Soseki's "Kokoro" Study 61: Did the Uncle Not Embezzle? (2) "Middle School Classmate"
Natsume Soseki's famous novel "Kokoro," serialized in the third year of Taisho (1914).
In the previous article, I intended to write that the embezzlement by the uncle claimed by "Sensei" might be groundless, but I ended up only with the introduction.
Continuing from there.
1. "Middle School Classmate"
Sensei's "middle school classmate", "old middle school friend", is suspicious.
Very suspicious.
I heard a rumor that my uncle had a mistress in the city. I heard that rumor from a friend who was a middle school classmate of mine in the past. Having a mistress is not something to be surprised at for this uncle, but I was surprised because I did not remember hearing such a reputation while my father was alive. The friend also told me various other rumors about my uncle. One of them was that although others thought he was on the verge of failure in his business for a time, he had suddenly recovered in the last two or three years. Moreover, it was one of the things that deeply stained my suspicion. I finally opened negotiations with my uncle.
(Note: Copyright has expired, so it is free to quote.)
The uncle kept a mistress, and although it seemed he had failed in business once, he had recently recovered suddenly.
From the way "Sensei" writes, these are all just hearsay from a "middle school classmate."
There seems to be no evidence or trace of confirmation from anyone else. Yet, Sensei trusts it completely.
Furthermore, an "old middle school friend" appears.
"In short, my uncle swindled my property. (Omitted) My other relatives intervened between my uncle and me. (Omitted) Still, they gathered everything I owned for my sake. It was far less than I had expected in terms of money. (Omitted) As a result of my thinking,
I asked an old middle school friend in the city to try to turn everything I received into money. The old friend advised me that it would be better to stop, but I did not listen. (Omitted) My
old friend handled it as I had asked. Of course, that was long after I arrived in Tokyo. Even if I tried to sell farmland in the countryside, it would not sell easily, and there was a fear that if it came to it, they would take advantage of me and cheat me, so the amount I received was much less than the market price. To confess, my property was only some government bonds that I had put in my pocket when I left home, and the money that this friend sent me later. (Omitted) However, it was more than enough to live as a student
. To tell the truth, I could not even use half of the interest that came from it."
・"a friend who was a middle school classmate"
・"old middle school friend in the city"
I cannot conclude that these are the same person, but even if they are different people, there seems to be some connection.
And Sensei asserts, "my uncle swindled my property."
However, for some reason, not a single piece of objective evidence to support that is written.
Even so, Sensei writes in his testament (letter) as if his own arbitrary assumptions and rumors he heard from a friend without confirming them are the basis for suspecting his uncle.
If you doubt these a little, a cliché story comes into view.
・Perhaps this "middle school classmate" was fully aware of the "Sensei's" highly imaginative, poetic personality (and perhaps he even heard that Sensei had flatly rejected the marriage proposal from his uncle).
・So, he went out of his way to feed Sensei information that would make him suspect his uncle of embezzlement, making Sensei paranoid and eventually succeeding in making him completely believe that his uncle had indeed embezzled.
・As a result, Sensei and his uncle clashed and parted ways, and Sensei decided to dispose of his father's vast inheritance (which was so large that he could live a quite elegant student life on less than half of the "interest" alone) and convert it into cash.
・The "old middle school friend" made a fortune by managing and disposing of that vast inheritance, earning large management fees, commissions, brokerage fees, and resale costs.
Since Sensei was likely in his early twenties at the time, the "old middle school friend" was probably around the same age. Therefore, it is likely that it was not the friend himself, but rather the friend's family or relatives who were in the business of disposal and resale. Otherwise, he would not have been able to go through the procedures of keeping and selling farmland in the countryside.
In other words, the "old middle school friend" conspired with his parents or relatives to plot to make a fortune by disposing of the vast inheritance Sensei owned, and succeeded brilliantly. Isn't that what happened?
2. Is Sensei's poetic nature and insensitivity a presentation of evidence?
I have pointed out several times Sensei's abnormal poetic nature, his conversely abnormal insensitivity, and the fact that these traits remained unchanged even after he became an adult.
Are these descriptions not a hidden explanation by the author of "Kokoro," Natsume Soseki, saying, "This 'Sensei' is a strange person with quite peculiar fixations and, conversely, an abnormally insensitive personality"?
That is why Sensei, with his abnormal fixations, believed that "his uncle embezzled" without a single piece of objective evidence, and became convinced that it was an established fact.
At the same time, Sensei was conversely abnormally insensitive (not caring at all about having rejected his cousin's marriage proposal), and thus completely trusted the clearly suspicious "middle school classmate," leaving the management and disposal of his vast fortune entirely to him.
I believe this speculation of mine can be supported by other works of Soseki.
・The protagonist of "Botchan": It is shown that Botchan is a person with extremely intense fixations.
・The main character of "The Wayfarer" (Kojin), the work preceding "Kokoro": Ichiro Nagano, who is constantly spouting poetry about Paolo, Francesca, spirits, souls, eternal victors, eternal losers, and how one must either die, go mad, or enter a religion.
Like these characters, Sensei in "Kokoro" is also a person caught up in fixations that differ from the facts. Is that not what is written?
I would like to think more about the meaning of this and the comparison with other works in the future.