm positive the daughters of Osugi and Noe are also living there." Before I left, he even telephoned with journalistic promptness and solicitude to tell me he had already arranged my visit. Nevertheless, I was certainly not mentally prepared to meet Noe's relatives this soon.
Only after we had been driving toward Hakata for five or six minutes, leaving houses with thatched roofs and blossoming cherry trees far behind, did I finally realize that the name I had just heard, Mako, was that of Osugi and Noe's eldest daughter. With Jun Tsuji, Noe had two boys; with Sakae Osugi, four girls and a boy. A glance at the following diagram will indicate the relationships:
As you look at this arrangement, noting the ordinary names of Noe's children by Jun Tsuji and the extraordinary names of her offspring by Sakae Osugi, you will be startled by the amazing life force with which she continued to conceive almost without rest.
Osugi had the greatest affection for his eldest daughter Mako, to whom he gave the strangest name of all his children—Mako meaning "Demon Child"—and he often mentioned her in his works. Even when Noe took her other children back to her hometown to give birth to another infant, Mako was the only one Osugi did not allow to go. And on those trips related to his work, he did not think it an inconvenience to take her along.
Late in 1922 Osugi had himself smuggled out of the country, and disguised as a Chinese, he tried to participate secretly in the International Anarchist Conference in Berlin. Because he delivered a speech in Paris on May Day before proceeding to Berlin, his identity became known and he was arrested. He was sentenced to a three-week confinement in Paris's La Santé prison. In his record of that time, "My Escape from Japan," in which he described the whole episode, Osugi commented:
No doubt by now they know about my arrest, thanks to the telegram sent by that newspaper. Adults will merely think I have finally done what I have been intending all along, but even though I have not spoken of my plan to any of my children, they must be worried about me, especially my eldest daughter Mako, for she would instinctively know my condition, despite the fact that she was not told. In my wife's letter the other day, she noted that when Muraki (Genjiro), who has been living in our home, was wrapping books to send to some prisoners, Mako said to him in a low voice, "Don't you have anything to send to Papa?" Since I disappeared after forcing her to spend a few days away from home in order to deceive her, Mako took it for granted that I was again in prison. And even when someone asked her, "Where is your papa?" she either remained silent, not answering at all, or smoothed everything over by talking about something else, but especially at night she speaks casually with her mother about the rumors concerning her father. I thought of sending her a telegram. I actually sat down at my table to try to jot down some simple sentences. But I could not come up with any wording cheap enough. The following strange items came from what I had tried to compose in various ways:
Mako! Mako!
Now Papa's
At La Santé, Paris,
A world-famous prison.
But don't worry, Mako,
For I'm eating delicious European food,
Licking chocolate,
Puffing cigars on a sofa.
And so
Thanks to this prison,
Be joyful, Mako!
Papa will soon return.
So many souvenirs, too heavy in my bag,
And cakes and kisses for my baby!
Dance and wait!
Wait, Mako! Mako!
I spent the entire day loudly reciting these poemlike lines while walking around my cell. Strangely enough, even though I did not feel the least bit sad, large tears emerged from my eyes as I was reciting. My voice trembled, and the tears flowed incessantly.
The passage suggests the figure of a devoted parent writing openly about the daughter he loves.
The collection of Sakae Osugi's complete works, published two years after his and Noe's deaths, contains more photographs of Mako than anyone else. Since almost all the pictures serving as the frontispiece for the volume were snapshots of the day of Osugi's return from Paris on July 12, 1923, only two short months before his final days, Osugi is shown with Noe and Mako, who both came all the way to Kobe to welcome him. He appears totally worn from his travels, despite the bright look on his face, and Noe reveals a lifeless expression, her stomach swollen in just about her ninth month with Nestor, her third child in three years. Only the six-year-old Mako makes the big round eyes she inherited from her father glitter, and no matter which photograph she is in, she looks happy and intelligent.
Mako's fashion was far too chic for those days. Her clothing was European, her hat stylish, and her hair cut in a pageboy bob. Photographs of her give the lively impression of a child in an intellectual urban family that delights
