Abstract
This thesis aims at analyzing the construction of the beauty of modern Japanese novels and clarifying their characteristics. Modern novels can be divided into two periods, the earlier and the later. As for the novels of Saikaku in the earlier period, in the writer's way of looking at things-themes, materials, characters, plots, style-handling, and so on-, in other words, in the dynamic creative activity itself, I find such an opposition between the two extremes as is found in Danrin's "Haikai", together with an unifying activity. In the novels of the later period, although a similar construction of beauty stands out which recalls the Saikaku's opposition and unification of those two contrary factors, the construction is found not in the creative activity but only in the inner construction of the idea of typical beauty such as "Iki" and "Tsu". The construction of beauty which which underlies the both of them I understand as the characteristic of the beauty of modern novels.
