都市風景美学の一水脈

―荷風の『日和下駄』とE •マーニュの『都市美論』―

抄録

　Emile Magne’s L’Esthétique des Villes (1908) which deals with the city from various points of view, influenced Kafū, as is revealed by certain aspects of his work, Hiyori-geta (1915), especially the classification of water in relationship to the city as one of the important elements of urban landscape. Kafū shares with Magne an appreciation for the vitality of the canals of the metropolis. However, Kafū goes so far as to appreciate the drains in the slum quarters of the Yamanote area; Magne’s interest in tasteful scenery does not allow him to admire such areas. Kafū regards the scenery of slums and drains in Yamanote as a “vision of misery” parallel to the tenement-houses and melancholic ditches of Shitamachi. To Kafū’s eye, the “vision of misery” is a metaphor of the “spirit of resignation” or “sense of quiescence” which inspires him poetically. Such a poetic inspiration for Kafū is stimulated by the beauty of the decaying city as depicted novelistically by G. Rodenbach in Bruges-la-Morte (1892). Kafū, with a fetishistic taste, associates the melancholy of the city Bruges and its canals with the “vision of misery.” The perspective on the urban landscape is also different between Magne and Kafū.The fact that Kafū’s eye is not focused on the center of the city but on the unknown corners of Tokyo as Magne’s is focused on the bustling quais of the Seine, leads us to conclude that Kafū’s appreciation of Magne’s work was adapted to his particular taste.