抄録
Soseki Natsume had sixteen books from the Cassell's National Library series. According to the old edition (1967) of the complete works of Soseki, he made twelve margin notes in Poems : 1700-1714, by Alexander Pope. However, the new edition (1997) omits half of the notes. The omission is due to one of the editorial policies of the new edition that fragmental notes like signs and references to other passages and other books should be omitted.
In this paper, I have managed to find out what the six margin notes the editor omitted mean or refer to. For example, “C. Ex.” is short for “conventional expression”. Moreover, I have made it clear that Soseki was recalling “balmy slumbers” in Othello and “balmy rest” in Odyssey, translated by A. Pope when he wrote the abbreviation on the margin of the sentence “Her guardian Sylph prolonged the balmy rest.” As for the references, Soseki wrote “Vide Cowper's Task” on the margin of the description of a magnificent coffee break at Hampton Court. Probably Soseki was remembering the contrasting description of a tea time in a rustic dwelling. In the essay, “English Poets' Ideas of Nature”, Soseki states that Pope's description of nature lacks artlessness which is one of the characteristics of Cowper's poetry. There is a possibility that Soseki got such a view about the two poets when he wrote “Vide Cowper's Task” on the margin of “The Rape of the Lock.”
My investigation shows that the margin notes looking like signs or referring to other passages and other books can be very important clues as to how Soseki read books and made use of them in his own works. The omission of the margin notes is, therefore, a serious mistake. I earnestly hope that the next editor will include the omitted notes in the new complete works of Soseki.
