The Uniqueness of the Japanese Novel and Its Contribution to the Theory of the Novel

Janet A. Walker

Contemporary Japan, 2003, vol. 14, issue 1, 287-310

Abstract: The Japanese novel has been viewed either as derivative of the Western novel or as a uniquely indigenous form with little or no relationship to the Western novel. In this paper I view it as both a unique Japanese form and as part of a global current of subjective fiction linked to modernization and expressing the ideal of the modern self. As the representative Japanese form of the novel I choose the shishōsetsu (I-novel, fiction of the self), which emerged around 1907 and dominated Japanese critical discourse until the 1960s. In the paper I juxtapose the Japanese novel with three versions of the European novel with the goal of ascertaining the differences between the Japanese and the European novel and arriving at a sense of the unique features of the Japanese novel. These are the roman personnel of the Romantic period, the realist novel, and the modernist novel. The shishōsetsu turns out to demonstrate some similarities with the Romantic subjective novel and also with the modernist novel. an emphasis on subjectivity in the context of different stages of modernity. It thwarts the expectations of the European realist novel, the standard novel form during much of the twentieth century and the one to which it was most often compared, in its avoidance of a depiction of society, its lyricism, and its preference for subjectivity and sincerity. As a form insisting on a radical lyricism and subjectivity, it reflects Japan's position as a modern nation that was simultaneously on the periphery in relation to Europe and part of the center of political power. It is a unique novel form which together with a body of theoretical writings provides an alternative form and theory of the novel.

Date: 2003
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DOI: 10.1080/09386491.2003.11826898

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