On Prose: Every worm to his taste: Junichiro Tanizaki

http://booktrek.blogspot.com/2010/07/some-prefer-nettles-tanizaki-junichiro

I went to New York City. It was during thanksgiving and the weather was lovely. While there, as always, I bought quite a few books. On my last full day there I was walking down 4th ave. and I stumbled upon a bookseller with a nice selection of classics. Rummaging through the boxes I found a Junichiro Tanizaki novel and I knew I had to have it. At the moment I didn't have cash so I did the next best thing, I put the book back and walked away, hoping to find an atm. I did, a few blocks down. Money in hand, I hurried back to the bookseller, hoping to find the book still there. Thankfully, the gods were in my favor that day, or maybe there just isn't a surplus of Japanese literature aficionados. Whichever. I bought the book.
I read the novel as soon as I returned to this small island I currently live in, and it is beautiful.
"Some Prefer Nettles" is a book of contrasts. Traditions versus change and modernity. Old versus new. It presents these contrasts through the microscopic view on the demise of a marriage. An introspective panorama on the effects of disappearing traditions and the melancholic consequences these changes can have on a marriage. Misako and Kanama, the married couple, are worlds apart residing in the same house with a child in the middle. The interesting aspect of the narrative is that both are aware of their lost love and connection, both openly entertain outside lovers, yet neither of the two want to face the implications of a divorce. In the background of the story is staged the transcendental tradition of the puppet theatre, given as a backdrop to the underlying theme of the novel.
Tanizaki weaves a story of poetic nostalgia of things past, and the quality residing in those elements of traditional culture. He clearly reveals the effects a foreign culture has on a native culture. His perspective is clearly for the conservation of custom and the beauty of customs, but he presents his perspective in a non-biased manner, portraying the full spectrum of sides, the outside and the domestic. Customs as they are, sometimes gritty. There is also a very interesting comparison between the crumbling marriage and Misako's father and his mistress O-hisa, who is 30 years her senior.
Living in the globalized world we all reside it is important to grapple with these questions of what is native and what isn't. To be able to see and understand the full scope of implications of losing or conserving one's traditions as this world continues to strive for globalization. It is important to be able to know and appreciate one's indigenous historical background as well as to be able to sift through the mire of modernity that is thrown in one's way continually, so as to be able to retain the useful and discard the degenerative.
It is for all these reasons that I found Tanizaki's work beautiful and relevant besides that fact that the portrayal of the traditional Japanese puppet theatre is magnificent.