Zenzo Kasai: 'The Sorrowful Father'

Dazai and Kasai

Osamu Dazai has a short story titled "Thinking of Zenzo." As Dazai writes in his novel "Tsugaru" that Zenzo Kasai was a "master of the novel from Tsugaru," Kasai was not only a senior from the same hometown but also a literary predecessor. While there is no direct mention of Kasai in "Thinking of Zenzo," Dazai makes an interesting point about the relationship between himself and his hometown of Tsugaru.
"I am spoiled by my hometown. When I touch upon the atmosphere of my hometown, my body feels sluggish, my selfishness emerges, and I almost lose all self-control. I become so hopeless that I am surprised at myself, and the brakes of my willpower melt away and vanish."
Perhaps this is not unique to Dazai, but something common among writers from Tsugaru. For instance, even when reading Zenzo Kasai's debut work "The Sorrowful Father," one might wonder why such selfishness is permitted.

The Sorrowful Father

The protagonist, "he," has left his four-year-old son and wife in his distant hometown while he lives alone in Tokyo, training to become a writer. His mother sends letters urging him to send clothes for the child.
According to Kei Kamata's biography "Shine no Wakaba ni Hikari Are" (Let There Be Light on the Young Leaves of the Shiinoki), Zenzo Kasai was receiving a monthly allowance of twenty to twenty-five yen from his wife's family at the time. Kamata estimates this would be equivalent to about 200,000 to 300,000 yen in modern terms. At the end of "Thinking of Zenzo," Osamu Dazai wrote, "Buy sorrow even if you have to pay for it," and I believe this phrase well represents Zenzo Kasai's creative stance.

By the way, what catches the eye first in "The Sorrowful Father" is, unexpectedly, the onomatopoeia. While "moya-moya" for mist or "gata-gata" for a car are fine, the way sparrows are described as "dyuku-dyuku" (chirping incessantly) and goldfish as "shina-shina" (swimming languidly) seems to reveal a linguistic sensibility unique to this writer.
Could it be related to this that he refers to the protagonist, "he," not as a writer but as a "cold, dark poet"? Or, perhaps because Kasai aimed to write by discarding daily life and worldly things, and by whittling away at himself in a quest-like manner, were sparrows something to be loathed?

Humor

In the fourth section of "The Sorrowful Father," he shuts himself in his boarding house due to a fever, and in this part, the documentary nature of the novel "The Sorrowful Father" is well demonstrated. There are the quiet students, the reserve officer who frequented prostitutes and died of syphilis, and the sound of coughing from the sickly wife in the next room.
Also, in the I-novel (shishosetsu), it is standard practice for the author to stare at themselves strictly until they become objective, but when this is taken to the extreme, a subtle humor begins to drift in. This is seen in the part where he imagines that the landlord of the boarding house died and the previous tenant of his room became ill because large mosquitoes were attacking from the graveyard on the cliff.
The dream the young poet has is also humorous.
Despite his life of poverty, he dreams that he has two or three more children, and that the children are growing plump and walking around the room with an arrogant posture.

A Father's Sorrow

The passage where his mother urges him to send clothes for the child is deeply sorrowful. There is a scene where, after he sends tabi socks, a cape, and picture books to the child for the New Year, the child shows them off to the neighbors saying they are "from Father," and carries his father's letters around.
When he thinks about returning to his hometown, he writes something cruel, saying the child tries to "eat into his heart like a large germ," and as someone who "must seek his own path, pursue it, and eventually perish," he ultimately dismisses the child, thinking the child "will not need a direct father." The fact that he is resigned to the idea that "the child will be able to learn many truths from his death" is staggering. It is, so to speak, the declaration of intent of the novelist Zenzo Kasai. Kasai's literature begins by rejecting all worldly morals and values, and what is shown in "The Sorrowful Father" becomes the major theme of Kasai's literary life.